Trump makes false claims in CPAC speech as South Carolina primary underway: Live

On Friday evening, during the Reagan Dinner, Bishop Joseph Strickland, the former bishop of Tyler, Texas addressed the topic Republican elected officials have hoped to avoid: the Alabama Supreme Court’s ruling that frozen embryos could be considered children under state law, saying that conservatives needed to guide Republicans politicians to support the “sanctity of life.”

“This decision by Alabama’s court was correct according to our Catholic faith,” he said addressing the conservative faithful and donors after an auction that included selling off portaits of Donald Trump and Jesus Christ and before a speech by failed presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.

Bishop Strickland, whom Pope Francis relieved last year from his position, called upon conservative activists to push Republican elected officials to stand steadfast behind the Alabama court ruling.

Read more from Eric Garcia:

Donald Trump falsely claimed that Californians are being sent several ballots as part of a scheme to defraud elections during his keynote speech at CPAC.

“I will tell you if God came down and God was the vote checker, I believe [Republicans] would win California, I think it’s so crazy,” Mr Trump said. “They send out 36 million ballots, just sent out to people unknown. They’re sent out all over the place. How many people from California know people that get six, seven, eight ballots?”

Donald Trump claimed he is a “proud political dissident” in his CPAC speech just days after he compared himself to Russian leader Alexei Navalny, who recently died in a Siberian prison under unclear circumstances.

Mr Trump said in National Harbor, Maryland on Saturday that “Joe [Biden] and his henchmen have you trapped and it’s an express train barreling toward servitude and to ruin – it’s moving at a speed that Joe doesn’t understand because Joe … I don’t think he knows what the hell’s going on, to be honest with you, but he’s surrounded by some very bad fascists”.

“A vote for Trump is your ticket back to freedom. It’s your passport out of tyranny,” he argued. “And it’s your only escape from Joe Biden and his gang’s fast track to hell. And in many ways, we’re living in hell right now.”

Read more from Gustaf Kilander:

Donald Trump discussed a previously-debunked claim during his keynote speech at CPAC on Saturday.

“18 months we didn’t have one soldier killed in Afghanistan, I was the one that got it — I was the one that had it ready, it was enough, 21 years, that was enough,” Mr Trump said.

When Mr Trump made a similar comment last year, the Associated Press reported that it is untrue the lack of casualties came solely under the Trump presidency. The 18-month period came just before President Joe Biden pulled American troops out of Afghanistan in August 2021, meaning it happened under both administrations, according to the AP.

Donald Trump is facing 91 felony counts after prosecutors brought several indictments against him in the last year.

Mr Trump faces charges in Georgia and Washington, DC related to overturning the 2020 election. Meanwhile, in Florida, he’s facing charges related to keeping classified documents, and in New York prosecutors say he falsified business records surrounding hush money payments during his first presidential campaign.

That’s not to mention the civil cases he’s faced, such as the E Jean Carroll defamation trials.

Meanwhile, the former president maintains his absolute innocence.

“The only crime I’ve committed is defending America,” he during his CPAC keynote speech on Saturday.

Gustaf Kilander has the story: