GOP Ex-Gov. Hogan laments Trump indictments bolstering candidacy

Former Maryland Republican Gov. Larry Hogan has lamented that former President Donald Trump's mounting legal woes have dominated the news cycle and contended that the development has hindered the efforts of his primary challengers to gain attention for themselves.

A prominent critic of the former president, Hogan opined that Trump's legal woes had edged other candidates out of the spotlight and prevented the anti-Trump faction of the GOP from coalescing around a single candidate.

"The fact is that nobody else can get any traction or attention because all we’re talking about is Donald Trump’s legal troubles," he told MSNBC's Jen Psaki on Sunday, according to the Washington Times. "While people haven’t left Trump as quickly as I would have hoped, there are about half of the people in the Republican primary who do not want Donald Trump. They just can’t decide on which of the other 11 candidates they want to support because they aren’t getting much oxygen or airtime."

"It hasn’t hurt Trump the way that most people would imagine it should have hurt Trump," he continued. "But it has impacted the dynamic of the Republican primary race."

Trump currently holds a 33.3% lead in the RealClearPolitics polling average, with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis claiming 18.5% to place a distant second. The former president has been indicted by both Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and special counsel Jack Smith in unrelated cases.

He has further announced his receipt of a target letter from Smith in a second probe, potentially signaling a third indictment, while Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is expected to announce charging decisions in her 2020 election probe this Summer.

Ben Whedon is an editor and reporter for Just the News. Follow him on Twitter.