Former President Donald Trump says that the recent media coverage of courts challenging his right to be on the ballot using the 14th Amendment has only boosted his popularity.
“To be honest with you, I’m much more popular now than I would have been if they didn’t do it,” Trump said to a crowd of his supporters while speaking in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, on Saturday.
Trump told the crowd at the Commit to Caucus event that the push to remove him from the ballot has backfired, as he says support for him is far greater than it was in 2016 or 2020.
In Michigan, Minnesota, and Colorado, voters and advocacy groups sought to disqualify Trump from running in 2024, citing the insurrection clause in Section 3 of the 14th Amendment and Trump’s actions on Jan. 6, 2021.
The clause says that those who have previously engaged in insurrections are not eligible to hold office. However, courts in each of the three states have decided in favor of Trump, citing not enough information or precedent to make a ruling the other way.
During the rally, Trump also took time to discuss potential opponents.
“But disinformation and misinformation, they always say ‘we want to really run against Trump,’” Trump said. “They want to run against me. They wouldn’t have indicted me four times and fought like hell to keep me off the ballot.”
He continued, taking a shot also at the media.
“But the fake news and the stupid people at the Wall Street Journal editorial board, they said the other day, ‘Well, they really want to run against Trump,’” he said. “Look, they said that in 2016, and we won. They said that in 2020, we did much better than anybody.”
Trump also claimed that in the last election, he received more votes than any sitting president in history, though he refused to acknowledge that he lost the 2020 election to President Biden.