U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks at a campaign event in Pella, Iowa, on January 23, 2016.
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“Donald Trump said today that he could kill somebody, shoot somebody on Fifth Avenue, and he wouldn’t lose any voters”.
Ted Cruz (Tex.), Trump’s most competitive rival in Iowa, who has few friends in Washington and has been criticized by the political class in Iowa.
“Here’s a United States senator, Republican, doesn’t have the support of one other Republican senator”, Trump said during a ballroom speech in Las Vegas Thursday.
Nine days from the first nominating contest in Iowa, however, it was Republican rival Marco Rubio who won the endorsement Saturday from the Des Moines Register, the state’s biggest and most influential newspaper.
Trump was referring to poll data that showed that a much larger fraction of his supporters said they are “absolutely certain” they’ll vote for him compared to the supporters of his opponents in the Republican primary. Among voters identifying as Democrat, those numbers swell to 38 percent, compared to 20 percent of Republicans.
” I am here to announce that I am officially endorsing Ted Cruz”, Beck said to loud applause.
With less than two weeks to go until the Iowa caucus, Donald Trump remains characteristically confident about his chances.
“We need a new George Washington”, he said in a press release.
The comments came not long after the conservative magazine National Review published its latest issue online featuring a collection of scathing anti-Trump essays from noted conservatives, underscoring the deep resistance that remains to his unorthodox candidacy, despite his commanding lead in early polls.
“Maybe he should have been roughed up because it was absolutely disgusting what he was doing”, Trump told Fox and Friends in November, after attendees at one of his rallies beat and kicked a black man there to protest the candidate.
Gov. Chris Christie was tied with former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush for sixth place with 4 percent.
Cruz was also joined prior to Glenn Beck’s endorsement by Bob Vander Plaats, President and CEO of The FAMiLY Leader as well as Congressman Steve King (R-IA) both of whom endorsed Cruz’s campaign. He was introduced by Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley. They say there’s still plenty of time for a more mainstream candidate to mount a serious challenge.
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Peoples reported from Ankeny.
