Perot reform pty

=populist?<div>=</div><div>1/12</div><div>
</div><div><a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/how-wily-newt-pulled-the-contract-with-america-scam-200577/">https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/how-wily-newt-pulled-the-contract-with-america-scam-200577/</a></div><div>Newton Leroy Gingrich is one wily mothertrucker. He’s calling his presidential platform this year a “<a href="http://www.newt.org/21st-century-contract-america" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">21st Century Contract With America</a>.” It’s a wingnutpalooza, naturally, endorsing such “timeless American values” as seeking to “establish English as the official language of government,” and reducing the corporate tax rate to 12.5 percent and the capital gains rate to zero; and featuring such “Day One Executive Orders” as the cancellation of all “immigration-related lawsuits against states” and a renewal of “President Ronald Reagan’s policy … to stop taxpayer dollars from being used to fund or promote abortions in foreign country.” (Critics call that the “<a href="http://www.genderhealth.org/the_issues/us_foreign_policy/global_gag_rule/" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">global gag rule</a>,” because it forbids any country receiving American aid from letting doctors even talk about family planning.) The title, of course, refers to the Contract With America, which 367 Republican congressional candidates signed on the Capitol steps in September of 1994. When, two months later, the GOP took over Congress for the first time since 1952, making its architect, Newt Gingtrich, the Speaker of the House, all the world proclaimed that the electorate had just delivered a historic mandate for conservatism.<p data-gtm-vis-first-on-screen-9326027_26="11868" data-gtm-vis-total-visible-time-9326027_26="100" data-gtm-vis-has-fired-9326027_26="1" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; margin: 0px; padding: 0.9375rem 0px;">Well, not really. The <a href="http://www.house.gov/house/Contract/CONTRACT.html" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">Contract With America</a> was a hustle from start to finish. It never really was about conservatism at all – practically the opposite. The fact that Newt can redeploy it to promote his right-of-Attila-the-Hun harpyish shrieking for 2012 just shows how effective the hustle – and the hustler – turned out to be.Here’s what happened: Ross Perot. Specifically, the weirdo billionaire Texas populist won nearly nineteen percent of the popular vote in the 1992 presidential election – the most for a third-party candidate in 80 years – with an odd platform of fiscal conservatism and social liberalism,  Immediately and instinctively, both parties began bidding for his constituency. The Democrats, however, had to punt: President Clinton had <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Selling-Free-Trade-Washington-Subversion/dp/0520231783/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1327525693&sr=8-1" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">made passing the North American Free Trade agreement his obsession</a> in 1993, but opposing it was <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Save-Your-Job-Our-Country/dp/1562827111/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1327525728&sr=1-1" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">Perot’s obsession</a>.In stepped the Republicans. The party’s Orwellian-in-Chief, messaging guru Frank Luntz, spoke at a Republican retreat a month after Clinton’s inauguration and described the Perot vote as “the GOP’s future.”Newt Gingrich, convinced, implored every Republican candidate and official to read Lunt’z presentation. Other bigwigs demurred: Bob Dole, for instance, said Perot was nothing but a “walking sound bite,” and pointed out, “There are more new taxes in his program than in Clinton’s program.” Aye, there was the rub: Perot was no conservative. His quirky mix of policy prescriptions included huge hikes on gas and tobacco taxes and new taxes on social security and employee health insurance benefits; he was obsessed with the federal deficit, and dead serious about eliminating it. He was for less American involvement abroad, and abhorred the politicization of the kind of “social issues” around which the Republicans had organized their 1992 convention. (<a href="http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=25847#axzz1kUq3vDhG" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">Their platform</a> opened with a nearly-6,000-word section, 14 percent of the document, on “traditional family values,” and featured <a href="http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/patrickbuchanan1992rnc.htm" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">Pat Buchanan’s infamous speech</a> declaring,”There is a religious war going on in this country. It is a cultural war”)Perot, however, was pro-choice. Still, he was also a tribune of “reform” – his vehicle, remember, was called the Reform Party. That meant, in Perot’s terms, strict ethics rules for Congress and government officials; campaign finance and lobbying reforms, especially for former officeholders; cutbacks on executive and congressional staff; and – the jug-eared billionaire’s unique calling card – an insistence on term limits for politicians. And this, to cynical Republicans like Gingrich who had been indifferent if not hostile to any such notions before, was something they could work with.An extraordinary but obscure political science monograph by Ronald Rapoport and Walter Stone, <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=LpBe1psZNk0C&printsec=frontcover&dq=three%27s+a+crowd+perot&hl=en&sa=X&ei=rm8gT-z6OOrh0QHBzIUG&ved=0CDYQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=three%27s%20a%20crowd%20per" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">Three’s a Crowd: The Dynamics of Third Parties, Ross Perot, and Republican Resurgence</a>, reconstructed through interviews, surveys, and documents how Gingrich devised a document micro-tailored to turn at least 70 percent of Perot voters, however fleetingly, into Republicans in time for November of 1994. “Republicans knew,” Stone and Rapoport write, “that the traditional Republican congressional campaign” – which is to say, conservatism – “would be insufficient to get this support.” This realization was the genesis of the Contract for America.They would not call theirs a “platform”; extensive focus-grouping with Perotistas suggested they preferred something more like the “Checklist For All Candidates” that Perot included as an appendix to his book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/United-We-Stand-Take-Country/dp/1562828525/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1327525891&sr=1-1" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">United We Stand</a>, which Perot wanted candidates to sign as a binding contract. They would keep the word “Republican” out of it; Perot voters were all about their disgust with the two existing parties. In terms of content, their “contract” would pass over in silence the Perovian preferences no Republican could get behind (there was nothing, for example, on NAFTA or the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, another Perot bugaboo, nor on campaign finance reform). Traditional Republican issues that did well with Perot supporters even if they weren’t really up the ally of Perot himself (tort reform; an anti-crime package, “stronger child-pornography laws”) were present but deemphasized. The headline-producing stuff was straight Perot: “first day” pledges to audit and restructure the House and Senate, to “require all laws that apply to the rest of the country to apply equally to Congress,” to press for a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution, and a “first-ever vote on term limits to replace career politicians with citizen legislators.” (Write the political scientists: “The term citizen legislators was selected based on focus groups with Perot supporters.)There was one extremely Republican, and not very Perovian, provision: a call for tax increases to require a three-fifths vote of congress. (Maybe they’d negotiated that one in secret with Perot himself: Gingrich and allies had been meeting with him since the spring of 1993, in defiance of the old-line House Republican leadership that Gingrich was soon to unseat. Later, Perot endorsed the Republican slate.) Finally, and most important: “Gone was the 1992 Republican platform emphasis on family values …. This decision was contentious, but Gingrich fought hard for it. He declared categorically, ‘There will be no social issues’ – a decision made with Perot voters explicitly in mind.” The final product comprised 44 percent “reform” issues, almost identical to the 41 percent in Perot United We Stand checklist (they had made up only 14 percent of the 1992 Republican platform). Then, Contract in hand, the Republican Congressional Campaign Committee got to work identifying Perot voters in districts where he had done well in 1992, blitzing them with direct mail, phone calls, and door-knocking.It worked. As Stone and Rapoport empirically demonstrate, fans of the guy who told voters “You’re the boss and I’m Ross” lined up to vote Republican. Gingrich became Speaker of the House. Promptly, Part B of the plan, which Stone and Rapoport don’t talk about, went into effect: in 1995, retroactively pronouncing the success of the what they now called the Republican Contract With America as a straight-up electoral endorsement of conservatism – “<a href="http://www.heritage.org/research/lecture/the-contract-with-america-implementing-new-ideas-in-the-us" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">the third leg of the conservative revolution in post-World War II America</a>” that began with Barry Goldwater and the Heritage Foundation, which had been in on the planning all along. <a href="http://www.heritage.org/research/lecture/the-contract-with-america-implementing-new-ideas-in-the-us" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">In 1995, Heritage staffer Jeffrey Gaynor claimed</a> that “an extensive philosophical groundwork formed the intellectual foundation with of the Contract With America when it formally appeared in the fall of 1994.” Which is bullshit.Meanwhile, the Christian Coalition claimed the Contract for America as a mandate for themselves. Ralph Reed, flanked Gingrich and other Congressmen who had helmed the Contract process, proclaimed: “<a href="http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1995-05-18/news/1995138040_1_christian-coalition-conservative-christian-plank" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">We have finally gained what we have always sought</a>: a place at the table, a sense of legitimacy and a voice in the conversation we call democracy.” Which was not bullshit. The Contract did earn the Christian right a place at the table, as they cynically knew it would – that was why, as Stone and Rapoport explain, “the Christian Coalition, recognizing the importance of the Perot constituency and knowing that a Republican House would be more supportive of its aims, praised an agenda that left out many of its most important issues.”Gingrich and Co. were able to get away with it because the plain facts of what the Contract actually was (a strategic erasure of Republican conservatism) almost entirely escaped the political press – at the time, and ever since. A <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=NOECAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA17&lpg=PA17&dq=%22self-aggrandizing,+wacky+splendor%22&source=bl&ots=WEvvcdTRSk&sig=NIJvhD542gDV4f8d_jX8M-4887c&hl=en&sa=X&ei=R3IgT9a9N4Lb0QHBvqgG&ved=0CCAQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22self-aggrandizing%2C%20w" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">1996 New York magazine article by Jacob Weisberg</a>, for instance, about how “Ross Perot is back, in all his self-aggrandizing, wacky splendor,” observed as evidence of said wackiness, “One minute Perot is making an important point about the unwillingness of the major parties to deal with the Social Security time bomb. The next he is off on a jag about how the Contract with America was actually his idea.” (Imagine!) A 2004 history of conservatism stated baldly that the Contract “<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=3Rf_3HYgSvIC&pg=PA116&lpg=PA116&dq=%22epitomized+antigovernment+conservatism%22&source=bl&ots=J-1D3MdMdD&sig=EcLamNxi-cnusTRtgiWM2infXF4&hl=en&sa=X&ei=GHMgT-eqKePV0QGhmtUG&ved=0CCAQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22epitomized%20antigovernm" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">epitomized antigovernment conservatism</a>.” The narrative was set: the Contract, and its consequence – the new Republican congressional majority – proved America was indisputably (to take the title of that 2004 history) a “<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Right-Nation-Conservative-Power-America/dp/B000F71124/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1327526614&sr=1-1" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">right nation</a>.” This supposed truism underwrites the defensive rhetoric of, say, Barack Obama, who felt compelled to say in his <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/state-of-the-union-2012" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">State of the Union</a> this week, quoting Abraham Lincoln, that “government should do for people only what they cannot do better by themselves, and no more.”Newt tells us his humungous revision of his 1994 masterpiece (<a href="http://www.newt.org/contract/legislative-proposals" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">Part 1: Legislative Proposals</a> is 8,238 words so far, compared to 849 words for the entire original) is “a work in progress which will be developed over the next year and finally unveiled in a completed form” on the eighteenth anniversary of the first Contract, on September 27, 2012. But you can sign it now nonetheless, sight unseen – your own preemptive Pledge of Allegiance to the Newt. That wily, wily mothertrucker.Rick Perlstein is the author of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Before-Storm-Goldwater-Unmaking-Consensus/dp/1568584121/ref=tmm_pap_title_0/188-5741354-6558707" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Before-Storm-Goldwater-Unmaking-Consensus/dp/1568584121/ref=tmm_pap_title_0/188-5741354-6558707" rel="nofollow" target="blank" style="box-sizing: border-box; -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased; transition: color 0.24s cubic-bezier(0.215, 0.61, 0.355, 1) 0s; text-decoration-line: none; position: relative; font-weight: 600;">Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America. </a>He writes a weekly column for RollingStone.com.</div><div>=</div>=<div><h2 style="box-sizing: inherit; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 0px 10px; word-spacing: 3.6px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Koch Industries Leads Corporate Contributions</h2>CMD tracked $23.5 million in direct corporate donations to conservative super PACs since 2019, much of which came from fossil fuel companies—most prominently, Koch Industries. In addition to donating $4 million to AFP Action, Koch Industries gave $500,000 to the Congressional Leadership Fund and $750,000 to the Senate Leadership Fund. The company gave nearly $5.3 million to super PACs from 2019 through January 2020.Real estate conglomerate Hillwood Development Co. gave close to $3.1 million to GOP PACs, including $1.1 million to the Congressional Leadership Fund, $1 million to the Senate Leadership Fund, and $1 million to Engage Texas, a super PAC funded by Texas-based companies and business executives that <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2020/02/01/engage-texas-super-pac-voter-registration/" target="blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="background: 0px 0px; box-sizing: inherit; transition: all 500ms ease-in-out 0s; text-decoration-line: none;">launched</a> in June 2019 “with the goal of registering hundreds of thousands of new voters and convincing them to help keep the state red in November.”Hillwood Development founder Ross Perot, Jr. gave $10,000 to Texans for a Conservative Majority, a super PAC that was founded in 2013 by a <a href="https://publicintegrity.org/politics/lone-star-lobbyist-launches-hybrid-super-pac/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="box-sizing: inherit; background: 0px 0px; transition: all 500ms ease-in-out 0s; text-decoration-line: none;">corporate lobbyist</a> to help reelect Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) and came out of hibernation last year to help the senator keep his seat again.Oil giant Chevron added $1 million to the Senate Leadership Fund, $750,000 to the Congressional Leadership Fund, and $15,000 to Maverick PAC. ConocoPhillips ANS Marketing Company, a subsidiary of ConocoPhillips, donated $1 million to the Senate Leadership Fund and $250,000 to the Congressional Leadership Fund. Oil and gas pipeline company Energy Transfer donated $1 million to Engage Texas and $100,000 to Texans for a Conservative Majority.Thirty-seven companies and one trade group gave more than $100,000 to conservative super PACs from 2019 through January 2020....</div><div></div>

H.R. Perot, Jr. of Plano, Texas, gave $20,000. He is Ross Perot's son, and has been called the wealthiest Texan of all time. Forbes has reported his net worth as $1.5 billion. He is also a big backer of Perry and the Texas Republican establishment.=<h1 class="print-title" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin-bottom: 0.2em;">=</h1><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000</a></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The Donald Trump presidential campaign of 2000 for the nomination of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reform_Party_of_the_United_States" class="mw-redirect" title="Reform Party of the United States" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Reform Party</a> began when <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_estate" title="Real estate" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">real estate</a> magnate <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump" title="Donald Trump" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Donald Trump</a> of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York(state)" class="mw-redirect" title="New York (state)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">New York</a> announced the creation of a presidential <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploratory_committee" title="Exploratory committee" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">exploratory committee</a> on the October 7, 1999 edition of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_King_Live" title="Larry King Live" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Larry King Live</a>. Though Trump had never held elected office, he was well known for his frequent comments on public affairs and business exploits as head of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Trump_Organization" title="The Trump Organization" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">The Trump Organization</a>. He had previously considered a presidential run in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,1988" title="United States presidential election, 1988" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">1988</a> as a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Party(United_States)" title="Republican Party (United States)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Republican</a>, but chose not to run. For 2000, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota" title="Minnesota" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Minnesota</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governor_of_Minnesota" title="Governor of Minnesota" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Governor</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Ventura" title="Jesse Ventura" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Jesse Ventura</a> persuaded Trump to seek the presidential nomination of the Reform Party, which was fracturing despite achieving <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballot_access" title="Ballot access" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">ballot access</a> and qualifying for <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matching_funds" title="Matching funds" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">matching funds</a> as a result of the presidential campaign of businessman <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_Perot" title="Ross Perot" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Ross Perot</a>, the party's <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,1996" title="United States presidential election, 1996" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">1996</a> presidential nominee. Trump's entrance into the Reform Party race coincided with that of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleoconservatism" title="Paleoconservatism" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">paleoconservative</a> commentator <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pat_Buchanan" title="Pat Buchanan" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Pat Buchanan</a>, whom Trump attacked throughout the campaign as a "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler" title="Adolf Hitler" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Hitler</a>-lover."Trump focused his campaign on the issues of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_trade" title="Fair trade" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">fair trade</a>, eliminating the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_public_debt" class="mw-redirect" title="US public debt" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">national debt</a>, and achieving <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_healthcare" class="mw-redirect" title="Universal healthcare" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">universal healthcare</a> as outlined in the campaign companion piece The America We Deserve, released in January 2000. He named media proprietor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oprah_Winfrey" title="Oprah Winfrey" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Oprah Winfrey</a> as his ideal <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Running_mate" title="Running mate" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">running mate</a> and said he would instantly marry his girlfriend, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melania_Knauss" class="mw-redirect" title="Melania Knauss" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Melania Knauss</a>, to make her <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Lady" title="First Lady" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">First Lady</a>. Critics questioned the seriousness of Trump's campaign and speculated that it was a tactic to strengthen his brand and sell books. Trump defended his candidacy as a serious endeavor and proclaimed that he had a chance to win the election. Though he never expanded the campaign beyond the exploratory phase, Trump made numerous media appearances as a candidate, traveled to campaign events in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida" title="Florida" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Florida</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California" title="California" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">California</a>, and Minnesota, and qualified for two presidential primaries. Veteran campaign strategist and longtime Trump aide <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Stone" title="Roger Stone" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Roger Stone</a> was hired as director of the exploratory committee.Internal conflict caused Ventura to exit the Reform Party in February 2000, removing Trump's most vocal proponent. Trump officially ended his campaign on the February 14, 2000 airing of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Today(U.S.TV_program)" title="Today (U.S. TV program)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">The Today Show</a>. Though he believed he could still win the Reform Party presidential nomination, he felt the party was too dysfunctional to support his campaign and enable a win in the general election. A poll matching Trump against likely Republican nominee <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W.Bush" title="George W. Bush" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">George W. Bush</a> and likely <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Party(United_States)" title="Democratic Party (United States)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Democratic</a> nominee <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Gore" title="Al Gore" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Al Gore</a> showed Trump with seven percent support. Despite his withdrawal, Trump won both primaries for which he qualified. Buchanan would go on to win the nomination.After the election, Trump gained greater fame as the host of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Apprentice(U.S.TV_series)" title="The Apprentice (U.S. TV series)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">The Apprentice</a>. He seriously considered running as a Republican in the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,2012" title="United States presidential election, 2012" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">2012 presidential election</a> but decided against it. Four years later, he initiated a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2016" title="Donald Trump presidential campaign, 2016" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">full-scale presidential campaign</a>, became the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Party_presidential_candidates,2016" title="Republican Party presidential candidates, 2016" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Republican Party's 2016 presidential nominee</a> and was elected the 45th <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_the_United_States" title="President of the United States" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">President of the United States</a>.<div id="toc" class="toc" style="border: 1px solid rgb(162, 169, 177); background-color: rgb(248, 249, 250); padding: 7px; display: table; zoom: 1;"><div id="toctitle" style="direction: ltr; text-align: center;"><h2 style="background: none; margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; border: none; display: inline; line-height: 1.3;">Contents</h2>  [<a role="button" tabindex="0" id="togglelink" style="font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none; cursor: pointer;">hide</a>] </div><ul style="list-style-type: none; margin: 0.3em 0px; padding: 0px; list-style-image: none;"><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-1" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#Background" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">1Background</a></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-2" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#Early_stages" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">2Early stages</a></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-3" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#Announcement" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">3Announcement</a></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-4" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#Primary_campaign" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">4Primary campaign</a><ul style="list-style-type: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2em; padding: 0px; list-style-image: none;"><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-5" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#October_1999" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">4.1October 1999</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-6" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#November_1999" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">4.2November 1999</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-7" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#December_1999" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">4.3December 1999</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-8" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#January_2000" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">4.4January 2000</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-9" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#February_2000" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">4.5February 2000</a></li></ul></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-10" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#Withdrawal" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">5Withdrawal</a></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-11" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#Results" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">6Results</a></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-12" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#Aftermath" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">7Aftermath</a></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-13" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#References" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">8References</a></li></ul></div><h2 linux="Linux" libertine="Libertine" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" serif="serif" line-height="line-height" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; font-weight: normal; margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(170, 170, 170);">Background[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000&action=edit&section=1" title="Edit section: Background" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">edit</a>]</h2>
Months later, during an April 1988 appearance on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Oprah_Winfrey_Show" title="The Oprah Winfrey Show" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">The Oprah Winfrey Show</a>,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-8" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[8]</a> Trump discussed his displeasure with the United States' status as a "debtor nation" and its seeming inability to compete with Japan. Winfrey asked Trump if he would ever run for president. He replied, "Probably not, but I do get tired of seeing the country get ripped off ... I just don't think I have the inclination to do it." Furthermore, he asserted that if he ever did run, he would win the election.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-9" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[9]</a> He later appeared at the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988_Republican_National_Convention" title="1988 Republican National Convention" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">1988 Republican National Convention</a>. In an interview on the floor, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBC_News" title="NBC News" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">NBC News</a> reporter <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Wallace" title="Chris Wallace" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Chris Wallace</a> asked whether Trump's visit to his first national convention would induce him to "take the plunge" into a presidential campaign. In response, Trump downplayed his prior exploration into presidential politics, though repeated that he would win if he ever ran, and praised then-presumptive Republican presidential nominee <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_H.W.Bush" title="George H. W. Bush" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">George H. W. Bush</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-10" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[10]</a> During another convention interview on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_King_Live" title="Larry King Live" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Larry King Live</a>, Trump dismissed the speculation that he had considered running for president and commented, "I doubt I’ll ever be involved in politics beyond what I do right now."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-caller-3" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[3]</a> Talk of a potential Trump candidacy grew silent for much of the next decade.Real estate magnate <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump" title="Donald Trump" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Donald Trump</a>, head of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Trump_Organization" title="The Trump Organization" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">The Trump Organization</a> since 1971, first dabbled in presidential politics in the early summer of 1987. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Party(United_States)" title="Republican Party (United States)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Republican</a> political organizer Mike Dunbar, unimpressed with the candidates for the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,1988" title="United States presidential election, 1988" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">1988 Republican presidential nomination</a>, founded the "Draft Trump for President" organization. Believing Trump had the makings of a president, Dunbar pitched Trump the idea of speaking at an event for Republican candidates in the first-in-the-nation primary state of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Hampshire" title="New Hampshire" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">New Hampshire</a>. According to Dunbar in a later interview, Trump was receptive to this idea.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-1" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[1]</a> Then a registered <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Party(United_States)" title="Democratic Party (United States)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Democrat</a>, Trump officially changed his registration to Republican in July 1987.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-five-2" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[2]</a> Speculation that he would actually run for president intensified two months later,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-caller-3" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[3]</a> when he purchased $94,801 worth of full-page advertisements in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_York_Times" title="The New York Times" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">The New York Times</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Globe" class="mw-redirect" title="Boston Globe" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Boston Globe</a>, and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Post" title="The Washington Post" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">The Washington Post</a> with the heading "There’s nothing wrong with America’s Foreign Defense Policy that a little backbone can’t cure." The advertisements reflected Trump's concerns that <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan" title="Japan" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Japan</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Arabia" title="Saudi Arabia" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Saudi Arabia</a>, and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuwait" title="Kuwait" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Kuwait</a> were taking advantage of American money and protection without providing any benefit to the United States.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-4" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[4]</a> The next month, as Dunbar had proposed, Trump appeared at a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotary_Club" class="mw-redirect" title="Rotary Club" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Rotary Club</a> luncheon in New Hampshire. There, he delivered what The New York Times described as an "impassioned speech," in which he expressed concern about the United States being "pushed around" by its allies and proposed that "these countries that are ripping us off pay off the $200 billion deficit." In the audience, college students held placards reading "Trump for President." Nevertheless, Trump proclaimed, "I'm not here because I'm running for President. I'm here because I'm tired of our country being kicked around and I want to get my ideas across."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-5" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[5]</a> Later, Trump appeared on the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phil_Donahue_Show" class="mw-redirect" title="Phil Donahue Show" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Phil Donahue Show</a>. After the appearance, he received a letter from former President <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Nixon" title="Richard Nixon" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Richard Nixon</a> in which Nixon explained that his wife <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pat_Nixon" title="Pat Nixon" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Pat</a>, "an expert on politics," had seen Trump on the show and "predicts that whenever you decide to run for office you will be a winner!"<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-6" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[6]</a> In November 1987, Trump released <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump:The_Art_of_the_Deal" title="Trump: The Art of the Deal" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">The Art of the Deal</a>, which became a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_York_Times_Best_Seller_list" title="The New York Times Best Seller list" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">New York Times bestseller</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-7" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[7]</a>In 1995, industrialist <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_Perot" title="Ross Perot" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Ross Perot</a>, who had received 18.9 percent of the vote during his Independent <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_Perot_presidential_campaign,1992" title="Ross Perot presidential campaign, 1992" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">1992 run for president</a>, formed the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reform_Party_of_the_United_States_of_America" title="Reform Party of the United States of America" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Reform Party of the United States of America</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-11" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[11]</a> Though Perot won the party's 1996 nomination and garnered 8.4 percent of the popular vote, rifts had begun forming within the party. Former Colorado Governor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lamm" title="Richard Lamm" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Richard Lamm</a>, who unsuccessfully challenged Perot for the 1996 presidential nomination, accused Perot of using the party as a personal vehicle, and broke off with his supporters to form a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Reform_Party" title="American Reform Party" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">new party</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-12" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[12]</a> In 1998, former professional wrestler <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Ventura" title="Jesse Ventura" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Jesse Ventura</a> was elected <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governor_of_Minnesota" title="Governor of Minnesota" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Governor of Minnesota</a> as a member of the Reform Party—the party's most significant victory—but Perot and his followers were not receptive to Ventura and his political allies.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-ventura-13" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[13]</a> The Perot-faction adamantly, though unsuccessfully, attempted to prevent the election of Ventura supporter <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Gargan(politician)" title="Jack Gargan (politician)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Jack Gargan</a> as party chairman in 1999 when Perot backer <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russ_Verney" title="Russ Verney" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Russ Verney</a> chose not to stand for re-election for his term ending January 1, 2000.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-14" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[14]</a> Opting not to run for president himself in 2000,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-ventura-13" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[13]</a> Ventura searched for candidates.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-exit-15" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[15]</a> Initially, he courted <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WWE" title="WWE" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">WWF Board Member</a> and former <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governor_of_Connecticut" class="mw-redirect" title="Governor of Connecticut" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Connecticut governor</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lowell_P.Weicker,Jr." class="mw-redirect" title="Lowell P. Weicker, Jr." style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Lowell P. Weicker, Jr.</a>. He then turned to friend and wrestling aficionado Donald Trump.<h2 linux="Linux" libertine="Libertine" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" serif="serif" line-height="line-height" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; font-weight: normal; margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(170, 170, 170);">Early stages[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000&action=edit&section=2" title="Edit section: Early stages" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">edit</a>]</h2>In 1999, The New York Times reported that Jesse Ventura first approached Trump about a possible <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,2000" title="United States presidential election, 2000" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">2000 presidential</a> run while both were in attendance at a wrestling event in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_City" class="mw-redirect" title="Atlantic City" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Atlantic City</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-16" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[16]</a> Trump's ambitions may have spawned earlier. The America We Deserve co-writer Dave Shiflett said Trump first thought about running in late 1998, when he looked at his political advantages in money and name recognition, and concluded that he was "at least as competent" as then President <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton" title="Bill Clinton" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Bill Clinton</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-dave-17" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[17]</a>According to Shiflett, this prompted Trump to ask top aide <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Stone" title="Roger Stone" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Roger Stone</a> to find the "most eminent <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hack_writer" title="Hack writer" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">hack writer</a> in America" to put Trump's political ideas into a book. Stone reached out to Shiflett, a contributor to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_American_Spectator" title="The American Spectator" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">The American Spectator</a>. In Spring 1999, Shiflett met with Trump about the project that would later become The America We Deserve. During the initial meeting, Shiflett claims Trump raised concerns about a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suitcase_nuclear_device" title="Suitcase nuclear device" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">suitcase bomb</a> destroying <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan" title="Manhattan" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Manhattan</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-dave-17" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[17]</a>
Two months later, amid reports that paleoconservative political commentator and adviser <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pat_Buchanan" title="Pat Buchanan" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Pat Buchanan</a> was about to join the Reform Party to seek the nomination, Trump announced that he would consider running as a sign of respect for Ventura. He labeled the views of Buchanan as "prehistoric",<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-22" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[22]</a> and commented that even though he liked Pat, "I'm on the conservative side, but Buchanan is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attila_the_Hun" class="mw-redirect" title="Attila the Hun" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Attila the Hun</a>."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-23" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[23]</a> He expected that a primary battle between the two would be "nasty."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-round-24" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[24]</a> According to columnist <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Novak" title="Robert Novak" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Robert Novak</a>, Bush operatives concerned about a third party run by Buchanan contacted Ventura indirectly about preventing Buchanan's nomination. Novak argued that Trump "seems a bad match with Perot's party, but he may be the GOP's last hope to stop Buchanan."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-25" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[25]</a> When Weicker decided not to seek the party's nomination due to internal bickering, Ventura reportedly went all in for Trump.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-26" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[26]</a> The media capitalized on a potential Trump versus Buchanan challenge,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-round-24" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[24]</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturday_Night_Live" title="Saturday Night Live" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Saturday Night Live</a> satirized it with a skit in which <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darrell_Hammond" title="Darrell Hammond" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Darrell Hammond</a> portraying Trump and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Parnell" title="Chris Parnell" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Chris Parnell</a> as Buchanan pitched their candidacies to Ross Perot, played by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheri_Oteri" title="Cheri Oteri" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Cheri Oteri</a>. The segment also featured an appearance by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Ferrell" title="Will Ferrell" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Will Ferrell</a> as Ventura.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-27" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[27]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-28" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[28]</a>In July 1999, the Democratic<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-nyt-18" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[18]</a> polling firm Schroth and Associates conducted a poll of 400 Reform Party leaders<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-daily-19" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[19]</a> and found Trump tied for third place for the Reform Party presidential nomination.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-nyt-18" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[18]</a> Both the Reform Party and Trump denied having commissioned the poll.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-daily-19" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[19]</a> Days later, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newsweek" title="Newsweek" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Newsweek</a> raised speculation<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-daily-19" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[19]</a> when it cited an unnamed "close friend" of Trump who said Trump was "toying" with the idea of a presidential campaign, allegedly in response to rumors of Ventura's courting of Weicker for a run. Trump purportedly held a grudge against Weicker for blocking his plans to build a casino in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgeport,Connecticut" title="Bridgeport, Connecticut" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Bridgeport</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-20" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[20]</a> in 1994. The two had an exchange of insults in which Weicker labeled Trump a "dirt bag" and Trump referred to Weicker as "a fat slob who couldn't get elected dog catcher."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-nyt-18" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[18]</a> In response to the Newsweek report, Trump sent out a press release in which he criticized the two party system, praised the Reform Party, and stated "If the Reform Party nominated me, I would probably run and probably win." However, he added that if the party nominated him, he would ask for "an immediate recount."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-nyt-18" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[18]</a> In an interview, he told The New York Times, "I'm honored and I'm flattered [by the speculation], but the fact is I've never had more fun than I'm having right now, building the most spectacular buildings in New York."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-nyt-18" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[18]</a>Chairman Verney denied that the Reform Party had any interest in Trump, explaining that party members had "never spent one second thinking about him." <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-daily-19" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[19]</a> A CNN-Time poll conducted later in July showed Trump with seven percent support nationally in a match up against Republican candidate <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W.Bush" title="George W. Bush" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">George W. Bush</a> and Vice President <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Gore" title="Al Gore" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Al Gore</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-johnson-21" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[21]</a>Trump further increased speculation of a full-scale campaign when his publisher <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaissance_Books" title="Renaissance Books" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Renaissance Books</a> announced a January 2000 release date for The American We Deserve. The publisher's press release announced a book tour and teased, "Donald Trump for President? Run or not, Donald Trump's ideas will have a major impact on the next presidential election."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-29" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[29]</a> Trump set January also as the month on which he would decide whether to run. He expressed, "I’m not interested in being the [third-party] candidate who gets the most votes in the history of the world outside of the Democratic and Republican parties, I would only consider this if I thought I could win."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-30" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[30]</a> On September 30, Trump wrote an opinion piece in the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wall_Street_Journal" class="mw-redirect" title="Wall Street Journal" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Wall Street Journal</a> titled, "America Needs a President Like Me" in which he argued that he would be "the kind of president America needs in the new millennium." He cited the "repugnant" comments of Buchanan and Ventura's personal encouragement as factors contributing to his decision.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-31" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[31]</a> In an October 6 interview on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dateline_NBC" title="Dateline NBC" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Dateline NBC</a>, Trump affirmed that he was "very serious" about his run.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-32" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[32]</a><h2 linux="Linux" libertine="Libertine" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" serif="serif" line-height="line-height" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; font-weight: normal; margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(170, 170, 170);">Announcement[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000&action=edit&section=3" title="Edit section: Announcement" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">edit</a>]</h2>
On the issues, Trump labeled himself "very conservative," but described his views on healthcare as "quite liberal" and "getting much more liberal," explaining "I believe in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_health_care" title="Universal health care" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">universal health care</a>. I believe in whatever it takes to make people well and better . . . . [I]t's an entitlement to this country if we're going to have a great country." He expressed opposition to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAFTA" class="mw-redirect" title="NAFTA" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">NAFTA</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_control" title="Gun control" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">gun control</a>, and said he would like to see alcohol corporations sued in the same manner as tobacco corporations. For his first presidential term, he proclaimed, "I want to do the right job: straighten out <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Security(United_States)" title="Social Security (United States)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Social Security</a>, get the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_deficit" class="mw-redirect" title="Trade deficit" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">trade deficits</a> in order, and lower taxes."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-announce-35" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[35]</a> As for the lack of a first lady, Trump said he could solve the issue "in 24 hours" by marrying his 29 year old model girlfriend <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melania_Knauss" class="mw-redirect" title="Melania Knauss" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Melania Knauss</a>. In a later interview, Knauss said she would marry Trump under such notice.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-gal-37" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[37]</a> In the role, she said, "I would be very traditional. Like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betty_Ford" title="Betty Ford" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Betty Ford</a> or <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacqueline_Kennedy_Onassis" title="Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Jackie Kennedy</a>. I would support him."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-38" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[38]</a> Trump described Knauss as "a woman of great style and elegance . . . very poised and gracious and able to get along with everyone."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-gal-37" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[37]</a>On October 7, Trump announced on Larry King Live that he formed an <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploratory_committee" title="Exploratory committee" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">exploratory committee</a> to explore a Reform Party presidential bid. Trump planned not to use the committee to raise money—he would personally fund his campaign—but wished to use the committee to advise him on political matters in preparation for a run. In the interview with Larry King, Trump was optimistic about his chances indicating a "very strong possibility" of victory.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-33" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[33]</a> He referenced a non-scientific <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Enquirer" title="National Enquirer" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">National Enquirer</a> poll of 100 individuals, showing him in first place against his Democratic and Republican counterparts.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-johnson-21" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[21]</a> When pressed, Trump identified <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oprah_Winfrey" title="Oprah Winfrey" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Oprah Winfrey</a> as his ideal choice for a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Running_mate" title="Running mate" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">running mate</a>,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-34" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[34]</a> describing her as "somebody that is very special," and that if she agreed to run, "she'd be fantastic . . . she's popular, she's brilliant, she's a wonderful woman."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-announce-35" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[35]</a> Oprah's spokesperson later responded "at this point in time . . . Oprah is not running."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-after-36" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[36]</a> Trump labeled <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudy_Giuliani" title="Rudy Giuliani" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Rudy Giuliani</a> as New York City's greatest <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayor_of_New_York" class="mw-redirect" title="Mayor of New York" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Mayor</a> and spoke admirably of Presidents <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwight_Eisenhower" class="mw-redirect" title="Dwight Eisenhower" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Dwight Eisenhower</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Reagan" title="Ronald Reagan" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Ronald Reagan</a>, saying that Reagan had a demeanor that contributed to a phenomenal spirit in the nation. Trump argued that President Bill Clinton could have been a great president, but destroyed his legacy with the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewinsky_scandal" title="Lewinsky scandal" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Lewinsky scandal</a>. As for the Reform Party, Trump offered praise for both Perot and Ventura, and attacked potential primary opponent Buchanan as someone "enamored" with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler" title="Adolf Hitler" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Adolf Hitler</a>, based on Buchanan's thesis that Hitler presented no military threat to the United States ahead of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II" title="World War II" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">World War II</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-announce-35" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[35]</a>After the announcement, Trump and Knauss had dinner with Ventura and were joined by actor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woody_Harrelson" title="Woody Harrelson" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Woody Harrelson</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-after-36" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[36]</a> Ventura later commented that Trump's chances of success depended on his impression of the Reform Party.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-johnson-21" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[21]</a> Onlookers questioned Trump's motive in running. Democratic pollster Harrison Hickman expressed doubts about the authenticity of Trump's campaign, saying "It’s all marketing of his name."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-after-36" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[36]</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matt_Bai" title="Matt Bai" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Matt Bai</a> of Newsweek commented "Most serious-minded people think Trump's flirtation with the Reform Party's presidential nomination is just a publicity stunt."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-wave-39" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[39]</a> Ex-wife <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivana_Trump" title="Ivana Trump" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Ivana Trump</a> doubted he would actually run.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-40" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[40]</a> Former New York City Mayor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Koch" title="Ed Koch" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Ed Koch</a> commented that people would likely not flock to Trump's campaign, suggesting that Trump was merchandising his brand.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-usa-41" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[41]</a> Trump disagreed with the critics, arguing that even though his sales had increased as a result of media coverage, he was serious about the campaign.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-wave-39" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[39]</a> Roger Stone was hired as director of the exploratory committee.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-42" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[42]</a><h2 linux="Linux" libertine="Libertine" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" serif="serif" line-height="line-height" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; font-weight: normal; margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(170, 170, 170);">Primary campaign[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000&action=edit&section=4" title="Edit section: Primary campaign" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">edit</a>]</h2><h3 style="background-image: none; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; overflow: hidden; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; border-bottom: none; line-height: 1.6;">October 1999[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000&action=edit&section=5" title="Edit section: October 1999" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">edit</a>]</h3>
Before Trump could venture out on the campaign trail, he had to tend to some personal matters. In an interview with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Daily_Telegraph" title="The Daily Telegraph" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">The Daily Telegraph</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marla_Maples" title="Marla Maples" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Marla Maples</a>, Trump's second ex-wife, threatened to reveal what Trump "is really like" if he chose to run for president in the general election. In response, Trump withheld $1.5 million in alimony he owed Maples, claiming she was in violation of the confidentiality agreement in the couple's <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divorce" title="Divorce" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">divorce</a> decree. After a Manhattan judge refused to hear the matter, a brief conference was held, wherein the judge's law secretary advised Trump to pay the alimony and advised Maples that further incidents would be cause for the judge to reconsider hearing the matter.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-44" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[44]</a> Trump's attorneys were satisfied that the meeting would cause Maples to rethink making any public statements on her marriage to Trump.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-45" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[45]</a>Trump's announcement made way for the anticipated Buchanan–Trump primary contest with Buchanan himself moving closer to mounting a Reform Party bid. Buchanan announced he would decide whether to join the race by late October. A Schroth and Associates poll of 500 people who voted for Perot in 1996, showed Buchanan with a slight edge over Trump, 32 percent to 29 percent.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-usa-41" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[41]</a> Though Ventura wished to prevent a Buchanan nomination, he did not publicly endorse Trump. Some of Ventura's advisers were skeptical of Trump's campaign and wanted Ventura to leave the party if a Buchanan nomination appeared imminent.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-wave-39" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[39]</a> Ventura's place in the party had become a subject of controversy. Chairman Verney asked Ventura to leave the party in early October after Ventura commented in a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Playboy" title="Playboy" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Playboy</a> interview that "organized religion is a sham and a crutch."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-43" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[43]</a> Perot also decided not to make an endorsement during the primary campaign, despite Buchanan's plea that Perot publicly support his entrance into the race.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-usa-41" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[41]</a>On October 24, Trump appeared on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meet_the_Press" title="Meet the Press" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Meet the Press</a>, where he announced that he would officially join the Reform Party. During the interview, Trump questioned why a politician was better suited to be president than him, commenting "I understand this stuff." He said that the Republican Party has become "too crazy right." Notably, he identified Buchanan as a "Hitler-lover" and mused, "I guess he's an anti-Semite . . . He doesn't like the blacks, he doesn't like the gays. It's just incredible that anybody could embrace this guy."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-mtp-46" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[46]</a> As for his reputation as a womanizer, Trump said he would not run if he believed it would be an impediment.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-mtp-46" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[46]</a> The next day, Trump formally joined the Reform Party, changing his voter registration from Republican to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independence_Party_of_New_York" title="Independence Party of New York" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Independence Party</a>, the New York affiliate of the Reform Party. On the same day, Buchanan announced that he too would leave the Republican Party to join with the Reform Party and attempt to obtain its presidential nomination.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-47" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[47]</a> Buchanan said he refused to engage in a "name-calling" contest with Trump but made a thinly veiled attack against Trump's wealth, arguing, "I don't believe the Reform Party nomination can be bought, and I don't believe the Presidency can be bought."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-mtp-46" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[46]</a> On <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Face_the_Nation" title="Face the Nation" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Face the Nation</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pat_Choate" title="Pat Choate" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Pat Choate</a>, the Reform Party's 1996 vice presidential nominee, said Trump would "make a good candidate," but argued that Buchanan could challenge Trump "on the merits" and that Trump and the media were misrepresenting Buchanan's views through "hate politics." Other party members expressed reservations about Trump's comments and personal life.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-mtp-46" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[46]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-48" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[48]</a> Verney wondered "what the compelling reason is for him to seek the presidency."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-Perot-49" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[49]</a> Trump acknowledged himself as "certainly controversial" but labeled himself as "a great businessman," who would "make the greatest treaties that this country's seen in a long time."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-50" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[50]</a> On <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fox_News_Sunday" title="Fox News Sunday" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Fox News Sunday</a>, he criticized <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_the_United_States_Trade_Representative" title="Office of the United States Trade Representative" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">U.S. Trade Representative</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlene_Barshefsky" title="Charlene Barshefsky" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Charlene Barshefsky</a> and said that as president he himself would fill the position and negotiate trade deals with other countries. He identified <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France" title="France" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">France</a>, Japan, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germany" title="Germany" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Germany</a>, and Saudi Arabia as nations taking advantage of badly negotiated trade deals with the United States.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-51" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[51]</a><h3 style="background-image: none; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; overflow: hidden; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; border-bottom: none; line-height: 1.6;">November 1999[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000&action=edit&section=6" title="Edit section: November 1999" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">edit</a>]</h3>In an effort speculated to implore the media to view the campaign more seriously,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-cbs-52" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[52]</a> Trump rolled out a tax proposal that became the subject of attention. In a series of telephone interviews in early November,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-cbs-52" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[52]</a> Trump proposed a one-time 14.25 percent "net worth tax" that would apply to individuals and trusts with assets greater than $10 million. The plan was meant to raise $5.7 trillion in revenue to wipe out the national debt, estimated at the time to be $5.66 trillion. The plan exempted one's homestead from the calculation. Trump estimated that the tax would only apply to one percent of the population and that the remaining 99 percent would receive a federal income tax cut as well as an elimination of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estate_tax" class="mw-redirect" title="Estate tax" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">estate tax</a>. He projected a 35 to 40 percent increase in economic activity as a result and eliminate $200 billion in federal interest payments, half of which would be used to fund middle class tax cuts and the rest to allocate for Social Security.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-53" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[53]</a> The original plan provided only one year for taxpayers to pay the new tax, but that was later increased to 10 years. Economists predicted that enactment of the plan would "risk capital flight"<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-54" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[54]</a> and "prick" the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stock_market_bubble" title="Stock market bubble" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">stock market bubble</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-cbs-52" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[52]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-55" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[55]</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Bartlett" title="Bruce Bartlett" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Bruce Bartlett</a> of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Center_for_Policy_Analysis" title="National Center for Policy Analysis" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">National Center for Policy Analysis</a> wrote in the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wall_Street_Journal" class="mw-redirect" title="Wall Street Journal" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Wall Street Journal</a> that the proposed rate would fall short of its goal and that at any rate, would introduce "devastating" disruption to the economic system.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-56" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[56]</a> Tax attorney Robert L. Sommers, writing in the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco_Chronicle" title="San Francisco Chronicle" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">San Francisco Chronicle</a>, argued that many wealthy people lacked sufficient cash on hand to pay the tax and that doing so would lead to the mass liquidation of assets, "roil[ing] the stock and real estate markets."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-sfgate-57" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[57]</a> Trump defended his plan, rejecting the speculation that it would be "a shock to the system."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-cbs-52" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[52]</a> Roger Stone noted that Trump had been thinking about the plan for a while and that he felt so strong about it that he was willing to pay $725 million of his own money in taxes under it.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-sfgate-57" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[57]</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CBS_News" title="CBS News" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">CBS News</a> speculated that the plan meant to appeal to middle and lower class Americans.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-cbs-52" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[52]</a> Trump's tax plan differed significantly from the plan put forward by Reform Party rival Buchanan, who had called for a 16 percent <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_tax" title="Flat tax" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">flat tax</a> on earnings over $35,000.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-cbs-52" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[52]</a><div class="quotebox" style="float: right; clear: right; margin: 0.5em 0px 0.8em 1.4em; width: 215px; padding: 6px; border: 1px solid rgb(170, 170, 170); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 240);"><div class="" style="position: relative;"><div style="margin: 0px 2em;">I think the only difference between me and the other candidates is that I'm more honest and my women are more beautiful.</div><div times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-weight="font-weight" bold="bold" font-size="font-size" large="large" color="color" gray="gray" style="position: absolute; left: 0px; top: 0px;">“</div><div times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-weight="font-weight" bold="bold" font-size="font-size" large="large" color="color" gray="gray" style="position: absolute; right: 0px; bottom: 0px;">”</div></div><cite style="font-style: inherit; display: block; text-align: center;">Donald Trump<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-dowd-58" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[58]</a></cite></div>Despite the discussion of substantive issues, the campaign's seriousness continued to come under attack. Ed Koch elevated his criticisms of the campaign, calling it "fraudulent" and arguing that Trump is the "greatest con artist in the world when it comes to trumpeting his own name . . . . [M]y gut tells me that he knows nothing [about policy]."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-59" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[59]</a> Former White House adviser <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Morris" title="Dick Morris" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Dick Morris</a> said "I think he's mainly selling books." Republican strategist <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Rollins" title="Ed Rollins" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Ed Rollins</a> questioned whether Trump could "say the right things" or "be willing to let somebody put an organization together." A <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Daily_News" title="New York Daily News" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">New York Daily News</a>/<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WNBC-TV" class="mw-redirect" title="WNBC-TV" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">WNBC-TV</a> poll showed that 74% of New Yorkers believed the campaign was being used only for Trump "to promote himself." Roger Stone commented that the perception problem would "solve itself" once the campaign would reveal the number of petition signatures it collected.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-60" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[60]</a> By mid-November, the campaign started receiving advice from political consultant Douglas Friedline, who ran Ventura's successful <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota_gubernatorial_election,1998" title="Minnesota gubernatorial election, 1998" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">1998 gubernatorial campaign</a>. Upon Friedline's advice, Trump assembled communications and campaign staff, and began planning events in strategic states.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-neal-61" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[61]</a> As a further step in organization, Trump set up a campaign website at the domain www.donaldjtrump2000.com and used Ventura's webmaster, Phil Madsen, to create an online community of supporters.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-62" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[62]</a>On his first campaign stop, Trump traveled to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miami" title="Miami" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Miami</a>, Florida and spoke before the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_American_National_Foundation" title="Cuban American National Foundation" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Cuban American National Foundation</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-63" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[63]</a> The foundation invited Trump after he wrote a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miami_Herald" title="Miami Herald" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Miami Herald</a> article denouncing Cuban President <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fidel_Castro" title="Fidel Castro" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Fidel Castro</a> and favoring the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_embargo_against_Cuba" title="United States embargo against Cuba" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">U.S. embargo against Cuba</a> several months earlier.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-neal-61" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[61]</a> During the visit, Trump was met with supporters touting "Trump 2000" posters and shouting "Viva Donald Trump!" There, he delivered his first foreign policy speech, capped with the line, "I'd have, personally, two words for [Castro]: 'Adios, amigo!'" Covering the event, columnist <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maureen_Dowd" title="Maureen Dowd" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Maureen Dowd</a> wrote that the fascination with Trump was the "apotheosis of our <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilded_Age" title="Gilded Age" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Gilded Age</a>," where "money, celebrity, polling, and crass behavior" warp politics and the television show <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who_Wants_to_Be_a_Millionaire(U.S.game_show)" title="Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (U.S. game show)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Who Wants to Be a Millionaire</a> dominates the culture.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-dowd-58" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[58]</a>Following this theme, Saturday Night Live performed a sketch in which Darrell Hammond reprised his role as Trump, holding a press conference announcing Millionaire winner <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Carpenter(game_show_contestant)" title="John Carpenter (game show contestant)" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">John Carpenter</a> as his running mate.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-64" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[64]</a> Soon thereafter, the actual Trump floated possible running mates and members of his presidential cabinet during a November 28 episode of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_Edition_with_Wolf_Blitzer" title="Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer</a>. He identified Senator <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McCain" title="John McCain" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">John McCain</a>, a Republican presidential candidate, as a possible <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Secretary_of_Defense" title="United States Secretary of Defense" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Secretary of Defense</a>. Trump said he would consider Democratic Congressman <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Rangel" title="Charles Rangel" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Charles Rangel</a> for <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Secretary_of_Housing_and_Urban_Development" title="United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Secretary of Housing and Urban Development</a> and mentioned retired General <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Powell" title="Colin Powell" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Colin Powell</a> as a possible <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Secretary_of_State" title="United States Secretary of State" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Secretary of State</a>. He praised <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Electric" title="General Electric" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">General Electric</a> CEO <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Welch" title="Jack Welch" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Jack Welch</a>, and discussed him as either <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Secretary_of_Treasury" class="mw-redirect" title="United States Secretary of Treasury" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Secretary of Treasury</a> or running mate. He again mentioned Oprah Winfrey as a possible running mate. During the interview, Trump expressed his willingness to spend $100 million to self-finance a full-scale campaign.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-65" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[65]</a> The Reform Party scheduled a debate of the candidates seeking the presidential nomination on December 3 in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portland,Oregon" title="Portland, Oregon" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">Portland, Oregon</a>. When a reporter asked a Trump aide whether Trump would appear, the aide was unaware of the debate. Ultimately, Buchanan attended but Trump did not.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_presidential_campaign,2000#cite_note-ws-66" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; background: none;">[66]</a>.......</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
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