Trump Plans To Skip Sec­ond GOP Debate To Ral­ly With Strik­ing Autowork­ers

For­mer Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump plans to skip the sec­ond Repub­li­can pri­ma­ry debate in Cal­i­for­nia to deliv­er a speech to strik­ing autowork­ers in Detroit that same night.
The itin­er­ary, which Trump’s 2024 cam­paign con­firmed to CBS News and CNBC, means the GOP fron­trun­ner is choos­ing to miss debat­ing his Repub­li­can rivals for a sec­ond time.
Trump eschewed last month’s Fox News debate in favor of appear­ing in an inter­view with for­mer Fox News host Tuck­er Carl­son.
Though the exact time and place for Trump’s speech was not imme­di­ate­ly clear, he report­ed­ly hopes to address hun­dreds of cur­rent and for­mer union mem­bers from the auto indus­try and beyond.
News of Trump’s intend­ed speech came a cou­ple of days after the Unit­ed Auto Work­ers labor union announced a strike against Ford, Gen­er­al Motors, and Stel­lan­tis with demands over wages and “eco­nom­ic and social jus­tice.”

Asked dur­ing a recent inter­view on NBC’s “Meet The Press” whose side he was on in the auto indus­try stand­off, Trump said, “I’m on the side of mak­ing our coun­try great. … The auto work­ers are being sold down the riv­er by their lead­er­ship, and the …