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Donald Trump, 2016
Donald Trump speaking in January 2016. Photo credit: Evan Guest / Wikimedia (CC BY 2.0 DEED)

On Saturday, Donald Trump received a hostile reception at the Libertarian Party convention. On Sunday, he received six votes when attendees were called upon to elect their party's presidential nominee.

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A day after getting booed while addressing the Libertarian convention, Donald Trump received a whopping six write-in votes when attendees selected their party’s nominee on Sunday. He barely edged out former porn star Stormy Daniels and Denali the Cat, one of whom he had an affair with.

The former president had asked Libertarians for their vote, saying that they would otherwise be irrelevant once again.

“Only do that if you want to win,” Trump said. “If you want to lose, don’t do that. Keep getting your three percent every four years.”

In an election that will very likely come down to a few thousand votes in a handful of states, the former president knows that he will need all the support he can get, and most of what the Libertarians want is more closely aligned with the GOP platform than with that of the Democrats.

Therefore, Trump did his best to pander to the crowd by making several promises, including the vow to commute the sentence of Ross Ulbricht “on day one.” Ulbricht founded the website Silk Road, which was a major hub for the sale of illegal drugs. He was sentenced to life in prison in 2015, meaning that he has already spent four years in the slammer while Trump was president (without commuting the sentence).

However, in the end, that apparently did not sway attendees, who gave him a mere six write-in votes when it was time to select the Libertarian presidential candidate. That amounts to less than one percent of the vote.

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. did not fare much better with a total of 19 votes.

Trump, who is used to addressing more adoring crowds, put his trademark spin on the loud boos that had accompanied his speech.

And by “trademark spin,” we mean that he presented an alternative reality of what happened.

According to the former president, he totally could have gotten the Libertarian nomination if those pesky rules had not prevented him from doing so… and those boos were actually not boos at all.

“The reason I didn’t file paperwork for the Libertarian Nomination, which I would have absolutely gotten if I wanted it (as everyone could tell by the enthusiasm of the Crowd last night!), was the fact that, as the Republican Nominee, I am not allowed to have the Nomination of another Party,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform.

Trump then slammed RFK Jr., noting that he is not a libertarian, and that only a fool would vote for him.

The former is certainly true. As for the latter, three times as many “fools” voted for RFK Jr. than for Trump himself… but at least the former president got five more votes than Stormy Daniels.

Author

  • Klaus Marre

    Klaus Marre is a writer, editor, former congressional reporter, and director of the WhoWhatWhy Mentor Apprentice Program. Follow him on Twitter @KlausMarre.

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