Conservative radio host Larry Elder announces his bid for president

Gitanjali Poonia
·3 min read
3
Republican conservative radio show host Larry Elder speaks to supporters after losing the California gubernatorial recall election Tuesday, Sept. 14, 2021, in Costa Mesa, Calif. Elder has now announced a bid for the GOP presidential nomination.
Republican conservative radio show host Larry Elder speaks to supporters after losing the California gubernatorial recall election Tuesday, Sept. 14, 2021, in Costa Mesa, Calif. Elder has now announced a bid for the GOP presidential nomination. | Ashley Landis, Associated Press

Conservative radio host Larry Elder on Thursday announced his bid for president in 2024 as a Republican candidate.

“America is in decline, but this decline is not inevitable. We can enter a new American Golden Age, but we must choose a leader who can bring us there. That’s why I’m running for President,” he wrote on Twitter.

Who is Elder Larry?

Elder, 70, unsuccessfully ran for California governor amid Gov. Gavin Newsom’s recall election in 2021. While campaigning, he said he would fix the state’s budget, pledged to replace Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California with a Republican and said he would fight homelessness. His former fiancée also accused Elder of threatening her with a gun during this time, but California prosecutors declined to pursue the case and he has denied the allegations.

After giving up on running for governor, Elder has set his eyes on the presidential race.

He joins a growing pool of GOP candidates, including former President Donald Trump, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, as well as hopefuls like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence and Sen. Tim Scott, who launched a presidential exploratory committee.

Related

“I feel I have a moral, a religious and a patriotic duty to give back to a country that’s been so good to my family and to me. And that is why I’m doing this,” Elder said Thursday on “Tucker Carlson Tonight.”

Elder has not previously served in elected office. He studied political science at Brown University before getting his law degree from the University of Michigan. After working as an attorney, he got a gig as a radio host in 1994. Nearly a decade later, he created “The Larry Elder Show.”

What are Larry Elder’s policy stances?

On his campaign website, he says he supports a tough-on-crime approach, a border that is secure, and the choice to choose which school to send your children to.

“Who wants choice in schools?” he told the Deseret News last year. “Black and brown parents do. But we’re spending an average of $15,000 per student here in California, and only half of the third grade kids in California can read at grade level proficiency, and 75% of Black boys cannot read at state levels of proficiency.”

He also believes that the critical race theory and diversity, equity, and inclusion programs “are increasing — not decreasing — racial tension,” according to his website.

Elder has credited his parents, who weren’t Republicans, for instilling his values, as he told the Deseret News.

“If anybody had a reason to become angry about racism in America; it was my mother and father, both of whom were born in the Jim Crow South,” he said. “And yet they told my brothers and me to be positive and work hard, and the sky’s the limit.”