Former independent presidential candidate Evan McMullin is considering running for a Utah Congressional seat currently occupied by House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz, a source close to him told the Daily Beast.
McMullin Still In Debt from Independent Bid
Former presidential candidate Evan McMullin “still owes some $670,000 to vendors who helped his campaign, including more than half a million dollars to a law firm,” the Salt Lake Tribune reports.
McMullin Is Trying to Build a New Party
BuzzFeed looks at Evan McMullin’s real goal in running for president.
“Bald, wiry, and barely 40, McMullin is not a bomb-thrower by nature. He is polite and mild-mannered, and speaks in the earnest cadence of a Mormon missionary asking for permission to come inside and share a brief message about Jesus. As a Capitol Hill policy wonk, McMullin was a loyal cog in the Grand Old Party until he quit his job in August to launch a presidential protest bid under the #NeverTrump banner. Initially, he said, his campaign was intended as a vehicle of reform, meant only to remind the GOP of its conservative principles. But now, in the final weeks of this havoc-wreaking election, McMullin is scanning the wreckage of the Republican Party, and wondering whether there’s anything left to salvage.”
Yahoo News: Is Evan McMullin’s presidential candidacy just a protest, or something bigger?
Evan McMullin Accidentally Picked Running Mate
Politico: “In all nine states where he has officially qualified on the presidential ballot, McMullin has listed a ‘Nathan Johnson’ as his vice presidential nominee. McMullin’s campaign won’t provide any more information about Johnson — including which of the thousands of people named Nathan Johnson the campaign is referring to — saying he is only a placeholder until McMullin names an actual running mate.”
“But in eight of the nine states, top election officials say McMullin’s campaign can’t pull Johnson’s name off the ballot, and that it’s ‘Nathan Johnson’ — not whomever McMullin eventually names as his pick for Vice President — that will appear on the ballot.”
McMullin Hears Trump ‘Hides In His Apartment’
Independent presidential candidate Evan McMullin told Business Insider Donald Trump’s campaign staffers have told him that the GOP nominee has times where he “hides in his apartment” and they’re growing “frustrated.”
McMullin also said that it’s “unclear” whether Trump “will make it through this campaign.”
He continued: “I’m hearing from people inside his campaign that there are times now when he hides in his apartment and doesn’t meet with any people. When he campaigns he goes out to a place he has to fly back home to New York. This is a fragile man and a fragile campaign and I’m not quite sure what’s going to happen in the days and weeks ahead of him. I’m not sure the RNC can continue to support him given his weakness as a man and as a politician and as a candidate for the presidency.”
Anti-Trump Republicans Finally Have a Candidate
“Key players in GOP’s anti-Trump movement are preparing to launch an independent presidential campaign for Evan McMullin — a CIA veteran and the chief policy director of the House Republican conference,” sources close to the effort told BuzzFeed News.
“McMullin has virtually no public profile. He doesn’t appear regularly on television, and has just 135 followers on Twitter. His most high-profile recent appearance seems to have been a TEDx talk about genocide he gave at London Business School in April.”
McMullin will file today and in a statement tells ABC News: “In a year where Americans have lost faith in the candidates of both major parties, it’s time for a generation of new leadership to step up.”
