Trump heads back to Texas for GOP event
Barely a week after he was at the Texas border, former President Donald Trump is expected back in the state this weekend as the keynote speaker at a political conference in Dallas.
Trump speaks at 3:35 p.m. Sunday at the Hilton Anatole Hotel in Dallas as part of CPAC Texas, a political conference for conservatives. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, Attorney General Ken Paxton and outgoing Republican Party of Texas Chairman Allen West are among dozens of speakers expected to speak at the three-day event that starts Friday.
Last week, Trump was in Hidalgo County to tour sections of the incomplete border wall he started building but never finished while in office.
The back-to-back visits come as Trump continues to muse about running for president again in 2024.
“You think I should do it again?” Trump said to a round of applause from mostly elected officials during his visit to the border last week.
Last week, Trump’s company and its longtime finance chief were charged by federal prosecutors in New York with a “sweeping and audacious” tax fraud scheme, the Associated Press reported. The executive and the organization pleaded not guilty. Trump himself was not charged with any wrongdoing in the case, which he condemned as a “political Witch Hunt by the Radical Left Democrats.”
Trump’s return this week will come at a big moment for Texas Republicans.
A special session of the Texas Legislature is set to begin Thursday. And over the weekend, West announced he is running for governor against Abbott.
Abbott already has been endorsed by Trump for re-election.
“I gave him a complete and total endorsement,” Trump said on June 30 with Abbott by his side on the Texas border.