Former Presidents George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush will sit out the 2016 election and will not endorse Donald Trump, the presumptive GOP nominee, Fox News reported Thursday.
On Wednesday, the Texas Tribune reported that the two men will stay on the sidelines.
Freddy Ford, an aide to George W. Bush said his boss “does not plan to participate in or comment on the presidential campaign.”
“At age 91, President Bush is retired from politics,” added Bush 41 spokesman Jim McGrath. “He came out of retirement to do a few things for Jeb, but those were the exceptions that proved the rule.”
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Fox added:
According to the Tribune, the elder Bush has endorsed every GOP presidential nominee since losing his 1992 re-election bid to Bill Clinton. George W. Bush also campaigned on behalf of Sen. John McCain in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012.
Both Bushes campaigned heavily for Jeb Bush earlier this year, but he dropped out after disappointing results in the first three presidential contests. Neither former president made an endorsement during the rest of the primary season, though George W. Bush was recorded last year telling donors “I just don’t like” Sen. Ted Cruz.
George W. Bush has also taken jabs at Trump, Fox added, saying that “we do not need someone in the Oval Office who mirrors and inflames our anger and frustration.”
“Strength is not empty rhetoric,” he added. “It is not bluster. It is not theatrics. Real strength, strength of purpose, comes from integrity and character. And, in my experience, the strongest person usually isn’t the loudest one in the room.”
Trump has also attacked the younger Bush, blaming him for the 9/11 terror attack and accusing him of lying to get the U.S. into Iraq.
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