Florida Governor Ron DeSantis abandoned his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination on Sunday, stating he will back front-runner Donald Trump.
In a video posted on X, formerly Twitter, DeSantis stated that after finishing second in the Iowa caucuses last week, he could not “ask our supporters to volunteer their time and donate their resources unless we have a clear path to victory.” Accordingly, I am hereby halting my campaign.”
His departure comes fewer than two days before the New Hampshire primary, where polls show him trailing ex-President Trump and former UN ambassador Nikki Haley.
“It’s clear to me that a majority of Republican primary voters want to give Donald Trump another chance,” DeSantis said in the video, noting that he has had differences with the former president, notably over the coronavirus pandemic.
“He has my endorsement because we can’t go back to the old Republican guard of yesteryear or a repackaged form of warmed-over corporatism that Nikki Haley represents.”
Last Tuesday, Trump, 77, swept Iowa, with 51 percent of Republican voters preferring the twice-impeached former president over DeSantis, who received only 21 percent, and Haley, who got 19 percent.
No contender has ever lost the race after winning the first two states, and Trump’s victory in New Hampshire would almost probably end the Republican primary battle.
Haley had generally refrained from punching out at Trump’s many controversies surrounding his candidacy, but in the past week began questioning his mental acuity, suggesting analogies between the ex-president and the 81-year-old incumbent Democrat Joe Biden.