Republican front-runner Donald Trump said Tuesday he doesn’t plan to honor his pledge to support the party’s nominee for president if it’s not him.
“No, not anymore,” Trump told CNN’s Anderson Cooper during a town hall event in Wisconsin, when Cooper asked if Trump still planned to adhere to the pledge he signed last fall.
“I have been treated very unfairly” by the Republican National Committee, Trump said without elaborating.
Trump said he wouldn’t expect his main rival, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, to support him, should Trump win the nomination. Cruz also promised to back the GOP nominee.
“I’m not asking for his support,” Trump said.
Trump recently hired longtime GOP lawyer and operative Paul Manafort to help his campaign navigate the delegate and convention process. He expressed dismay at delegate apportionment in the recent Louisiana primary that awarded Cruz more delegates, even though Trump won the majority of votes.
Trump has toyed with the idea of mounting a third-party campaign since summer, when his nascent campaign seemed to to go out of its way to poke the Republican establishment.
“I just wanted fairness from the Republican Party,” Trump said when he signed the pledge in September. “I will be totally pledging my allegiance to the Republican Party, and the conservative principles for which it stands.”