Stop 'kissing his butt': Trump opponent bashes GOP for backing candidate who doesn't stand 'a chance'

Many critics of former President Donald Trump have been applauding ex-New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's vehement attacks on his 2024 GOP presidential rival — complaining that other candidates, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, have been offering only tepid criticism. A leaked DeSantis debate strategy memo, in fact, even urges the Florida governor to "defend Trump," who is facing four criminal indictments yet remains the Republican presidential primary frontrunner.

Former Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas), another 2024 GOP presidential hopeful, is slamming fellow candidates for not criticizing Trump more aggressively.

During a Sunday, August 20 appearance on MSNBC, Hurd told host Jen Psaki, "What people want is folks that are not afraid of Donald Trump and who are going to articulate a vision for a future and talk about the issues of the day that are impacting them — and not just focusing on Donald Trump's legal baggage…. Here's what we're learning: There's a good chunk of people that are never going to vote for Donald Trump, and there's folks that like Donald Trump, voted for him twice, still like him as a person, and don't think he has a chance in a rematch against Joe Biden."

Poll after poll is showing Trump as the 2024 GOP presidential primary's frontrunner. In a CBS News/YouGov poll released on August 20, Trump leads second-place candidate DeSantis by a whopping 46 percent.

"If Donald Trump is leading in the polls," the former Texas congressman told Psaki, "and he's your opponent, then kissing his butt is not going to help you win."

Hurd is arguing that if Republicans nominate Trump in 2024, President Joe Biden will be the beneficiary.

"(Trump) doesn't want to have to defend his poor record," Hurd told Psaki, Biden's former White House press secretary. "He doesn't want to have to defend all of these issues he's dealing with. These legal issues are self-inflicted wounds. And that's what I'm looking forward to talking about — not only his problems, but articulating what the GOP needs to be doing, so we prevent a trend that has been happening for the last 20 years. And that's losing the general election popular vote."

Republicans have lost the popular vote in seven of the United States' last eight presidential elections. The last Republican presidential nominee who won both the popular vote and the electoral vote was President George W. Bush in 2004.