Former President Donald Trump won’t have to sign an oath to run against Gov. Ron DeSantis in the March election after the Republican Party of Florida voted against requiring primary contenders to vow support for the ultimate nominee.
Trump, who has refused to take the same vow needed of candidates to participate in national GOP debates, is seen as winning the decision. The pledge requirement had recently been implemented by the state party in May. Since that time, Trump has continued to dominate the Republican field, while DeSantis, whom he has long regarded as his biggest competitor, has struggled and been forced to let go of scores of staff members.
In their respective home states, where Trump and DeSantis both reside, they are bitter rivals.
Due to the oath requirement, primary contenders would have been compelled to support the ultimate nominee in order to be included on the ballot.
Trump might not have been able to run on the Republican ticket in the general election in November if he had been disqualified from the primary ballot. Joe Gruters, a former state GOP chairman and current senator, demanded its removal during a party gathering on Friday.
Gruters, a steadfast Trump fan, is one of the few Republican state legislators in Florida to vote for the outgoing leader over DeSantis. Whether on purpose or not, Gruters added, “the party looks like it was favoring a certain candidate by putting this in place.”
The Trump world and the DeSantis world are now engaged in a proxy war.
Despite the fact that the Trump campaign did not immediately react to a message requesting comment regarding the vote, members of the team shared messages on X, now known as Twitter, that depicted the outcome as a victory for Trump.
Gruters claimed that the requirement would have also been against RNC rules prohibiting state-level changes to the nomination process within two years after an election.
However, according to RNC regulations, each state party has until October 1 to decide how it will nominate delegates who will formally select a presidential contender. “When people say, ‘Well, Trump doesn’t want to sign the loyalty pledge,’ it is not about that.
It’s about the party erecting barriers that weren’t there four months ago, according to Gruters.
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