Donald Trump says he has picked his running mate for 2024
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Donald Trump has already selected his running mate for the 2024 race, he revealed on Wednesday night, but refused to say who he had picked.
The former president gave an hour-long town hall event with Fox News in Des Moines, Iowa, ahead of Monday’s caucus to determine the state’s choice for the Republican nomination.
Mr Trump boasted that many people had asked him if they could work in his second administration, including the “very most important people in the military”.
Asked by the Fox host Martha MacCallum whether he had yet chosen a running mate, Mr Trump responded: “Well, I can’t tell you that really. I mean, I know who it’s going to be.”
The admission is the first time that Mr Trump has spoken about a definite choice for his running mate, amid speculation he could choose Kristi Noem, the South Dakota governor, or the former Fox presenter Tucker Carlson.
Others thought to be in contention include Sarah Huckerbee Sanders, who is Mr Trump’s former press secretary and the current governor of Arkansas, and the New York congresswoman Elise Stefanik.
On Wednesday night Mr Trump joked that he could even choose Chris Christie – the former New Jersey governor and vocal Trump critic who pulled out of the Republican primary race earlier in the day.
“What about any of the people who you’ve run against?” Ms MacCallum asked. “Would you be open to mending fences with any of them?”
“Oh, sure. I will, I will,” Mr Trump replied, adding: “I’ve already started to like Christie better.”
Despite his criticism of Washington – the city he referred to as “the swamp” during his 2016 campaign – Mr Trump said he had learned from his first term and had some candidates lined up for jobs in his second administration.
“Now I’ve gotten to know Washington -- to know the people -- I know the best, I know the smart ones, and the weak ones, the strong ones,” he said.
Mr Trump is expected to launch a clearout of the federal government if he wins a second term, replacing many of the officials he believed blocked some of his key policies between 2016 and 2020.
Until now, he has commented little on the possible contenders for vice president – choosing to speak positively about most candidates suggested to him without committing to one of them.
Haley refuses to rule herself out
Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor who is running against Mr Trump, has not ruled out accepting the job if it was offered to her.
“First of all, it’s highly offensive to think I would go through all of this to run for vice president,” she said in an interview with the New Hampshire Union Leader last week.
“I am fighting to become president and I’m going to win,” she added.
However, it seems incredibly unlikely that Mr Trump would choose Ms Haley – his former UN ambassador – as the campaign jibes between the pair get increasingly vicious.
Earlier this week, the former president reposted an article on his Truth Social account that falsely suggested Ms Haley was ineligible to run for president because her parents were not US citizens when she was born. There is no such restriction on presidential candidates.
Speaking at a debate with Ron DeSantis in Des Moines on Wednesday night, Ms Haley criticised Mr Trump’s refusal to appear at the event.
“He’s the one that I’m running against. He’s the one that I wish would be here. He needs to be defending his record,” she said.
With five days to go until the Iowa caucus, Mr Trump remains by far the race’s frontrunner, with a 52-point national polling lead and double-digit lead in Iowa alone.
