Michigan GOP Won't Dump Trump for Keynote Speech

Businessman Donald Trump is scheduled to give the keynote address at Republicans’ Lincoln Day Dinner for Genesee and Saginaw counties. (Photo by Gage Skidmore via Flickr)

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Donald Trump isn’t fired – at least not as the keynote speaker for next month’s Lincoln Day dinner fundraiser for the Republican parties of Genesee and Saginaw parties.

The flamboyant businessman and potential Republican spoiler riled almost everyone at a gathering in Iowa last weekend when he said Arizona Sen. John McCain – who he’s been feuding with over immigration – wasn’t a war hero because he had been captured.

McCain, a naval aviator, spent five years in prisoner of war camp when his plane was shot down over Hanoi during the Vietnam War. “I like people who weren’t captured,” Trump said.

Reaction to comments by Trump, a non veteran, was swift among his opponents, who said Trump should apologize to McCain. Some called on the fiery candidate to withdraw from the race, and Sean Spicer, the Republican National Committee’s chief strategist and communications director, said in a statement “there is no place in our party or our country for comments that disparage those who have served honorably.”

Genesee County GOP Chairman Michael Moon said Monday that he’s been hearing from both Trump’s supporters and his detractors, “and a lot more people are excited about him coming” as the keynote speaker of the Aug. 11 event at the Birch Run Expo Center.

Moon told the Detroit Free Press that he doesn’t agree with what Trump said, “but I’ll defend his right to say it.”

“My job is to help make money for the county party and I’m pretty sure with all the controversy, we’ll sell out,” Moon said.

Related:

• GOP Spoiler Trump to Bring Firebrand Campaign to Michigan

Trump has refused to apologize, but said Monday that McCain was a hero.

McCain told CBS News Trump doesn’t owe him an apology, but “I think he may owe an apology to the families of those who have sacrificed in conflict and those who have undergone the prison experience in serving their country.”

Trump thinks McCain owes his supporters an apology for comments the Arizona senator made earlier this month at a rally in Phoenix that drew anti-immigration activists and sparked the feud between the two.

McCain said Trump has “fired up the crazies” with sweeping generalizations about crime among unauthorized Mexican immigrants, and threatened to derail progress the party has made toward immigration reform and attracting.

“Now he galvanized them,” McCain said after a Trump rally in Phoenix a week ago. “He’s really got them activated.”

On ABC’s “This Week,” Trump said:

“A week ago, I had thousands of people in Phoenix, Arizona, talking about the whole horrible situation with illegal immigration,” Trump said. “We had thousands and thousands of people. And he called them ‘crazies.’ He insulted them. He should apologize to them, by the way. He insulted them, and then I insulted back.”

Ticket Information for Aug. 11 Event

Ticket information for the event will be available Wednesday, according to a post on Facebook. Tickets are $25 each, and the event is expected to sell out, Moon told the Free Press.