Gov. Chris Sununu (R-NH) has joined failed 2012 presidential candidate and establishment Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) in calling for the clearing of the Republican primary field soon after voting begins in an effort to keep former President Donald Trump from winning the nomination.
Sununu, who flirted with a presidential bid before opting not to enter the fray, laid out his vision to “stop” Trump, who constantly garners a majority in national polls, in a New York Times opinion article published Monday morning. He contended that the dozen or so candidates in the field who make the debate stage in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on Wednesday should go on the offensive against Trump:
To win, they must break free of Mr. Trump’s drama, step out of his shadow, go on offense, attack, and present their case. Then they need to see if they can catch fire this fall — and if they can’t, they need to step aside, because winnowing down the field of candidates is the single best chance to stop Mr. Trump. Too much is at stake for us to have wishful candidacies. While the other Republican candidates are running to save America, Mr. Trump is running to save himself.
Sununu, who was pictured with Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) on Saturday, sees early voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire as an opportunity to weaken Trump and believes the field must be dwindled down to a maximum of four candidates before the Granite State primary for his vision to work. He promises to assist in weeding candidates out of the field and will back whoever he thinks has the best shot to defeat Trump, whom he dubbed a “narcissist.”
Handshake by handshake, person by person. That’s how you win the First in the Nation Presidential Primary.
Good to see @RonDeSantis doing it the New Hampshire way at the Londonderry Old Home Day Parade. Two of the best governors in the country hanging in Londonderry! pic.twitter.com/KrFmTKWLWI
— Chris Sununu (@ChrisSununu) August 19, 2023
The two-term governor encouraged some of Trump’s nearest competitors, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, and Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), to “take on Mr. Trump, show a spark, and not just defend him in absentia” during this week’s debate.
Notably, a debate strategy memorandum from DeSantis-aligned super PAC Never Back Down, which the Times unearthed last week, advised just the opposite. It offered a strategy for DeSantis to “Defend Donald Trump in absentia in response to a Chris Christie attack” and to “take a sledge-hammer to Vivek Ramaswamy,” who has taken second place in multiple recent polls.
Super PACs are barred by law from coordinating with campaigns they are supporting, but oftentimes they might publicly post polling documents, strategy documents, suggested talking points, and more online in obscure places for the campaigns they are backing to find so they can get around anti-coordination laws.
Sometimes, a super PAC gets away with doing so in a manner that nobody notices, but other times, rival campaigns and news outlets, as in this case, notice such documents posted somewhere — and that can cause problems for a candidate if sensitive strategy suggestions make it into the public sphere.
Sununu has been vocal about stopping Trump since he announced he would not seek the nomination, authoring a June 5 op-ed in the Washington Post titled, “I’m not running for president in 2024. Beating Trump is more important.”
Trump fired back at Sununu in late July month while he knocked the 45th president on several cable stations.
“RINO Chris Sununu recently stated that, ‘I’m not running for president in 2024. Beating Trump is more important.’ No, he’s not running for President because he’s polling at Zero, and has no chance of winning,” Trump wrote, according to the Hill.
In the Wall Street Journal in late July, Romney published a very similar opinion piece to Sununu’s piece on Monday, writing that it is possible any of Trump’s rivals could upset him “if the field narrows to a two-person race before Mr. Trump has the nomination sewn up.”
“Donors who are backing someone with a slim chance of winning should seek a commitment from the candidate to drop out and endorse the person with the best chance of defeating Mr. Trump by Feb. 26,” he added.
Trump blasted Romney as a “loser” in response to the piece while speaking with Breitbart News bureau chief Matthew Boyle in a long-form on-camera interview on August 3.
WATCH – Trump: Romney Is “a Loser,” “The Right Candidate Will Beat Him” in Utah Primary
“He has no respect in the Republican Party,” Trump said of Romney. “He’s a terrible Republican. I think he’s terrible for the nation also. I saw him marching with the Antifa and the groups down in Washington with his mask on—you couldn’t even see his face. They were marching, and these were real terrorists—very bad people he was marching with. He didn’t even know the difference.”
Trump added that “the right candidate will beat him” in Utah’s Republican primary for U.S. Senate.
Riverton Mayor Trent Staggs, who is running for U.S. Senate in Utah, ripped his opponent during an appearance on Sirius XM’s Breitbart News days after Trump responded. He called Romney “so out of touch.”
LISTEN:
“And that Wall Street Journal article, wow. I mean, to spend that type of time and energy on that … we have so much else going on that he should be focused on as a senator,” he said. “I think that was received with a, I say a collective eye roll … from GOP donors, because Romney, he still hasn’t learned that actions actually speak louder than words, and that’s why there’s this stark difference between Trump and Romney,” he added. “And what people want, and especially out here in Utah, I’m seeing, what conservatives want is that action, that bold action, that typified President Trump’s administration.”
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