Jason Miller, a senior adviser to former President Trump, says he’s encouraging Trump to delay an announcement about a possible 2024 White House bid until after the Senate runoff election in Georgia next month.
“Of course, President Trump had said he’d be making an announcement on Nov. 15, next Tuesday. I’m advising the president to hold off until after the Georgia race,” Miller, who worked on Trump’s 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns, said on Newsmax.
“Priorities A, B and C need to be about Herschel [Walker] right now,” Miller added. “This is bigger than anything else in the country. We’ve got to show the focus is on Georgia.”
Walker, a Republican whom Trump vocally encouraged to run and later endorsed, is in a runoff against Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock in Georgia, a race that could potentially decide which party controls the Senate for the next two years. The runoff is slated to take place on Dec. 6.
Trump on Monday teased that he would be making a major announcement next week amid growing speculation that he is planning to officially launch a presidential campaign for 2024.
But after an underwhelming performance by Republicans in the midterms, some in the party are pointing the finger at the former president. Some of his highest-profile endorsements in GOP primaries lost in the general election, and numerous current and former lawmakers have argued the party needs to move past Trump.
The former president told Fox News he saw no reason to change the timing of the announcement despite the midterm results.
Party officials worry that if Trump announces a 2024 bid before the runoff, it will boost Democratic turnout in Georgia — a state Trump narrowly lost in 2020 — and drag down Walker.
Former Trump White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany on Wednesday said she would also urge Trump to hold off on making his announcement.