(CNN)Republican Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker isn’t backing President Donald Trump’s reelection bid, his communications director Lizzy Guyton told CNN affiliate WCVB on Wednesday.
“The governor cannot support Donald Trump for president and is focused on seeing Massachusetts through the pandemic,” Guyton wrote in an email. “He’ll leave the election analysis to the pundits.”
At a news conference earlier Wednesday, the governor said he would “take a pass” when asked who he was supporting for president. Baker’s office later clarified to say he was taking a pass on the question, not on voting in this year’s election, according to WCVB.
In March, Baker declined to tell the State House News Service whom he had voted for in the state’s Republican primary, but he said he didn’t vote for Trump. The governor had previously said he didn’t vote for Trump in 2016.
Baker has publicly sparred with Trump in the past. He slammed the President’s “bitterness, combativeness and self-interest” in the wake of nationwide protests following the police killing of George Floyd.
“I heard what the President said today about dominating and fighting. I know I should be surprised when I hear incendiary words like this from him, but I’m not,” Baker told reporters in June. “At so many times during these past several weeks when the country needed compassion and leadership the most, it was simply nowhere to be found.”
Source: Republican Massachusetts governor will not support Trump’s reelection effort
