Donald J. Trump has been pouring tens of thousands of dollars into the coffers of the American Conservative Union (ACU), the sponsor of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). But the financial bribes went for nothing, as Trump cancelled his CPAC speech last Saturday amid reports that hundreds of conservatives were preparing to turn their backs and walk out on the billionaire businessman’s remarks.
The reason for the threatened walkout was apparent in the results of the CPAC straw poll, a survey of CPAC participants, showing Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) in first place with 40 percent, Senator Marco Rubio second with 30 percent, and Trump getting only 15 percent.
Trump’s massive financial investment in the ACU and its chairman, lobbyist Matt Schlapp, didn’t pay off in the end.
However, if Trump divides the Republican Party this fall, leading to a Democratic presidential victory, part of the blame will clearly lie with Schlapp and his predecessor Al Cardenas, who cultivated Trump as a major donor to the ACU and made him out to be a legitimate conservative candidate. Cardenas is now a lobbyist with the law firm of Squire Patton Boggs and Cardenas Partners. https://www.aim.org/aim-column/support-for-trump-backfires-on-cpac/
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