Trump slams primary foes as jokers: ‘I guess it’s a publicity stunt’

President Trump slammed his GOP challengers Monday as jokers who are polling so poorly that some states don’t want to bother with a 2020 primary.

“They are all at less than 1%. I guess it’s a publicity stunt,” Mr. Trump said.

“They have no credibility,” he told White House reporters.

Though Mr. Trump has struggled to get his approval ratings above water, he enjoys extensive support within the Republican Party.

Mr. Trump said he can’t blame the four states that have scrapped their GOP primaries already. He said the contests would be a waste of money.

Eyeing his foes, Mr. Trump said former Massachusetts Gov. Bill Weld’s vice presidential bid in 2016 never got off the ground, and that former Rep. Joe Walsh couldn’t win a second term in the House.

He reserved special criticism for former Rep. Mark Sanford, who jumped into the race Sunday but is dogged by an extramarital affair he had in 2009, while serving as South Carolina’s governor.

The governor told aides at the time that he was hiking the Appalachian Trail, even though he’d gone to South America to meet his mistress.

“Mr. Tallahassee Trail or Appalachian Trail — he’s the Appalachian Trail, right?” Mr. Trump said, repeating a verbal mistake that made headlines in 2018. “The Tallahassee Trail is nice, too, but I think it was the Appalachian Trail.”

“But he wasn’t on the Appalachian Trail, he was in Argentina,” Mr. Trump said.