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Former US president Donald Trump has kicked off his 2024 White House bid with stops in New Hampshire and South Carolina.
Key points:
- Mr Trump is the first Republican to announce his run
- Other possible contenders include Ron DeSantis, Mike Pence and Nikki Haley
- In New Hampshire, Mr Trump said his policies would be the opposite of President Joe Biden's
The events in early-voting states mark the first campaign appearances since he announced his latest run more than two months ago.
"Together we will complete the unfinished business of making America great again," Mr Trump said at an evening event in Columbia to introduce his South Carolina leadership team.
Mr Trump and his allies hope the events in states with enormous power in selecting the nominee will offer a show of force behind the former president after a sluggish start to his campaign that left many questioning his commitment to running again.
"They said, 'He's not doing rallies, he's not campaigning. Maybe he's lost that step,'" Mr Trump said at the New Hampshire GOP's annual meeting in Salem, his first event.
But, he told the audience of party leaders: "I'm more angry now and I'm more committed now than I ever was."
In South Carolina, he further dismissed the speculation by saying: "We have huge rallies planned, bigger than ever before."
While Mr Trump has spent the months since he announced largely ensconced in his Florida club and at his nearby golf course, his aides insist they have been busy behind the scenes.
His campaign opened a headquarters in Palm Beach, Florida, and has been hiring staff.
And in recent weeks, backers have been reaching out to political operatives and elected officials to secure support for Mr Trump at a critical point when other Republicans are preparing their own expected challenges.
In New Hampshire, Mr Trump promoted his campaign agenda, including immigration and crime, and said his policies would be the opposite of President Joe Biden's.
He cited the Democrats' move to change the election calendar, costing New Hampshire its lead-off primary spot, and accused Mr Biden, a fifth-place finisher in New Hampshire in 2020, of "disgracefully trashing this beloved political tradition".
"I hope you're going to remember that during the general election," Mr Trump told party members.
Mr Trump himself twice won the primary, but lost the state each time to Democrats.
Trump mocks Biden, transgender people and electric cars
Later in South Carolina, Mr Trump said he planned to keep the state's presidential primary as the "first in the South" and called it "a very important state".
In his speech, he hurtled from criticism of Mr Biden and Democrats to disparaging comments about transgender people, mockery of people promoting the use of electric stoves and electric cars, and reminiscing about efforts while serving as president to increase oil production, strike trade deals and crack down on migration at the US-Mexico border.
While Mr Trump remains the only declared 2024 presidential candidate, potential challengers, including Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, former vice-president Mike Pence and former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley, who was Mr Trump's ambassador to the United Nations, are expected to get their campaigns underway in the coming months.
After his South Carolina speech, Mr Trump told the Associated Press in an interview that it would be "a great act of disloyalty" if Governor DeSantis opposed him in the primary and took credit for the governor's initial election.
"If he runs, that's fine. I'm way up in the polls," Mr Trump said.
"He's going to have to do what he wants to do, but he may run. I do think it would be a great act of disloyalty because, you know, I got him in. He had no chance. His political life was over."
He said he had not spoken to Mr DeSantis in a long time.
Governor Henry McMaster, US senator Lindsey Graham and several members of the state's congressional delegation attended Mr Trump's event at the statehouse.
Mr Trump's team has struggled to line up support from South Carolina politicians, even some who eagerly backed him before.
Republicans hold off on supporting Trump
Some have said that more than a year out from primary balloting is too early to make endorsements or that they are waiting to see who else enters the race.
Others have said it is time for the party to move past Mr Trump to a new generation of leadership.
South Carolina House Speaker Murrell Smith was among the legislative leaders awaiting Trump's arrival, although he said he was there not to make a formal endorsement but to welcome the former president to the state in his role as speaker.
Otherwise, dozens of supporters crammed into the ceremonial lobby between the state House and Senate, competing with reporters and camera crews for space among marble-topped tables and a life-sized bronze statue of former vice-president John C Calhoun.
Dave Wilson, president of conservative Christian nonprofit Palmetto Family, said some conservative voters may have concerns about Mr Trump's recent comments that Republicans who opposed abortion without exceptions had cost the party in the November elections.
"It gives pause to some folks within the conservative ranks of the Republican Party as to whether or not we need the process to work itself out," said Mr Wilson, whose group hosted Mr Pence for a speech in 2021.
But Gerri McDaniel, who worked on Mr Trump's 2016 campaign, rejected the idea that voters were ready to move on from the former president.
"Some of the media keep saying he's losing his support. No, he's not," she said.
"It's only going to be greater than it was before because there are so many people who are angry about what's happening in Washington."
The South Carolina event was in some ways off-brand for a one-time reality television star who typically favours big rallies and has tried to cultivate an outsider image.
Rallies are expensive, and Mr Trump added new financial challenges when he decided to begin his campaign in November — far earlier than many had urged.
That leaves him subject to strict fundraising regulations and bars him from using his well-funded leadership political action committee to pay for such events, which can cost several million dollars.
AP