Ron DeSantis allegedly fighting his super PAC as campaign gets messier

Reports of infighting have surfaced as Ron DeSantis‘s presidential campaign continues to flail. Tensions are rising between DeSantis’s official campaign and Never Back Down (NBD), the most prominent super PAC supporting the Florida governor.

According to sources from both groups who spoke with Politico, each is blaming the other for the challenges the campaign has experienced since its launch.

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One of the biggest sources of tension is that both the DeSantis campaign and NBD are trying to run the show, with NBD having thought they would also play the role of the de facto campaign, considering how much more money the PAC has raised than the campaign itself. NBD raised $130 million in the second quarter, compared to $20 million by the campaign.

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But without being legally allowed to communicate, the battle is being fought through memos, the media, and competing initiatives.

“It’s clear that NBD is going to be taking on a bigger role given the publicly available finances, and they are busy making ads and building the Iowa bus tour this week,” said an unnamed source. DeSantis is the PAC’s guest on the bus tour, and the comingling will undoubtedly affect this power struggle in some way. But as Politico put it, only time will tell whether the two groups can find a way to work together without violating campaign finance laws.

But according to campaign spokesperson Andrew Romeo, the alleged tension is merely rumor. “Our campaign is laser-focused [on] electing Ron DeSantis president and we are nothing but grateful for groups like Never Back Down that are working to support this mission,” Romeo said.

The reports come as the DeSantis campaign becomes increasingly messy. Currently, the Florida governor is in a distant second place in 2024 Republican primary polling, getting an average of 18.4% support in recent polls, according to RealClearPolitics, which is down from 21.5% earlier this month. Donald Trump is in first with an average of 52.4%.

The DeSantis campaign recently purged a third of its staff as part of a reported campaign “reset” to try to revive his standing. The layoffs were also related to the fact that the campaign has spent almost 40% of the $20 million it raised in the second quarter – with many of those funds coming from maxed-out donors who cannot donate again.

Two staffers have also caused controversy for the campaign by secretly creating controversial ads and publishing them through supporters’ social media accounts. One video included Nazi imagery; speechwriter Nate Hochman was fired after being identified as its creator. The other video was slammed by both sides of the aisle for being virulently homophobic.