Only one GOP candidate went to the Miami courthouse for Trump’s arrest
Former President Donald Trump, who polls show is the Republican frontrunner for 2024, was arrested on Tuesday on federal charges in connection to whether he allegedly mishandled classified documents.
Trump is largely ahead of the rest of the GOP pack, according to polls. A Quinnipiac poll shows Trump has 53 percent support among GOP voters, while No. 2 is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has 23 percent. No other candidate reached 5 percent.
Vivek Ramaswamy and radio host Larry Elder publicly denounced Trump’s arrest on Tuesday. In a statement last week, after the federal indictment was unsealed, DeSantis condemned what he called the weaponization of federal agencies but didn’t mention the former president by name.
Ramaswamy, meanwhile, was the only Republican candidate to go to Miami to defend Trump, saying that the Department of Justice (DOJ) is engaging in “police state”-style tactics by arresting Trump.
In an appearance in front of the Miami courthouse, Ramaswamy mounted a defense of Trump and said that “it would be a lot easier for me as a Republican candidate if Donald Trump were not in it. But I don’t want to win this election, unlike others, by eliminating our competition by a federal administration police state arresting my opponents.”
The businessman-turned-candidate then alleged that the GOP “donor class” told “every Republican candidate and telling us to stay away from this … I refuse to abide by being a disciple of the donor class.”
After Trump’s arrest, Elder, who unsuccessfully ran for governor against Gov. Gavin Newsom in a recall election, told Fox News that if he’s elected, “I would instruct my Attorney General to drop the politically-motivated charges against Trump.”
“I can tell you that it is deeply disturbing that Hillary Clinton was not charged for her blatant violation of the Espionage Act when she destroyed her private email server,” Elder continued in a statement. “And why is the special counsel investigation into [President] Biden’s mishandling of classified documents taking so much longer than the investigation of Trump?”
