ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) — Former governor of Maryland. Larry HoganA Republican running for a Senate seat that could determine control of the House will once again skip the Republican National Convention as national party leaders waver over whether the GOP will help finance his campaign.
Hogan’s campaign confirmed that the former governor will not attend next month’s Republican Party convention in Milwaukee, July 15-18. Hogan, who has been one of former President Donald Trump’s fiercest critics, also did not attend the party’s conventions in 2020 and 2016.
Hogan, who is trying to navigate a difficult path by running as a Republican in a heavily Democratic state, angry party leaders last week when he said before Trump was convicted by a Manhattan jury on 34 criminal counts related to hush payments that the public owed “ respect the verdict and the legal process.”
“At this dangerously divided moment in our history, all leaders – regardless of party – must not add fuel to the fire with more toxic partisanship,” Hogan posted on X before the verdict was announced. “We must reaffirm what made this nation great: the rule of law.”
Chris LaCivita, a senior adviser to the Trump campaign, responded to X: “You just ended your campaign.”
Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, was convicted on all charges related to a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election by falsifying business records to conceal secret payments to pornographic actor Stormy Daniels, who said the two had sex. The former president classified the verdict as politically motivated.
On Sunday, Lara Trumpco-chair of the Republican National Committee and daughter-in-law of the former president, sharply criticized Hogan’s comments, saying on CNN’s State of the Union that Hogan “doesn’t deserve the respect of anyone in the Republican Party right now.” to point.”
Asked whether the Republican Party would provide resources to support Hogan’s campaign, Lara Trump said: “Well, I’ll get back to you about all the monetary details, but what I can say is that as co-chair of the Republican Party, I think he I should never have said something like that. I think that’s ridiculous.”
Hogan is trying to become the first republican in more than 40 years to win a Senate seat in this deep blue state, where Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-1 statewide, with much of the Democratic support in Baltimore and the Washington suburbs. He is running against Democrat Angela Alsobrooks, chief executive of Prince George’s County, near the nation’s capital.
In the last two presidential elections, Hogan said he did not vote for Trump. Hogan said he wrote on behalf of his father, former U.S. Rep. Larry Hogan Sr., in 2016, and the late President Ronald Reagan in 2020. Trump received about 32% of the vote in Maryland in 2020.
Hogan won his first term as governor in 2014 in an upset victory, using public campaign financing against a much better financed opponent, receiving considerable crossover support from Democrats. Four years later, he became the second Republican in the state’s history to be re-elected governor.
