Ex-Trump White House official explains why his 2024 campaign is 'sad and depressing to watch'

Conservative Republican Stephanie Grisham has a strong connection to Trump World. In addition to serving as the third of four White House press secretaries in the Trump Administration, Grisham was a press secretary for former First Lady Melania Trump.

But in 2024, Grisham is among the conservatives who is supporting Vice President Kamala Harris' presidential campaign. Grisham is part of the Republicans for Harris group along with former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Illinois), former New Jersey Gov. Christie Todd Whitman and others on the right.

In an interview with the Washington Post published on August 9, Grisham laid out some reasons why, as a conservative, she is supporting Democrat Harris rather than the GOP nominee she once worked for: Donald Trump.

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Grisham told the Post, "You can only be hit over the head so much and be told your own country sucks so much before you get fatigued by it. I think people yearn for a message of hope. Now that I've taken a step back and watch it more as a citizen, it's just sad and depressing to watch."

Grisham, in a "This American Life" segment aired on some National Public Radio (NPR) stations in early June, said she was looking at other countries to possibly move to if Trump wins in November — as she fears being targeted for retaliation by a second Trump Administration. And The Lincoln Project's Fred Wellman, another conservative Trump critic interviewed for that segment, told "This American Life" the same thing.

Conservative Brendan Buck, an ex-aide to former House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin), compared the Trump and Harris campaigns in the Post's article and expressed similar views to Grisham's.

Buck told the Post, "I think there are a lot of people who are yearning for something exciting and something fun, something we have not had since the Obama era. There is something appealing that you want to be a part of when people are having fun."

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Read the Washington Post's full report at this link (subscription required).