GOP donors call for sidelining Donald Trump

At least one top Republican donor wants the party to keep Donald Trump from the debate stage.

“Someone in the party ought to start some sort of petition saying, ‘If Trump’s going to be on the stage, I’m not going to be on there with him,’” Republican donor John Jordan told The Associated Press on Monday, according to a report published Tuesday. “I’m toying with the idea of it.”


“It’s something I feel strongly about as somebody who not only cares about the Republican Party, but also Latinos,” he added.

The comments come in the wake of a letter sent by Wyoming-based investor Foster Friess, another top GOP donor, calling for candidates to stay on the “civility reservation,” according to AP.

“Our candidates will benefit if they all submit to Ronald Reagan’s 11th Commandment, ‘Thou shall not speak ill of a fellow Republican,’” Friess wrote in a letter late last week to Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus, obtained by the AP.

According to the report, Friess cited the support of Las Vegas-based casino mogul Sheldon Adelson and Todd Ricketts, the co-owner of the Chicago Cubs. (Ricketts is backing Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker in the primary; Adelson remains officially neutral.)

Republican presidential candidates, from New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, have routinely pointed out flaws in their fellow partisans.

Nearly all of the Republican candidates roundly rejected Trump’s remarks last month that Mexico and other countries are sending rapists and murderers across the border, for example.

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, however, declined to condemn Trump’s comments, telling NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he was not going to be a party to “Republican-on-Republican violence.” Christie responded to those remarks on Fox News, calling it “ironic” that the senator is giving “lectures” on the issue after Christie accused Cruz of sponsoring ads against incumbent Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee in the 2014 election cycle.

According to a copy of Mike Huckabee’s response to Friess obtained by the AP, the former Arkansas governor said he “hope[s] that we don’t commit fratricide again as a party.”