GOP Gov. Hogan: Trump Cabinet Secretaries Urged Me to Primary President

Appearing Thursday on Bloomberg TV, Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) claimed “a couple” of President Donald Trump’s cabinet secretaries urged him to consider launching a primary challenge against the president in the 2020 election.

Exclusive:

Gov. Larry Hogan tells me “a couple” of Pres. Trump’s cabinet secretaries encouraged him to consider challenging Trump in a primary.

— Hogan declined to say who bc he “wouldn’t want to see a couple of friends be fired.”

via @BloombergTV @BloombergRadio

Watch: pic.twitter.com/OktWHib0X0

— Kevin Cirilli (@kevcirilli) July 23, 2020

A transcript is as follows:

KEVIN CIRILLI: Larry Hogan writes that members of President Trump’s Cabinet urged him to consider challenging President Trump in the 2020 Republican primary. He writes, “The media was also enamored by the idea of a popular Republican governor, a real Republican, with a proven record of electoral success going toe to toe with Donald Trump inside the GOP… but cabinet secretaries? Encouraging me to run for president agains their boss for president? That one surprised me.” That is a stunning revelation. How many and which members of the president’s cabinet told you to consider running against him?

GOV. LARRY HOGAN: There were only a couple and I am not going to reveal the names because they are private conversations, and I certainly would not want to see a couple of friends fired from the administration… I don’t think it comes as any surprise to folks that there are a lot of people in the administration who have sometimes spoken out here and there. It was just one small thing to mention in the book. Certainly not a main focus of anything we were talking about. I did not have any kind of a serious effort to try to run for president. But a lot of people are encouraging me. I was surprised to hear how close some of these folks were in the White House.

CIRILLI: What was there primary motivation?

GOV. HOGAN: I think it was a little bit of a concern about losing the election and when the bottom is going to drop out of this thing and what was the alternative. And could we find someone who could perhaps put together a winning coalition in the fall.