The head of Never Back Down - Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis's (R) super PAC - has resigned.
Fox News reports: "Chris Jankowski, a veteran operative in Republican politics, submitted his resignation letter, effective immediately, to the board of Never Back Down on Wednesday."
Jankowski has also released a statement on his resignation.
The statement reads:
Never Back Down’s main goal and sole focus has been to elect Governor Ron DeSantis as President. Given the current environment, it has become untenable for me to deliver on the shared goal and that goes well beyond a difference of strategic opinion. For the future of our country, I support and pray Ron DeSantis is our 47th president
Jankowski's resignation, according to NBC News, comes after some recent infighting among members of the super PAC.
"Leaders of Ron DeSantis' Never Back Down super PAC met privately last Tuesday to hash out a strategy for fighting Nikki Haley's rise in the polls. Instead, two of them nearly came to blows," the outlet reports.
It continues, "Jeff Roe, the top consultant for the super PAC, got into a heated argument with longtime DeSantis confidant Scott Wagner while a small group of nine board members and senior staff were discussing budgeting."
NBC goes on to report that the "infighting represents an escalation in the long-running war between Never Back Down's professional political operatives and DeSantis’ Tallahassee-based inner circle over who is to blame for the governor’s failure to compete effectively with front-runner Donald Trump for the Republican nomination."
Both DeSantis and his wife, Casey, are reported to be "increasingly upset" by Never Back Down's leadership.
There was a time when DeSantis was considered to be Trump's top Republican 2024 rival. But, at this point, it seems unlikely that any Republican can give Trump a serious challenge in the 2024 Republican presidential primary.
Real Clear Politics reports that Trump, on average, leads DeSantis - the second-place candidate - by 46.3 percentage points. Trump leads Haley - the third-place candidate - by nearly 50 percentage points.
This is already bad news for DeSantis. But, what makes the situation even worse for DeSantis is that Haley has recently been gaining ground on him, putting him in jeopardy of losing his number two spot.
The former South Carolina governor is now only three percentage points behind DeSantis, on average. Some individual polls even have Haley ahead of DeSantis.
It is usually when things are not going well that infighting is more likely to occur. Just about every metric would seem to suggest that things are not going well for DeSantis's 2024 campaign.
