In a rare moment of honesty, Donald Trump fully admitted to a CPAC crowd that if the event’s straw poll results look bad for him, he’ll simply call the whole thing “fake.” During his speech on Sunday, Trump flat-out admitted his entire strategy for dealing with information that looks bad for him, and naturally, the audience ate it up even though the former president essentially confessed that he has no problem lying to his supporters on a routine basis.
Trump on polling: "If it's bad, I say it's fake. If it's good, I say, that's the most accurate poll perhaps ever." pic.twitter.com/YxeYxlZy3M
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 11, 2021
Via Mediaite:
“By the way, you have a poll coming out,” Trump said about halfway through his remarks. “I want to know what it is. You know they do that straw poll, right?”
“Now, if it’s bad, I just say it’s fake,” Trump continued, as the crowd laughed. “If it’s good, I say that’s the most accurate poll, perhaps ever.”
During his speech, Trump also attempted to cajole CPAC organizers to tell him the results of the straw poll in advance, but they wouldn’t budge. When that strategy didn’t work, he decided to make a bold prediction about what would happen.
“If it’s bad, it’s front-page news in the newspapers and if it’s great, they won’t even cover it,” Trump said.
To the surprise of no one, Trump scored a whopping 98% approval rating from the CPAC crowd, and the results were immediately reported on Fox News. However, there was an interesting wrinkle in the results. According to Mediaite, while Trump was the clear favorite to win the 2024 Republican primary for president, besting Florida Governor Ron DeSantis 70% to 26%, DeSantis dominated the results when Trump was cleared from the field.
Considering the two are currently at odds, with reports coming out that Trump “f*cking hates” DeSantis, these poll results should do wonders for their feud as it makes clear that the Republican Party is ready to back DeSantis if Trump can’t run in 2024.
(Via Mediaite)