DERRY, N.H.—Gag orders, more than 90 criminal charges, and multiple civil lawsuits against former President Donald Trump are not doing anything to slow down his popularity among supporters, with a huge crowd turning out to hear him speak in New Hampshire on Monday.
The frontrunner in the crowded race for the White House drew an estimated 2,500 to the New England Sports Center in Derry where chants of “Trump,” “USA,” and deafening roars of support showed President Trump was quickly forgiven for being nearly 90 minutes late to the packed, standing room only event.
Upon his arrival, President Trump announced he had just come from the New Hampshire secretary of state’s office to officially file as a candidate for the state’s primary, something a group of state Republicans had recently tried to block him from doing.
In leading the August efforts, former Trump supporter and failed U.S. Senate candidate Bryant Messner argued that anyone who causes an insurrection is barred from running for the presidency under the U.S. Constitution. President Trump is currently under indictment on allegations he led a movement to overthrow the government as part of the Jan. 6, 2021 protests in the U.S. Capitol. Mr. Messner filed a petition seeking to declare President Trump ineligible to participate in the New Hampshire primary.
The New Hampshire secretary of state ultimately rejected the petition, noting that President Trump is “innocent until proven guilty” and that voters in the battleground state will have the ultimate say in who wins the party’s nomination.
In poking fun at his four indictments, President Trump incited a swell of applause and cheers when commented that the four indictments pending against him have only boosted his popularity.
“I go up in the polls every time I get indicted,” he said, speculating his opposition must now be realizing their mistake by understanding that “we are going to indict him right into the White House.”
Among his staunchest supporters who turned out for his New Hampshire appearance were Kathleen Keenan and Jewlianna Ruggiero, two strangers who engaged in a embrace when Ms. Ruggiero, an Israeli-American Jew spotted Ms. Keenan, an Irish Catholic, draped in the Israel flag.
“I wore the flag to show solidarity with Israel,” Ms. Keenan, a staunch Trump supporter who attended the Jan. 6 protest “and was proud to have been there,” she told The Epoch Times. “America is not anti-Semitic.”
Ms. Ruggiero was nearly reduced to tears by Ms. Keenan’s gesture.
Several years ago, Ms. Ruggerio experienced anti-Semitism in New Hampshire when someone taped over the letter “L” on her vanity plate that spelled out her nickname “JEWL,” altering it to read “JEW.”
She recently adopted the X, formerly known as Twitter, username “ultra maga not yet deprogrammed,” the latter part to mock former Secretary of State and First Lady Hillary Clinton’s recent call to “deprogram” Trump supporters.
Now with several relatives fighting on the front lines against Hamas in Israel following the attack by the terrorist group, she believes the only hope for world restoration is President Trump.
“You have people in this country who hate Donald because they hate law and order, that is what he represents,” she said.
Both she and Ms. Keenan said they believe President Trump is the “only chance America has” to prevent what they predict is inevitably another 9/11-style attack, a stark contrast to the opinion of such adversaries as former congresswoman and fellow Republican Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) who over the weekend called President Trump “the single most dangerous threat” to America.
Ms. Cheney made the comment on CNN’s “State of the Union” while also teasing the idea she might jump into the race for the president. She also commented that President Joe Biden is providing “better leadership” on foreign policy over President Trump.
President Trump did not touch upon Ms. Cheney’s comments, but he did show his usual political stance against President Biden, calling him “a dream for Islamic terrorists” and for turning America into “a hot bed of Jihads.”
In laying out a litany of reasons for the barb, President Trump noted terrorists have allegedly entered the United States under the current administration’s unbridled open border policy, and that the Taliban has now become the world’s second-largest trader of military weapons after President Biden left behind billions of dollars of U.S. military equipment in Afghanistan.
The Biden administration was also recently accused of sending $33 million earmarked as COVID-19 disaster relief funds to a Palestinian group with ties to Hamas.
The allocation was revealed in a report by USASpending.gov and first reported on by Fox News a week following the attacks in Israel.
In responding to other recent news reports, President Trump joined in the now widely publicized criticism of President Biden for spending a leisurely day at the beach with First Lady Jill Biden as both domestic and global chaos grew, including concern about Americans being held hostage following the Hamas attack.
“He sleeps on the beach all day and we potentially have World War III going on,” said President Trump.
In published video footage, President Biden and the first lady can be seen lying on beach chairs in their bathing suits on Sunday at Rehoboth Beach in Delaware, the location of a $2.74 million vacation home they own.
President Trump also reiterated key pledges including withholding federal funding of any schools that mandate vaccines and to launch an aggressive deportation of immigrants living illegally in the United States. He also said he would clean up America’s cities including Washington, D.C., which President Trump said has become “a dirty crime riddled death trap” in a short time under the Biden administration.
