Former Illinois Republican Rep. Joe Walsh has dropped his primary bid against President Trump for the White House, he announced Friday.
“I’m suspending my campaign, but our fight against the Cult of Trump is just getting started. I’m committed to doing everything I can to defeat Trump and his enablers this November. I can’t do it alone,” Walsh, 58, tweeted.
I’m suspending my campaign, but our fight against the Cult of Trump is just getting started. I’m committed to doing everything I can to defeat Trump and his enablers this November. I can’t do it alone. Join me at https://t.co/d40HA9h2Kz.
— Joe Walsh (@WalshFreedom) February 7, 2020
In an exit interview with CNN, he said he would be supporting the 2020 Democratic nominee in the fall, spending the rest of the cycle encouraging centrist Republicans and independents to do the same. He suggested former Vice President Joe Biden and Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar were the most palatable to members of the GOP such as him.
“Donald Trump is a dictator, he’s a king. He literally is the greatest threat to our country right now. Any Democrat would be better than Trump in the White House. That’s not an easy thing for me to say, but that tells you how seriously this moment is,” he said, without endorsing a specific candidate.
Former US Rep. Joe Walsh ends his Republican primary challenge against Trump
“[Trump] can’t be stopped within the Republican Party. Nobody can beat him. It’s Trump’s party… It’s not a party. It’s a cult.”https://t.co/VntLFoYj9U pic.twitter.com/JagOIRBFvo— New Day (@NewDay) February 7, 2020
Walsh, a former talk radio host and social worker in inner-city Chicago who had contested Iowa and was promoting a busy schedule in New Hampshire, launched his campaign in August. But after five months on the trail, he received only 1.1% of the state delegate equivalents in this week’s first-in-the-nation caucuses.
During his announcement, Walsh slammed Trump for being “completely unfit” and took aim at the president in a two-minute video on his own website over the incumbent’s incessant use of social media.
[Also read: Beheading journalists, the N-word, and racist Obama voters: Joe Walsh’s long history of incendiary statements]
“We’re tired of a president waking up every morning and tweeting ugly insults at ordinary Americans,” Walsh told ABC News at the time. “We’re tired of a president who is tweeting this country into a recession.”
However, his stance against the president was a political reversal, as the former congressman supported the president’s 2016 run for the White House. In a past tweet, Walsh stated, “On November 9th, if Trump loses, I’m grabbing my musket. You in?”
The Illinois Republican, who won his seat in Congress in 2010 at the height of the Tea Party movement, lost his 2012 reelection to a Democrat, now Sen. Tammy Duckworth.
Following his defeat, he returned to Illinois to start a radio show only to lose the program after he launched his bid for the 2020 presidency.
Walsh became the second Republican challenger to Trump, joining former Massachusetts Republican Gov. Bill Weld, who announced his run for the White House earlier in the year.
