Former President Donald Trump said in an interview aired on March 16 that his decision whether to run for reelection in 2024 hinges on how Republicans perform in 2022.
“Well, based on every poll, they want me to run again, but we’re going to take a look and we'll see. First steps first, we have to see what we can do with the House. I think we have a very, very good chance of taking back the House,” he told Maria Bartiromo on Fox News.
“I think we have a chance to do better in the Senate. We need leadership in the Senate, which frankly, we don’t have. We need better leadership in the Senate. We have a good chance to take back the Senate, and, frankly, we'll make our decision after that,” Trump said.
Trump had previously hinted that he may run again during his comeback speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando, Florida, on Feb. 28.
In the interview, Trump highlighted and took credit for the Republican victories in the House in 2020. The GOP gained 14 seats in the House, resulting in the slimmest Democratic majority in the chamber, 222–213, since 2000.
“You know, we were going to lose from 15 to 25 seats last time. I got involved. I worked very hard,” Trump said. “What happened is we ended up winning 15 seats instead of losing potentially 25 seats. That’s a big swing and it almost cost [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi her job. I think we have a chance of taking back the House.”
The former president has endorsed two Republican House candidates so far, Max Miller in Ohio and Julia Letlow in Louisiana. Miller, a former White House official, is running against one of the ten Republicans who voted to impeach Trump. The former president has suggested that he will endorse primary challengers against the other nine, which include Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), the third-ranking Republican in the House.
Republicans need to gain just five seats to retake control of the House. The Senate is currently split 50–50, with Vice President Kamala Harris on deck to break ties. Fourteen Democratic seats and 20 Republican seats will be up for grabs in 2022. A number of establishment Republicans in the Senate aren’t seeking reelection, opening the door for Trump to reshape the party’s leadership in the chamber.
Trump noted that if the Democrats’ H.R. 1 election bill becomes law, “Republicans will have a very hard time getting elected.”
“What will happen is the Democrats will be able to do what they did in the last, in the 2020 election,” Trump said. “And when you look at the dishonesty and all of the things that took place in that election, this should have never happened.”
