Donald Trump disappointed several attendees at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) when he delivered the last-minute news that he would not be coming on Saturday to speak to conservative activists.
Attendees were left frustrated with Trump’s decision to pre-empt the annual conference of conservatives, which comes on the same day as the Louisiana primary and caucuses in Maine, Kentucky and Kansas, where Trump will hold a rally Saturday.
“I’m disappointed in that. I’m not a Trump supporter, but I think that he should be here,” said Steve Deford, a 50-year-old Arizona native, who said that he supports Sen. Ted Cruz, but “wouldn’t mind Rubio at all.”
“Just like Rubio said, he’s a fraud, so I’m not a supporter,” Deford continued, pointing to term limits and reforming the tax code as his two big issues.
“It’s disappointing. Especially if you’re undecided or planning to vote for Trump in a primary,” said Mary Anne Mavrovich, 67, who will vote in North Carolina on March 15th.
Several college students attending the conference disagreed with Trump’s move, and told the Washington Examiner that it’s another example showing that Trump is not a true conservative.
“I definitely think it shows conservatives that he’s not in tune with us,” said John Gower, a student at Lock Haven University in Pennsylvania. “We’re here to support conservative values, and if he doesn’t want to support those conservative values with us, what does that tells us? It tells us that he’s not going to support conservative values in the White House.”
“The other candidates are going to have a field day with this,” Gower continued. “I think Rubio and Cruz and those guys are going to get here and they’re going to say, ‘You know what? Look at this. We’re standing here uniting with you guys, supporting these conservative values, but Trump’s not here.'”
“I thought it was a little disrespectful,” said Jack Davis, a freshman at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich., who said that it’s probably a “smart” move since he’ll be talking to soon-to-be voters. “It’s smart on his part. But just to tell us that he was coming and then just to bail 24 hours [before]. If it was a week, I guess it’d be a little bit more understandable. But still, it’s definitely wrong on his part to do that to a lot of people who came maybe just to see him.”
However, some didn’t think that the move would be a make-or-break decision for voters.
“I didn’t plan on voting for him anyway, so it doesn’t affect me one way or another,” said Alex Pavliv, 57, from New Jersey.
