Former US President George W. Bush stands for the national anthem before the game between the Boston Red Sox and the Baltimore Orioles at Oriole Park at Camden Yards on Sunday, August 21, 2022 in Baltimore, Maryland; Former US President Donald Trump speaks at a Save America Rally to support Republican candidates running for state and federal offices in the state at the Covelli Centre on September 17, 2022 in Youngstown, Ohio.
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Former President George W. Bush is lending his support to Senate hopeful Joe O’Dea.
O’Dea, a Republican, has repeatedly said that he doesn’t want Donald Trump to ever run again.
Bush has also campaigned for and donated to Trump foils in Georgia, Alaska, and Wyoming.
Former President George W. Bush is heading to Colorado to fundraise for Senate hopeful Joe O’Dea, combining forces with another Republican who doesn’t want to see former President Donald Trump back in the White House.
O’Dea, who is vying to unseat incumbent Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet in a state where President Joe Biden beat Trump by nearly 14 points in 2020, has repeatedly said he hopes Trump stays away from the 2024 race.
“I think a lot of people are ready to move our country forward,” O’Dea said this summer. Political pollsters at FiveThirtyEight currently show three-term lawmaker Bennet with a 10-point lead.
Bush’s backing of first-timer O’Dea’s bid against Bennet, as first reported by NBC, tracks with the former two-term president’s efforts to keep the scandal-plagued Trump out of politics.
Bush immediately condemned the insurrectionists who executed the deadly siege at the US Capitol in January 2021, and also maxed out his political contributions to Trump impeachment supporters Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming.
Bush also campaigned with Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp ahead of a bitter GOP primary with Trump-backed 2020 election denier David Perdue. Trump urged Perdue, who lost his seat to Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff in January 2021, to try and oust Kemp as punishment for not going along with Trump’s baseless election fraud claims.
Kemp handily beat Perdue, and is now facing a rematch against Democratic gubernatorial hopeful Stacy Abrams in November.