Florida Governor Ron DeSantis announced Sunday that he was ending his bid for the Republican nomination in the 2024 presidential election and endorsed former President Donald Trump.
DeSantis said, in a video posted to social media, that he did not see a path forward.
In endorsing Trump, DeSantis said and that while he had had disagreements with him over Covid and other issues, the former president is a superior alternative to both President Joe Biden, and former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, the latter of whom he blasted, referring to her to as representing the “old republican guard,” and a “repackaged form of warmed over corporatism.”
“If there was anything I could do to produce a favorable outcome, more campaign stops, more interviews, I would do it,” DeSantis said in his video message. “But I can’t ask our supporters to volunteer their time and donate their resources if we don’t have a clear path to victory. Accordingly, I am today suspending my campaign.”
The governor, who won not only a resounding victory in the typically vacillating state of Florida, succeeded in forming a GOP-dominated legislature and congressional makeup in his second term.
DeSantis, announcing his long-anticipated candidacy in May, was once favored by many elites in the conservative movement as a rising, younger star and the top alternative to former President Donald Trump.
Trump, in his usual style, hammered DeSantis on the campaign trail, giving him one of his signature “nicknames” used to mock his opponents and critics – Ron “DeSanctimonious.”
But Trump quickly changed gears after DeSantis endorsed him.
“With only a few days left until President Donald J. Trump’s victory in New Hampshire, we are honored by the endorsement from Governor Ron DeSantis and so many other former presidential candidates,” Trump said in a statement. “It is now time for all Republicans to rally behind President Trump,” Trump added.
DeSantis only briefly came within striking distance of the former president, managing to lead him in a December 2022 USAToday/Suffolk University poll, prior to DeSantis declaring his candidacy. Subsequent polls had him trailing Trump consistently. He had also fallen far behind Haley in recent polls taken in New Hampshire, the next stop on the road to the nomination.
According to a poll released recently by CNN and the University of New Hampshire, DeSantis only has 6% support in the state. Trump received 50%, and U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who placed third in Iowa, had 39%.
DeSantis had finished second in last week’s Iowa caucus, earning 21% of the vote and picking up nine delegates.
Trump, whose base supporters are similar ideologically to DeSantis’, will likely pick up more support.
Prior to running for president, DeSantis had worked with Trump.
Earlier Sunday, before DeSantis’ announcement, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) said he would welcome the governor back into the Trump camp.
“I remember the good old days when I was Ron DeSantis’s transition chairman and he and President Trump worked so well together,” Gaetz, a top Trump supporter, told a crowd.
“I hate when mom and dad fight,” he said, and was met with laughs from the audience. “It turns out we might get Ron DeSantis back on side pretty soon and I would welcome that.”
Haley, in a statement given after DeSantis’ announcement, praised him as a “good governor,” and wished him well.
“So far, only one state has voted,” the statement continued.
“Half of its votes went to Donald Trump and half did not. We’re not a country of coronations. Voters deserve a say in whether we go down the road of Trump and Biden again or we go down a new conservative road.
“New Hampshire voters will have their say on Tuesday. When I’m president, I will do everything in my power to show them they made the right decision.”
However, Haley, who has steered clear of personal attacks on Trump, has taken aim at her former boss in recent days, questioning his mental capabilities and citing his age.
“He’s just not at the same level he was in 2016,” the former South Carolina governor said of Trump Sunday, in an interview with CBS.” “I think we’re seeing some of that decline.”
“He claimed that Joe Biden was going to get us into World War II. I’m assuming he meant World War III,” she said. “He said that he ran against President Obama. He never ran against President Obama. He says that I’m the one that kept security from the Capitol on January 6th. I was nowhere near the Capitol on January 6th.
“Don’t be surprised if you have someone that’s 80 in office, their mental stability is going to continue to decline,” Haley added.
Unlike the last competitive GOP primary in 2016, which started off with over a dozen candidates and still had five going into delegate-rich Super Tuesday, the race is now down to only two who have significant support; Haley and Trump.
Following the Iowa caucus, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, who came in fourth place and picked up three delegates, suspended his campaign. Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, who received a fraction of 1%, also bowed out. In November, Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) quit the race.
Source: Hamodia