Search

Trump wants to run again, says former acting director of national intelligence

Grenell said that Trump had told him “personally, a number of times,” he plans to run for a second term.

By David Isaac, World Israel News

President Donald Trump “does want to run again,” Richard Grenell, the former acting Director of National Intelligence, told Newsmax TV on Saturday.

Grenell said that Trump had told him “personally, a number of times,” he plans to run for a second term.

Grenell said he opposed the formation of a third ‘Patriot’ party (Trump has been rumored to be considering such a move). “We should work very hard on the Republican party,” Grenell said.

“Look, it’s like a sports team, right. Your party is not always perfect and you try to get it better… You don’t abandon it,” he told Newsmax TV.

“Clearly, Donald Trump is a Republican and should run again as a Republican,” Grenell said.

Grenell’s comments came after Trump made his first public remarks since leaving office on Friday to a Washington Examiner reporter in which he said, somewhat cryptically, “We’ll do something, but not just yet.”

Trump faces a second impeachment trial in the Senate. Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said she will send the articles of impeachment to the Senate on Monday. If the Senate votes to impeach, and it will require 67 votes to do so, he will be barred from running again. Pro-Trump supporters have argued that is the only reason Democrats have impeached Trump a second time – they fear his return.

Read  Orthodox Union presents 100,000 pro-Israel letters to the White House

The House of Representatives voted on Jan. 13 to impeach Trump for “high crimes and misdemeanors” – specifically, inciting an insurrection.

There is a disagreement over whether a former president can be impeached. Attorney Alan Dershowitz has come out strongly against the idea, telling World Israel News, “It violates the impeachment provision of the Constitution, as well as the person. It’s a terrible thing.”

However, Keith E. Whittington, professor of politics at Princeton, disagrees, writing in the Wall Street Journal on Jan. 22, “For the Founders, it would have been obvious that the ‘power to impeach’ included the ability to hold former officials to account.”