Bob Daemmrich / The Texas Tribune
Former President George W. Bush hugs Laura Bush at the topping out ceremony for the George Bush Presidential Center at Southern Methodist University on Oct. 3, 2011.
George W. Bush and Laura Bush did not vote for either major-party presidential nominee this year, a spokesman for the former president said Tuesday. Instead, they did not make a selection at the top of the ticket and voted for Republicans down ballot.
“They didn’t vote for Hillary; they didn’t vote for Trump,” spokesman Freddy Ford wrote in an email to The Texas Tribune after radio host Rush Limbaugh suggested Tuesday that the Bushes had voted for Clinton.
Neither George W. Bush nor his father, fellow former President George H.W. Bush, endorsed their Republican Party’s nominee, Donald Trump. But it has been an open question whether they would cast a ballot for Trump — or his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton.
Speculation flared in September that George H.W. Bush was planning to vote for Clinton. His spokesman neither confirmed nor denied reports at the time — or on Tuesday.
“We are not commenting on the presidential race,” Jim McGrath, a spokesman for George H.W. Bush, said in an email.