Trump campaign delayed rally to avoid 'embarrassment' -- not because of New Hampshire's weather: Ex-RNC head

President Donald Trump postponed his New Hampshire rally due to weather concerns, and former Republican National Committee chair Michael Steele thinks that's a bogus excuse.

Saturday's rally at a Portsmouth airport will be rescheduled for later after forecasts called for storms early in the day, with a 20 percent chance of rain by evening, but new reporting suggests the Trump campaign was concerned about attendance.

"Carol Lee and her team are reporting that some White House officials are saying, 'We don't need another Tulsa,'" said MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell.

Trump's first rally since the coronavirus lockdowns eased drew only about 6,500 supporters to Oklahoma, and Steele said that was politically damaging to an already weak incumbent.

"It's a different narrative when you're, as you saw, in Tulsa and in Arizona, where the numbers were far shorter off the mark than what the president's team had projected and was telling the public," Steele said. "That kind of political embarrassment where polling numbers, just fresh out today are showing only 37 percent of the country supporting how the president is handling any of this, 33 percent of the American people supporting how the president is handling the racism."

"You don't need to compound that narrative with the visual of half empty halls," he added. "So, this, to me, smacks more of a political withdrawal as opposed to one being called by the weather."