page_title: Donald Trump 2000 presidential campaign
section_title: Background
hierarchical_section_title: Donald Trump 2000 presidential campaign / Background
caption_attribution_description: English: Donald Trump shaking hands with Bill Clinton at Trump Tower in 2000
context_page_description: Donald Trump's presidential campaign of 2000 for the nomination of the Reform Party began when real estate magnate Donald Trump of New York announced the creation of a presidential exploratory committee on the October 7, 1999 edition of Larry King Live. Although Trump had never held elected office, he was well known for his frequent comments on public affairs and business exploits as head of The Trump Organization. He had previously considered a presidential run in 1988 as a Republican, but chose not to run. For 2000, Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura persuaded Trump to seek the presidential nomination of the Reform Party, which was fracturing despite achieving ballot access and qualifying for matching funds as a result of the 1996 presidential campaign of businessman Ross Perot. Trump's entrance into the Reform Party race coincided with that of paleoconservative commentator Pat Buchanan.
  Trump focused his campaign on the issues of fair trade, eliminating the national debt, and achieving universal healthcare as outlined in the campaign companion piece The America We Deserve, released in January 2000.
context_section_description: Real estate magnate Donald Trump, head of The Trump Organization since 1971, first dabbled in presidential politics in the early summer of 1987.  Republican political organizer Mike Dunbar, unimpressed with the candidates for the 1988 Republican presidential nomination, founded the "Draft Trump for President" organization.  Believing Trump had the makings of a president, Dunbar pitched Trump the idea of speaking at an event for Republican candidates in the first-in-the-nation primary state of New Hampshire.  According to Dunbar in a later interview, Trump was receptive to this idea.  Then a registered Democrat, Trump officially changed his registration to Republican in July 1987.  Speculation that he would actually run for president intensified when he purchased $94,801 worth of full-page advertisements in The New York Times, Boston Globe, and The Washington Post with the heading "There's nothing wrong with America's Foreign Defense Policy that a little backbone can't cure."  The advertisements reflected Trump's concerns that Japan, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait were taking advantage of American money and protection without providing any benefit to the United States.  The next month, as Dunbar had proposed, Trump appeared at a Rotary Club luncheon in New Hampshire.  There, he delivered what The New York Times described as an "impassioned speech," in which he expressed concern about the United States being "pushed around" by its allies and proposed that "these countries that are ripping us off pay off the $200 billion deficit."  In the audience, college students held placards reading "Trump for President."  Nevertheless, Trump proclaimed, "I'm not here because I'm running for President. I'm here because I'm tired of our country being kicked around and I want to get my ideas across."  Later, Trump appeared on the Phil Donahue Show.  After the appearance, he received a letter from former President Richard Nixon in which Nixon explained that his wife Pat, "an expert on politics," had seen Trump on the show and "predicts that whenever you decide to run for office you will be a winner!"  In November 1987, Trump released The Art of the Deal, which became a New York Times bestseller.
  Months later, during an April 1988 appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show, Trump discussed his displeasure with the United States' status as a "debtor nation" and its seeming inability to compete with Japan.  Winfrey asked Trump if he would ever run for president.  He replied, "Probably not, but I do get tired of seeing the country get ripped off ... I just don't think I have the inclination to do it."  Furthermore, he asserted that if he ever did run, he would win the election.  He later appeared at the 1988 Republican National Convention.  In an interview on the floor, NBC News reporter Chris Wallace asked whether Trump's visit to his first national convention would induce him to "take the plunge" into a presidential campaign.  In response, Trump downplayed his prior exploration into presidential politics, though repeated that he would win if he ever ran, and praised then-presumptive Republican presidential nominee George H. W. Bush. During another convention interview on Larry King Live, Trump said, "I doubt I'll ever be involved in politics beyond what I do right now." Talk of a potential Trump candidacy grew silent for much of the next decade.
  In 1995, industrialist Ross Perot, who had received 18.9 percent of the vote during his Independent 1992 run for president, formed the Reform Party of the United States of America. Although Perot won the party's 1996 nomination and garnered 8.4 percent of the popular vote, rifts had begun forming within the party.  Former Colorado Governor Richard Lamm, who unsuccessfully challenged Perot for the 1996 presidential nomination, accused Perot of using the party as a personal vehicle, and broke off with his supporters to form a new party. In 1998, former professional wrestler Jesse Ventura was elected Governor of Minnesota as a member of the Reform Party—the party's most significant victory—but Perot and his followe
caption: Trump with President Bill Clinton at Trump Tower in 2000
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