Noah Rothman and Harold Ford assess the state of the 2024 race and Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson sparking speculation that he could run for president.
Noah Rothman and
Harold Ford assess the state of the 2024 race and Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson
sparking speculation that he could run for president.
Republican Gov.
Greg Abbott of Texas will endorse former President Donald Trump for their
party's 2024 nomination when the two team up Sunday near the U.S.-Mexico
border, GOP sources in Texas confirm to Fox News.
The former
president will join the governor in Edinburg, Texas, for Abbott’s annual
pre-Thanksgiving tradition of serving tamales to Texas Department of Public
Safety troopers and Texas National Guardsmen deployed along the southern border
under the governor's Operation Lone Star program.
Trump endorsed
Abbott in 2021, as the conservative governor was gearing up for re-election and
faced multiple primary challenges from the right. Abbott overwhelmingly won
renomination in March of last year before comfortably defeating Democratic
challenger former Rep. Beto O'Rourke last November to secure a third term
steering Texas.
Abbott was
grateful for Trump's early endorsement last cycle, according to those in the
governor's political orbit, and he's now apparently returning the favor.
Trump, who's
making his third straight White House run, is the commanding front-runner for
the Republican 2024 nomination, with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former
ambassador to the United Nations and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley
currently vying for a distant second place in the polls.
Trump's lead
expanded over the spring and summer as he made history as the first former or
current president in American history to be indicted for a crime. Trump's four
indictments — including in federal court in Washington D.C. and in Fulton
County court in Georgia on charges he tried to overturn his 2020 presidential
election loss — have only fueled his support among Republican voters.
The former
president's trip to Texas to meet with Abbott near the border will spotlight
the combustible issue of illegal immigration and border security. The issue's
long been top of mind for Republican voters, and GOP leaders and politicians
for two and a half years have heavily criticized President Biden's administration
over the surge in border crossings by migrants.
Trump has pledged,
if he wins back the White House, to launch the largest mass deportation effort
in American history, would reinstate travel bans as well as his 2019
"Remain in Mexico" program, which forced non-Mexican asylum-seekers
aiming to enter the U.S. at the southern border to wait in Mexico for the
resolution of their cases. Trump also said he'd seek to end automatic
citizenship for children born in the U.S. to immigrants who entered the country
illegally, an idea he proposed during his administration.
Biden's 2024 re-election
campaign has slammed Trump's "scary" proposals, arguing that it would
violate the U.S. Constitution, the nation's values, and the rights of
immigrants.
Border security
has also long been a top issue for Abbott, who's sparred repeatedly with the
Biden administration.
The Texas
legislature, during a special session called by the governor, this week passed
a controversial measure allowing state law enforcement officials to arrest
suspected undocumented migrants. Democrats have pilloried the strict
immigration bill.
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