Former U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, a one-time presidential candidate who announced this week that she’s leaving the Democratic Party, will campaign for a Republican U.S. Senate candidate ahead of the 2022 midterms.
Retired Army Gen. Don Bolduc, who won the New Hampshire Republican primary and will face incumbent Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) in the Nov. 8 general election, confirmed in a statement on Oct. 12 that the former Hawaii congresswoman will be stumping for him.
Bolduc has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump.
He added, “I am going to spend every day between now and Election Day building a wide coalition of supporters that includes Republicans, independents, and even disaffected Democrats who know that Senator Hassan is a career politician and must be retired.”
Gabbard drew headlines on Oct. 11 when she announced she was leaving the Democratic Party. She was a candidate for the Democrats in the 2020 presidential election after having served multiple terms in the House of Representatives.
“If you can no longer stomach the direction that the so-called woke Democratic Party ideologues are taking our country, then I invite you to join me,” she in a video posted on Twitter. Democrats “divide us by racializing every issue & stoking anti-white racism, who actively work to undermine our God-given freedoms enshrined in our Constitution.”
Although Gabbard ultimately endorsed Joe Biden for president in 2020, she’s since been critical of his administration. The former lawmaker continued to target Biden in her video message.
“President [Joe] Biden campaigned on a message of unity, healing the partisan divide and bringing the country together. He just gave a big speech saying supporters of President Trump are the most extremist group in our country and a threat to our democracy. That’s half the country,” she remarked.
In her video message, Gabbard didn’t indicate if she would be joining another political party.
“I will say, with our two-party system, I think it is broken. And it’s largely broken because of the outsized amount of power that the two parties have, making it impossible for really there to be a viable independent or third party,” she said in January 2020.
Gabbard served in the House from 2013 and 2021 and was the vice chair of the Democratic National Committee from 2013 to 2016. She’s a combat veteran with several deployments to the Middle East and Africa, and holds the rank of lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve.
