'Bored' CPAC has never been 'more dead' than under Trump: reporter

The Conservative Political Action Conference is now all but run by former President Donald Trump -- and, according to The Atlantic's McKay Coppins, that has made it incredibly boring.

In his review of this weekend's CPAC festivities, Coppins noted that the event's attendance was significantly down than in past years and he found that even those who were in attendance appeared "bored."

"Everything about the conference -- the speakers, the swag, the media personalities broadcasting from outside the ballroom --suggested that it was little more than a three-day MAGA pep rally," he writes. "The result: In my decade of covering the event, I’d never seen it more dead."

In fact, Republican operatives have confided to Coppins that they're come to see attending CPAC as a "chore" and they were secretly happy when CPAC chairman got hit with sexual misconduct allegations so they would have an excuse not to go.

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And even though Trump won the CPAC straw poll for the GOP nomination in 2024, Coppins said he found several attendees who were just tired of his shtick.

"[Trump's] CPAC speech on Saturday night, like so many of his recent appearances, felt predictable and devoid of vitality as he rambled past the 90-minute mark in front of a not-quite-full ballroom," writes Coppins. "Trump, in other words, has become the establishment—and the establishment, by definition, is boring. He might as well attach an exclamation point to his campaign slogan and start asking voters to 'please clap.'"