Americans for Prosperity, a fundraising organization established by powerful conservatives Charles and David Koch, is not endorsing former President Donald Trump in the 2024 Republican primary, the organization implied in a memo Sunday.
“The best thing for the country would be to have a president in 2025 who represents a new chapter,” a letter from the organization’s CEO, Emily Seidel, said. But the memo didn’t mention Trump by name, leaving open the possibility of an endorsement further down the road.
The move could mark trouble for Trump, if it leads the AFP’s base of wealthy conservative donors away from his campaign. He is the only candidate from a major party to announce a 2024 run so far, though a cast of potential Republican challengers have publicly teased potential campaigns.
“AFP Action is prepared to support a candidate in the Republican presidential primary who can lead our country forward, and who can win,” the letter said.
The AFP also plans to insert themselves “in elections earlier and in more primaries,” Seidel wrote, in order to yield “better candidates.”
“The Republican Party is nominating bad candidates who are advocating for things that go against core American principles. And the American people are rejecting them,” the letter said, evoking the 2022 midterm failures of several prominent conservative Senate candidates (many of them backed by Trump) and the disappointing GOP performance in House races.
The New York Times and the Washington Post initially reported on the memo.
