Our latest book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. The 2024 race has begun.
State of play: Win It Back, a political action committee (PAC) affiliated with the conservative group Club for Growth, says it burned through $6 million creating 40 anti-Trump messages — none of them effective, the New York Times reported
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, once generally seen as the best prospect to take down Trump in the primaries, has been in a downward spiral since July.
- .Republican Accountability PAC — a group of former Trump voters dedicated to moving beyond the former president — is giving up on the primary after spending $1 million on ads in Iowa. "We have stopped spending money in the primary," the PAC's leader, Sarah Longwell, told Reuters.
- Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) — who clashed with Trump when he refused to go along with Trump's claim that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump in Georgia — said last week that he'll support Trump if he gets the GOP nomination.
Between the lines: In a sign of DeSantis' struggles, Trump — obsessed with blasting the Florida governor for much of this year — is now taking aim at former UN ambassador Nikki Haley, who's done well in the two GOP debates and is outpolling DeSantis in New Hampshire.Thursday morning, Trump complained on Truth Social that Fox News "has been pushing Nikki 'Birdbrain' Haley" after having "totally given up on Ron DeSanctimonious."
- Two of his biggest donors in the primary and Florida's gubernatorial race have paused their support or have decided to stop backing him.
- Hotel entrepreneur Robert Bigelow, the biggest individual donor to the DeSantis-aligned Never Back Down PAC, won't donate more money for now.
- Billionaire and Citadel CEO Ken Griffin — who previously said "our country would be well-served by [DeSantis] as president" —now is not supporting DeSantis.
