Will Hurd ends long-shot bid for GOP nomination, backs Haley

By Will Weissert | Associated Press

WASHINGTON — Former Texas congressman Will Hurd suspended his Republican presidential bid Monday, abandoning a brief campaign built on criticizing Donald Trump at a time when his party seems even more determined to embrace the former president.

Hurd said on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, that he was endorsing Nikki Haley, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, for the GOP nomination.

“While I appreciate all the time and energy our supporters have given, it is important to recognize the realities of the political landscape and the need to consolidate our party around one person to defeat both Donald Trump and President Biden,” Hurd wrote.

He said Haley “has shown a willingness to articulate a different vision for the country than Donald Trump and has an unmatched grasp on the complexities of our foreign policy.”

Hurd was the last major candidate to join the already crowded Republican primary field when he announced his run in late July. He leaves the race after failing to gain traction as pragmatic moderate who pledged to lead the party away from Trump’s “Make America Great Again” movement. Hurd failed to qualify for both the first GOP debate in Milwaukee in August and the second debate the following month in Simi Valley, California.

Hurd ending his campaign follows another Republican candidate, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, who became the first presidential hopeful to suspend his campaign shortly after failing to make the first debate stage.

Hurd wasn’t invited to the Milwaukee event after falling short of Republican National Committee minimums on support in the polls and sufficient numbers of donors to his campaign.

Hurd was initially defiant about missing the debate, arguing that the Republican Party blocked him for refusing to sign a pledge for its presidential candidates to support the eventual primary winner, even if it was Trump. The RNC standards are “arbitrary, unclear, and lack consistency. This is an unacceptable process for a presidential election,” he said in a statement.

When he didn’t make the second debate, Hurd wasn’t defiant. He wrote on X that “we narrowly missed the cut for the second debate and our campaign is at an inflection point.”

A clandestine CIA officer who worked in Pakistan, Hurd served three terms in the House through January 2021 and was the chamber’s only Black Republican during his final two years in office. He represented Texas’ then-most competitive district, which was heavily Hispanic and stretched from the outskirts of San Antonio to El Paso, encompassing more than 800 miles of Texas-Mexico border.

Hurd opted not to seek reelection in 2020, saying he was pursuing opportunities outside Congress “to solve problems at the nexus between technology and national security.” Last year, he traveled the country promoting his book “American Reboot: An Idealist’s Guide to Getting Big Things Done.”

The 46-year-old has long been a fierce Trump antagonist, even encouraging the then-Republican presidential nominee to leave the 2016 race when the “Access Hollywood” tape in which Trump brags about sexually assaulting women was made public in the final weeks before Election Day.

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