WATCH: Popular Former Governor Mike Huckabee Takes a Stand for Donald Trump

Popular former Governor Mike Huckabee (R-AR) endorsed Donald Trump for his 2024 presidential run on his channel Huckabee on TBN. Mr. Huckabee was governor of Arkansas, a solidly Republican state, from 1996 to 2007 and was a former candidate himself for the presidency in 2008 and 2016. His daughter, Sander Huckabee Sanders (R-AR), was Trump’s former White House Press Secretary and currently serves as the 47th governor of Arkansas. She was elected in a landslide in 2022 and is the first female governor of the state.

Breitbart News provided a partial transcript of Mr. Huckabee’s ringing endorsement of the 45th president. Huckabee said “I love my country, and I don’t want it to be in second place or third place. I want it to be first.” He also said that “as president, he exceeded my expectations in implementing the America First policies and they were long overdue…I will again personally support President Trump so he can finish what he started during his first term. I believe he accomplished more to make America great again than any president in my lifetime and that goes back to Eisenhower.”

The former governor mentioned that “[w]hen people ask, how could I support him? I say, well, it’s like choosing a doctor to do surgery on a member of my family. If my choice was between a kind, loving, praying surgeon, who had the bedside manner of a pastor, but who had never successfully done that particular surgery [o]r I could pick a surgeon who was gruff, bombastic, and impatient, and who had the bedside manner of a schoolyard bully, but he had successfully done that surgery hundreds of times. I’d pick the guy with the questionable personality, but with the skillful, experienced surgical hands.”

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The aged Republican executive stated other presidents may have had a better gloss to them but none were quite as effective as the former President. He remarked that “[t]here were presidents who were more articulate and had a more engaging sense of humor, such as Kennedy and Reagan. There were some who had great legislative savvy, such as Lyndon Johnson. Some were truly decent and kind human beings — Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush. But no president, no president, helped this country get steered away from the insanity of socialist economics and insane policies on energy, the military, and the proper role of the courts.”

Mr. Huckabee is the latest of a long distinguished lineup of Republican politicos who have come out in favor of Trump’s third bid for the White House. Other such conservative endorsements have been covered by the DC Enquirer.