DeSantis to enter race; bitter face-off with Trump

WASHINGTON—Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is set to launch his 2024 presidential campaign Wednesday, signaling 18 months of acrimony ahead as he and Donald Trump lock horns in what is expected to be an attritional contest for the Republican nomination.

DeSantis was considered a rising Republican star, but has been caught flat-footed by months of relentless attacks from the former president, who has surged into a commanding lead despite being engulfed in a firestorm of criminal investigations.

The 44-year-old governor will make his announcement in a live-streamed chat with billionaire Twitter owner Elon Musk on the network’s audio platform as he bids to co-opt some of the tech mogul’s star power to upstage Trump.

“I’m endorsing Governor DeSantis— he doesn’t hold back and he’s trying to make changes,” one backer said in a video compilation of messages of support posted on Twitter by the Never Back Down political organization.

Musk teased the 6:00 pm (2200 GMT) Twitter Spaces event in remarks to a conference hosted by the Wall Street Journal, promising it would be live and unscripted, with “real-time questions and answers.”

The announcement will come with a campaign launch video and the start of a three-day retreat in Miami for some of DeSantis’s wealthiest donors, who will be briefed on the campaign before the governor hits several early-voting states next week.

National profile

Long viewed as the most viable challenger to twice-impeached Trump, DeSantis is better known than most of the hopefuls in the chasing pack for the Republican nomination—but still lacks the frontrunner’s national profile.

The launch format offers him a dual advantage—giving him precious access to Musk’s 140 million followers, many of whom are in Trump’s base, and, if he wins the nomination, the attention of a chunk of younger, less conservative voters he will likely need for a shot at the White House.

DeSantis has used his platform as Florida’s chief executive to burnish his conservative credentials, signing off on some 80 new state laws this spring, many targeting “woke indoctrination” in schools and other public institutions.

AFP RED-HOT FURY. Incandescent materials, ash, and smoke are spewed from the Popocatepetl volcano as seen from the San Nicolas de los Ranchos community, state of Puebla, Mexico, on May 23. Authorities raised the warning level for the volcano to one step below red alert, as smoke, ash, and molten rock spewed into the sky posing risks to aviation and far- ung communities below.