Though many conservatives are kicking the tires on Ron DeSantis as the future of the movement, one group of former Republican operatives is less convinced, but is ready to stop him in his tracks nonetheless.
In what is billed as an "interested parties memo," the Lincoln Project argues that the Florida Governor is just another player in a "post-ideological" GOP that is nothing short of a "dangerous and destructive movement."
The memo begins with a treatment of former President Donald Trump and the "MAGA" movement, before namechecking DeSantis amid a list of "those rising under him — the Taliban 20, the Congressional Republicans, Kevin McCarthy, DeSantis, the alt-right media, and the countless others who continue to push radical anti-democratic propaganda and lies in an effort to stir distrust and chaos in our nation."
The memo returns to the DeSantis denunciations soon enough, throwing his predecessor as Governor in the mix.
"Donald Trump, Kari Lake, Kevin McCarthy, Mitch McConnell, Ron DeSantis, Rick Scott, Glenn Youngkin, and Marjorie Taylor-Greene are all part of the same movement. Some, like DeSantis and Youngkin may hold themselves out as 'normal' but they've rarely stood up to Trump or the worst in his movement. In fact, they endorsed, and campaigned for, the likes of Kari Lake and Herschel Walker in 2022."
Indeed, DeSantis endorsed Walker, and traveled across the country for Lake, who lauded the Governor's "BDE," or "Big DeSantis energy." (We understand that BDE has alternate meanings in some quarters).
Expect the Lincoln Project to try to stoke conflicts between DeSantis and the rest of the namechecked right-wingers. They vow to "develop messaging and tactics that allow us to drive wedges between the Republican candidates, keeping them fighting with one another, and specifically inducing them into fights with Donald Trump."
Though DeSantis has yet to move into an active phase of a 2024 Presidential campaign, the Lincoln Project will troll him and other Republican contenders as if they are running.
"As of this writing, Donald Trump is the only declared candidate for the Republican presidential nomination. We expect that by this summer, that will have changed, but it is still too soon to say by how much. There is a wild expectation that more than a dozen other Republicans could take on Trump in what will be a long, ugly, and divisive fight for the GOP standard.
"We will be there, just as we were in 2020, to encourage internecine fighting, spark chaos, enrage Trump with our 'Audience of One' strategy, and remind voters — Republicans, Democrats, and Independents, why Trump and his sycophants should never again occupy the Oval Office."
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