Sen. Pat Toomey. Photo: Ting Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Retiring Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) told CNBC on Friday that he does not believe former President Trump should be the Republican presidential nominee in 2024, calling his behavior after the 2020 election "completely unacceptable."
Why it matters: Toomey largely supported Trump and his agenda during his first term, but became one of seven Senate Republicans to vote to convict the former president after he was impeached for his role in the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.
- Toomey was one of the first in his party to congratulate President Biden after his win in the 2020 elections, saying at the time that "Trump should accept the outcome of the election and facilitate the presidential transition process."
Worth noting: Toomey announced last October that he will not seek re-election, insulating him from the threat of a GOP primary challenge that Trump usually directs at his Republican critics.
What he's saying: "I think after what happened post-2020 election, I think the president’s behavior was completely unacceptable, so I don’t think he should be the nominee to lead the party in 2024," Toomey said.
- "I’m a conservative Republican by any objective measure, by looking at the voting record, by looking at my views compared to that of a traditional conservative Republican," he added.
- "It is President Trump who departed from Republican orthodoxy and conservative orthodoxy in a variety of ways. I stuck to the conservative views that I’ve had for a long time, he had a different point of view on matters such as trade and sometimes immigration and other things."