Missouri GOP candidates vie for Trump endorsement despite litany of criminal proceedings

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (First Alert 4) - Republican candidates for Missouri’s statewide races have made their support for former President Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign clear even as he battles 91 felony indictments in four separate cases, carries a civil liability for sexual abuse and defamation, and a judgement of criminal fraud against his namesake organization.

On Friday, Trump was ordered to pay $83.3 million in additional damages to advice columnist E. Jean Carroll. In May, a different jury awarded Carroll $5 million. It found Trump is responsible for sexually abusing Carroll and subsequently defaming her by claiming she made it up. Trump is appealing that award.

Trump, along with his surrogates and supporters, has been largely successful in downplaying the perilous legal position in which he finds himself, – brushing off the litany of vastly different criminal charges and mounds of documented evidence as merely an effort by Democrats to meddle with the 2024 election. He’s used the criminal indictments to feed, in the minds of his supporters, a narrative that he is being unfairly persecuted because of his presidential candidacy, – a sentiment echoed by his acolytes in Missouri.

In most polls, Trump remains ahead of his closest Republican rival, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley.

“It’s time to unite as Republicans and work together to send Donald Trump back to the White House,” Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.

Kehoe leads Missouri’s GOP gubernatorial primary in fundraising and endorsements, and is nearly tied with Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft in recent polling.

“After @NikkiHaley got 3rd in Iowa & claimed it was a “two person race”, she lost by double digits in New Hampshire even with Democrat votes,” Ashcroft posted on X. “It’s time for her to stop being an election denier & rally around @realDonaldTrump as our Republican nominee so we can beat @JoeBiden!”

State Sen. Bill Eigel, R-Weldon Spring, also endorsed  Trump, despite the former president’s campaign directly criticizing Eigel for using Trump’s name in fundraising efforts.

State Treasurer Vivek Malek and Attorney General Andrew Bailey, both of whom are running for reelection, similarly aligned behind Trump.

“What used to be the Republican Party of Bush and Reagan has been taken over by MAGA extremists,” an official statement from the Missouri Democratic Party in remembrance of the January 6th insurrection. “Power hungry Republicans stood by as MAGA fanatics, like [U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley], with an agenda that is divisive, dysfunctional and dangerous to our very Democracy took control of their party. This dysfunction is rampant in our own state legislature where it is a daily contest among Republicans to see who can be the most extreme in attacking the rights and freedoms of Missourians.”