On his old campaign plane or air force one where he would idle, have the tv on, usually fox news and he would watch the coverage of the plane he would even talk to people next to him like there is the plane. he would marvel over that and how he would gain attention. air force one, when the presidential aircraft touches down that s not newsworthy we can debate on yesterday, the coverage of it, but this is what he s already done. he has completely taken up all of the oxygen in the political field, particularly on the republican side. to willie s point already getting pledges of loyalty from his potential opponents there who dare not criticize him and only criticize the manhattan da. we ve seen his poll numbers go up, his fundraising go up and we do see the media potentially making some of the mistakes it made in 2016 we need to be doing a better job, all of us, going forward as he now enters not just as a presidential candidate, willie,
Former president trump is back on the campaign trail tonight for the first time since announcing his third run for the white house. he held events in a couple of key early voting states and shared sharp comments about two of his potential gop rivals. what did he say? reporter: a big day for donald trump as he made his return to the campaign trail after a 2 1/2 month hiatus. doing traditional campaign events that felt very different from his previous two presidential campaigns including stopping at a burger joint here in south carolina just moments ago. the former president did have moments throughout the visits today that did feel like vintage donald trump. one of those took place on his campaign plane earlier today when he talked to reporters and
Cnn s gabby orr has more. reporter: donald trump making his return to the campaign trail on saturday holding back-to-back events in new hampshire and south carolina unveiling his leadership team in south carolina as well as two endorsements. one from south carolina governor henry mcmaster, the other from senator lindsey graham and announcing a campaign hire in new hampshire. state chairman steve stepanek will join as a senior advisor in the first in the nation primary state. the former president surrounded himself with supporters at both events. there are several republicans who said they are waiting to see how the gop primary field takes shape in 2024. who else jumps in? some have mentioned nikki haley, who is considering a presidential campaign of her own, and we learned that she actually called former president donald trump this week to inform her of his interest. the former president saying on his campaign plane that he
Dangerous for a country. and he s trying to kaix like a convention candidate. and he was throwing digs at nikki haley and ron desantis. let s listen to that and talk about it on the other side. nikki haley called me the other day to talk to me. i talked to her for a little while and i said go by your heart if you want to run. she publicly stated i would never run against my president. ef whats a great president. florida was closed for a long period of time. they closed the beaches and everything else. they re trying to rewrite history. congressman, he s having these events, he s on his campaign plane, he s talking to reporters, he s trying to come across like a conventional candidate. yet, this is somebody who tried to overturn an election. right. should he be treated like a conventional candidate, do you think? from a media perspective, i guess so. he s legitimately running. we didn t convict him. we impeached him in the house and didn t convict him in the
Endorsements. one from south carolina governor henry mcmaster, the other from senator lindsey graham. and announcing a new campaign hire in new hampshire. outgoing republican state chairman steve step nick will join the trump campaign as a senior adviser as a first in the nation primary state. the former president surrounded himself with supporters at both of these events, but there are several republicans who said that they still are waiting to see how the gop primary field takes shape in 2024. who else jumps in. some of them have mentioned nikki haley, the former governor of south carolina, who is considering a presidential campaign of her own. the former president saying on his campaign plane that he encouraged haley to run if that s what s in her heart. he said, quote, go by your heart and launch a campaign if you want to. and so that could potentially make for a very interesting primary here in south carolina. cnn, gabby orr, in columbia, south carolina. we are tracking a conser