Are DeSantis’s influencers following him onto the Trump train?

Ron DeSantis didn’t just drop out of the 2024 presidential race this Sunday — he also endorsed former president Donald Trump, the opponent who had bested him in Iowa. That pragmatic act made sense for him in terms of self-preservation, but was sure to frustrate some of his early supporters and “influencers,” who had been engaged in a lengthy online war with Trumpworld for months. Where will they turn now that the GOP primary is a two-horse race?

“My view on every election has always been to vote for the best available candidate,” ex-Trump lawyer Jenna Ellis told The Spectator. Now that DeSantis is out, she is not sure if that candidate will be on the Republican ticket. “At this point, I am considering third-party options, including Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose policies on some important issues are actually more conservative than Donald Trump and certainly not worse.” Ellis added that while she understands that DeSantis honored his pledge as a GOP candidate, “voters have no such ethical obligation.” For Trump to get her vote a third time, “he would have to take responsibility for his decisions during the Covid-19 pandemic, personnel issues and policy changes like running to the left of DeSantis on abortion.” Ellis believes that Trump has to address his “complete record.”

“If conservatives really want to stop losing, we need to demand better best available candidates,” Ellis concluded. “So we’ll see. 2024 could be the year to break the two-party chokehold on America because I find it very hard to believe a majority of Americans on either side really want a repeat of Trump versus Biden. I think we want a better alternative.”

Newsweek senior editor-at-large Josh Hammer thinks that Republicans should rally to Trump. When asked about third party options like RFK Jr., Hammer told The Spectator that there are way too many question marks in the air. “What is his economic philosophy? What kind of judicial picks would he make? What kind of foreign policy would he oversee?,” he asked. “No one has any idea — nor could they, because there is no track record.”

“By far the better course of action for conservatives would be to simply come home and vote this fall for the man who delivered three (i.e., pre-Covid) generally competent years of governance, oversaw a rocking economy, helped transform the federal judiciary, and helped prevent the world from bursting into flames,” Hammer concluded. 

“Ron DeSantis was my favorite candidate in the race,” said the Daily Wire’s Ben Shapiro in an X video. “I think he would’ve made the best president of all the candidates who are in the race.” Yet Shapiro views rallying to Trump as an inescapable reality for conservatives. “Obviously the Republican voting base wants Donald Trump, and you know what, that’s the Republican voting base’s prerogative. I think there will be a future for Ron DeSantis in the movement, I think there will be another time for Governor DeSantis again. With that said, this primary race, as I said after Iowa, is over and it will remain over. New Hampshire will be won by Donald Trump. It is time for the party to coalesce behind the guy who is going to beat Joe Biden, and that guy is Donald Trump.”

Your Voice CEO Bill Mitchell, who describes his X feed as #DeSantis2024 Central, was not very excited about the prospects of a Trump presidency. “Governor DeSantis far and away remains the best candidate in this race. I say ‘in’ because he has merely suspended his campaign. He is younger, smarter, more principled, more conservative and more electable in November than Trump. He is also unindicted and brings far less day to day drama.” Nonetheless, Mitchell did tell The Spectator that he would vote for Trump under a single a condition — “if he makes DeSantis his running mate.” The same idea has been floated around by other folks in the governor’s orbit, including podcast host Dave Rubin.

“This is the only ticket that can bring the stability and intelligence to a Trump administration to make it effective or even possible. If Trump picks another, I will look hard at supporting a third-party candidate who could actually win this time with the divided electorate,” Mitchell added.

The Spectator also reached out to @FlaKayleigh, who many in the MAGA-sphere accuse of being Mitchell’s alt account. “As a Ron DeSantis supporter, America loses with either of the remaining options. Haley is a Democrat and Trump’s nomination will cause a Democrat win,” the outspoken DeSantis supporter explained.

Jordan Schachtel kept things simple. “Donald Trump is a far superior candidate to Nikki Haley [and Joe Biden],” the publisher of the Dossier newsletter told The Spectator. “I have no interest in a future that involves a nuclear exchange over the Donbas region.” Political consultant Ryan Girdusky, who wrote an insightful critique of the DeSantis campaign, kept it even simpler: “No one gives a shit about my endorsement or who I’m going to vote for.”

Former DeSantis speechwriter Nate Hochman, who has been off the campaign since July 2023, told The Spectator, “Regardless of who you supported at any juncture over the past year, there are now two overriding imperatives for anyone who genuinely cares about America First: 1) Deny the Nikki Haley faction of the GOP the chance to claw its way back into power, and 2) Defeat Joe Biden in November. It’s an easy choice. Trump 2024.”