War in Iran tests loyalty among Trump's base at this year's CPAC
Members of the Republican faithful are gathering in Dallas on Saturday for the final day of the Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC, the annual event known for high-profile appearances from the most prominent figures in the MAGA movement. And while celebrations of President Trump's agenda have been front and center, missing from the lineup this year was the president himself.
Instead of closing out the multi-day conference with a rally-type address akin to previous years, Trump skipped CPAC this year for the first time in a decade.
His absence comes at a tense moment in his second term. Saturday marks one month since the U.S. began strikes against Iran — a move that has caused divides within the president's historically loyal base.
Here are a few takeaways from the conference so far.
The war in Iran looms over CPAC
While polling shows most Americans may be against the war, CPAC is still the Trump show.
"I think a lot of people feel more confident in [Trump] doing it than a lifelong politician that wants to follow the rules of their party," argued Jeff Hadley, who drove from Raleigh, N.C., to attend CPAC.
While some high-profile conservatives like Tucker Carlson and Megyn Kelly have been vocal critics of the war, Hadley's view is consistent with many Republicans right now. A recent survey by Pew Research Center found nearly eight in 10 Republicans approve of Trump's handling of the war.
However, peeling back the curtain, that support drops substantially when looking solely at younger Republicans and conservative-leaning independents — two groups that Trump made gains with in 2024.
"I feel betrayed because he's promised no new wars," said 30-year-old attendee Joseph Bolick, an Army and Marine Corp. veteran from Tyler, Texas, who has voted for Trump since 2016 and now says he no longer supports him.
"Why aren't we helping Americans? The economy's suffering," he added. "Why can't we focus on our own people instead of foreign governments?"
One of the few speakers to criticize the war from the stage was former Florida congressman Matt Gaetz.
"A ground invasion of Iran will make our country poorer and less safe," Gaetz said. "It will mean higher gas prices, higher food prices, and I'm not sure we would end up killing more terrorists than we would create."
Midterm conversations largely took a backseat
CPAC has long been regarded as a destination for conservative voters to network and organize, and for popular voices within the GOP to rally their base.
But this year, fewer candidates treated it as a campaign stop. Just a handful of Senate and House candidates spoke at the event.
Among those who spoke was former Republican National Committee chairman Michael Whatley, a candidate for Senate in North Carolina. His message? The midterms will be crucial to deciding the direction of Trump's remaining time in office, because if Democrats take back the House or Senate, they will stall the GOP agenda.
"We will make absolutely sure that Donald Trump is going to get a four-year term, not a two-year term," he said. "We cannot let the left win this election cycle and take away this agenda that we're fighting for every single day."
CPAC saw a lot of new faces this year
Many conservative firebrands were missing from the lineup — from top Trump surrogates like Vice President JD Vance to MAGA media personalities such as Carlson and Kelly. All three have appeared at different CPAC events in recent years.
While there were some familiar faces – including former Trump advisor Steve Bannon – CPAC's lineup this year focused more heavily on newer names in the conservative movement, albeit ones who are less central figures in Trump's traditional orbit.
On Thursday, the final speaking slot of the evening went to Nick Shirley, the 23-year-old content creator who went viral for alleging fraud in Minneapolis day-care centers run by Somali immigrants.
Other prominent speaking slots went to conservative activists from around the world, such as former British Prime Minister Liz Struss and Eduardo Bolsonaro, son of former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro. Their appearances reflected CPAC's broadening ambitions to take MAGA conservatism abroad.
That said, while the speakers list did look different, much of the program still revolved around Trump's key policy priorities, and leaned heavily on culture war issues and concerns about illegal immigration.
MAGA without Trump?
Towards the start of the program on Friday, CPAC chairman Matt Schlapp led a discussion titled, "Can't We All Just Get Along," where he argued that conservatives should acknowledge and welcome differences in opinion.
"How boring would CPAC be if it was all: unity, agreement, vanilla, right?" he said. "We wouldn't want that."
"One of the reasons why, essentially, there is this collaboration and this coalition that stays together is because people embraced Trump and Trumpism," Schlapp added.
But as 2028 inches closer, Trump's absence at CPAC this year is a reminder that he may be the only figure that holds large parts of the party together, and when he's not there, it's unclear who fills that role.