Former National Security Advisor John Bolton said Monday he may launch a 2024 White House run if other prospective GOP presidential candidates fail to denounce Donald Trump’s comment about terminating the Constitution.
“I’d like to see Shermanesque statements from all the potential candidates,” about the 76-year-old former president’s Saturday Truth Social post, Bolton said during an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press Now.”
“If I don’t see that, I’m going to seriously consider getting in,” Bolton added.
The former Trump administration White House official said that the former president’s statement should be considered “disqualifying” for public office.
“I think to be a presidential candidate you can’t just say, ‘I support the Constitution.’ You have to say, ‘I would oppose people who would undercut it.’”
Bolton, who before his stint in the Trump White House served as the US Ambassador to the United Nations from 2005 to 2006, teased a 2024 announcement from him might come sooner than people think.
“It might be earlier than some would think,” Bolton said, without laying out a specific timeline for his decision.
He added he would run on a platform “true to free market principles” and said that he is “not a social conservative.”
Trump fired Bolton in September 2019 after the then-president reportedly clashed with the longtime diplomat on issues related to North Korea and Afghanistan.
“I disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions,” Trump said in a tweet announcing his firing.
The former president has come under fire from many in the GOP after a Truth Social post on Saturday in which he claimed that the “Massive Fraud” during the 2020 elections “allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.”
On Monday, Trump attempted to clarify his statement in another social media post.
“The Fake News is actually trying to convince the American People that I said I wanted to “terminate” the Constitution. This is simply more DISINFORMATION & LIES, just like RUSSIA, RUSSIA, RUSSIA, and all of their other HOAXES & SCAMS.
“What I said was that when there is ‘MASSIVE & WIDESPREAD FRAUD & DECEPTION,’ as has been irrefutably proven in the 2020 Presidential Election, steps must be immediately taken to RIGHT THE WRONG. Only FOOLS would disagree with that and accept STOLEN ELECTIONS. MAGA!” the former president wrote.
High-profile Republicans, such as former Vice President Mike Pence, Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), and Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) have denounced Trump’s claims.
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