Former CIA clandestine agent Will Hurd is jumping into the race for the White House, joining a growing field of contenders taking on former President Donald Trump in the battle for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination.
Hurd, a one-time CIA officer from Texas who served three-terms in Congress before deciding against running for re-election in 2020, launched his Republican presidential campaign on Thursday.
He officially declared his candidacy in an interview and also filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission to run.
"This is a decision that my wife and I decided to do because we live in complicated times and we need common sense," Hurd told CBS News.
Hurd listed top issues as China, inflation, education and artificial intelligence.
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"To be frank on this, that we're not talking about these things," he said. "I'm pissed that our elected officials are telling us to to hate our neighbors. Our neighbors are not our enemies. They're our fellow Americans who we just happen to have a disagreement with."
"These are the issues that we should be talking about," Hurd continued. "And I believe the Republican Party can be the party that talks about the future, not the past."
Hurd joins a burgeoning Republican presidential nomination field that is currently dominated by Trump, who launched his third straight White House campaign in November.
"The GOP will continue to lose to Democrats if Donald Trump is the nominee," Hurd told Fox News in May.
When asked by CBS how he can stand out among the field of candidates, Hurd said, "You can't be afraid of Donald Trump. Too many of these candidates in this race are afraid of Donald Trump."
Hurd is not a fan of the former president, so his criticisms of Trump come as no surprise.
But pointing to the other actual and likely 2024 Republican presidential contenders, Hurd said "I’m not satisfied with the field as it stands right now. No one is taking on Trump effectively, or presenting a vision for the future."
In a campaign launch video shared first with Fox News, Hurd said "the soul of our country is under attack. Our enemies plot, create chaos, and threaten the American Dream. At home, illegal immigration and fentanyl stream into our country. Inflation, still out of control. Crime and homelessness growing in our cities, and liberals do nothing."
Taking aim at both Trump and President Biden, Hurd argued that "President Biden can't solve these problems—or won't. And if we nominate a lawless, selfish, failed politician like Donald Trump—who lost the House, the Senate, and the White House—we all know Joe Biden will win again. "
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The Democratic National Committee welcomed Hurd to the race by seeking to tie him to Trump, however.
"Will Hurd spent his career in Congress in lockstep with Donald Trump’s extreme MAGA agenda – voting to rig the economy for the ultra-wealthy, ban abortion nationwide, gut Planned Parenthood, and repeal the Affordable Care Act, all while cozying up to the gun lobby," said DNC Chair Jaime Harrison. "The GOP primary field is overflowing with MAGA Republicans desperate to win over the right-wing fringes, and Hurd is just the latest entrant into an incredibly chaotic and extreme 2024 field."
Hurd grabbed national attention last year during a well-publicized book tour for "American Reboot: An Idealist’s Guide to Getting Big Things Done." In his book, Hurd urged his party to rethink its style of politics and offered ideas to reform America’s political system and keep the nation competitive against China and other powers.
Hurd’s book — which is partly a memoir about growing up in Texas with a Black father and White mother and his CIA and congressional careers, and partly a prescription for his party and the country as a whole — appeared to some political pundits as a roadmap for a possible 2024 White House run.
And in November, the day after an expected red wave turned into a trickle in the midterm elections, Hurd posted an 800-word essay encouraging Americans who were upset with the choice of candidates from the two major parties to become more involved in primary elections — which are often dominated by Democratic and Republican base voters.
"One of the things that we have to recognize, and the Republican Party needs to come to grips with is that we’ve been losing. I don’t have to tell you that seven out of the eight last popular elections were lost by Republicans. We lost the House in 2018. We lost the Senate and the White House in 2020. We did not take the House back by the margin we should have in 2022," Hurd stressed in an April interview with Fox News Digital in Iowa, the state that leads off the GOP primary and caucus schedule.
Looking ahead to the next year, Hurd said that "the GOP has an opportunity in 2024 but we need candidates that can appeal to independents and that can appeal to Democrats. They’re wanting that because everybody thinks the country is on the wrong track."
This year Hurd, who was the only Black Republican in the House during his last two years in Congress, sparked further 2024 speculation with one trip to Iowa and four to New Hampshire, the first two states to vote in the GOP presidential nominating calendar.
Besides Trump, Hurd joins a primary battle that also includes Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, former two-term Govs. Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas and Chris Christie of New Jersey, two-term South Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, multimillionaire entrepreneur and conservative commentator Vivek Ramaswamy, Michigan businessman Perry Johnson, radio talk show host and former California gubernatorial candidate Larry Elder, and Miami Mayor Francis Suarez.
Asked how he can compete with better known candidates with bigger war chests, Hurd told Fox News earlier this year that "the person that has the most money doesn’t always win," and emphasized that "the message matters."
Hurd’s preaching an upbeat message of unity and appears to be keeping his distance from the current political battles over abortion, transgender rights, "wokeism," and other hot button social issues which dominate many of the discussions in a Republican Party reshaped by Trump and focused on fighting the left.
"If there's one thing you need to know about me," Hurd said in April at a major Republican 2024 presidential cattle call in Iowa. "I think America is the greatest country on Earth, and we're better together."
