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QUITO Ecuador's President Guillermo Lasso on Wednesday described coming early elections as an opportunity to unite the country

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is considered Donald Trump's strongest Republican rival in the crowded 2024 contest, but many voters are only starting to get to know DeSantis

Ron DeSantis is officially running for president, having filed his statement of candidacy with the Federal Election Commission on Wednesday. The long-awaited move by the Florida governor follows a campaign announcement video released a day earlier by his wife, Casey, on Twitter. His filing was first reported by The Associated Press. Mr DeSantis is expected to address voters in his first appearance as a candidate for president later Wednesday evening in a Twitter space hosted by Elon Musk ally David Sacks. He will then appear on Fox News for an interview immediately afterwards with Bret Baier. The rising Republican star is in his second term as governor of the trending-red Sunshine State, having won reelection by double digits just last year. He previously won election to office in 2018 by a fraction of a percentage point. He enters the race with one key label tied to his campaign already: The second-place challenger, thanks to months of polling that have shown him firmly behind Mr Trump in a Republican primary matchup. That same polling has shown him consistently in the double digits, however, which is more than can be said for his other Republican rivals — Nikki Haley, Tim Scott, Asa Hutchinson and others. Mr DeSantis’s official launch also signals a likely shift in strategy. Whereas for months the governor has sought to avoid a direct confrontation with Mr Trump, that now is unavoidable, even without the near-constant barrage of attacks that his now-official rival has been lobbing his way. That strategic shift has been hinted at for some time now, with a DeSantis-aligned PAC even swiping directly at the former president following his CNN town hall earlier this month. It isn’t clear whether the Jacksonville native, 44, will be successful in his bid to oust Mr Trump as de facto leader of the GOP. But he heads into the 2024 race with all the structural advantages he could possibly hope for: A sympathetic if not outright supportive GOP establishment, a national voter base that has indicated time and time again it does not wish for Mr Trump (or, for that matter, Mr Biden) to run again, and a political pedigree that seems almost lab-generated for a presidential run. He previously served in the House of Representatives as a founding member of the Freedom Caucus, and before that was a lawyer for the US military. During his service, Mr DeSantis was stationed at Guantanamo Bay before later being part of the 2007 Iraq troop surge which saw him playing legal adviser to a US commander in Fallujah. More follows... Read More Can Ron DeSantis beat Donald Trump? These Florida political veterans aren’t so sure The War on Terror turned Ron DeSantis into Florida’s anti-woke warrior. Can it win him the White House? Everything we know about Ron DeSantis’ policies as he launches 2024 campaign

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, whose clashes with Disney and aggressive pursuit of conservative victories has made him a leading Republican Party figure, has filed to run for president in 2024.

Donald Trump and his allies are planning a coordinated effort to upend the media cycle around the presidential campaign launch of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, which will include videos and a social media blitz leaning on high-profile, Trump-aligned conservative commentators, sources familiar with the plans told CNN.

He’s a ubiquitous presence in conservative media with a reputation as an anti-woke warrior who has used a compliant state legislature to make Florida a mecca for Trump-era Republicanism. But if Ron DeSantis wants to be president, he has to defeat Donald Trump and Joe Biden, and prominent Florida politicians aren’t so sure either of those things will ever happen. The second-term Florida governor, who for months has sojourned through the traditional primary battlegrounds of Iowa and New Hampshire while hawking his manifesto-cum-memoir The Courage to be Free, was once seen as a formidable obstacle to the twice-impeached ex-president’s dream of reclaiming his place in the White House. But in the weeks since Mr Trump found himself on the wrong end of an indictment from a New York grand jury, the Florida governor has seen his standing in the polls tumble while his fellow Floridian has surged to a commanding lead among GOP primary voters. Still, Mr DeSantis is poised to launch a presidential presidential campaign that has support from a decent chunk of his party and a formidable war chest transferred from his successful re-election run last year. He gained that support — and a national profile — by winning the hearts and minds of some former Trump boosters through his wholehearted rejection of any and all restrictions or mandates meant to contain the Covid-19 pandemic, and he has kept his core support among some GOP diehards by using a compliant state legislative majority to enact a laundry list of conservative priorities and use resulting culture war battles to raise his profile even further. A Republican media strategist who worked on Mr Trump’s 2020 campaign, Giancarlo Sopo, told The Independent he believes Mr DeSantis is “the obvious choice” to lead the GOP in next year’s election because of what he described as the Florida governor’s role in enacting “the boldest conservative agenda this country has seen since Ronald Reagan” and Mr DeSantis’ “unique ability to demoralize and defeat the left”. Yet Mr Sopo’s confidence in Mr DeSantis’ abilities wasn’t shared by many Florida GOP veterans contacted by The Independent. None of the Florida-based operatives would speak on the record for fear of alienating the governor, who has earned a reputation for vindictiveness during his five years in Tallahassee. But the consensus opinion among the GOP political strategists, many of whom have had a hand in national campaigns of years past, was that the governor’s reputation as a lib-triggering prizefighter is a carefully manufactured façade — a recent invention that is a fabrication formed by a coterie of combative press aides and sympathetic media outlets. Mr DeSantis’ reinvention as a woke-battling colossus standing astride the Sunshine State could not be a starker contrast to how he conducted himself during the five years he spent in Washington while representing Florida’s 6th Congressional District in the House of Representatives. The future governor won his first House election in 2012, just two years after the Tea Party movement that arose after Barack Obama’s inauguration helped the GOP retake control of the chamber from the Nancy Pelosi-led Democratic caucus. As he geared up to run in that election, Mr DeSantis found a way to capitalise on the anti-Obama sentiment within the GOP by calling his first book Dreams from Our Founding Fathers — a title that positioned it as a response of sorts to Mr Obama’s best-selling memoir, Dreams from My Father. After he was sworn in to Congress in January 2013, he quickly became one of the most conservative members of an avowedly conservative House Republican Conference. After he won a second term in the 2014 midterms, he became a founding member of the House Freedom Caucus, a group of far-right Republicans that would become such a thorn in the side of then-House Speaker John Boehner that the Ohio Republican chose to resign rather than suffer the indignity of being forced out for forging one too many compromises with Mr Obama. The Florida Republican compiled as conservative a voting record as any member of the House GOP, but despite arriving on the scene at a time when his brand of hard-right conservatism was becoming more and more en-vogue in the House, he never became as well-known as some of his equally conservative colleagues, such as Reps Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), Mark Meadows (R-NC) or Justin Amash (R-MI). One possible reason for that — his reputation as an awkward loner — appears to have already hampered his chances against Mr Trump. A former House GOP colleague, ex-Michigan Representative David Trott, told Politico earlier this month that Mr DeSantis never once attempted to so much as start a conversation with him during the two years they sat next to each other on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “I was new to Congress, and he didn’t introduce himself or even say hello,” he recalled in an email to the outlet’s Playbook newsletter. In a subsequent phone interview, Mr Trott also called the Florida governor an “a*****e” and said he does not think Mr DeSantis “cares about people”. Another House colleague who spoke anonymously to NBC News said he “had no friends” in Congress and was “not a backslapping politician”. “He wasn’t a friendly guy. He was a personal-agenda-driven guy,” said one lawmaker. “I was with him in the gym every morning and could hardly get him to say hello. He didn’t seem like he liked being here.” Mr DeSantis’ alleged dislike of the lower chamber became evident after just two terms when he briefly stood as a candidate for the Senate seat held by Senator Marco Rubio, who was then running for president in the 2016 primary. When Mr Rubio lost the Republican primary for president to Mr Trump, Mr DeSantis instead stayed on the ballot for his House seat and won a third term easily. But after a short period of working to gain Mr Trump’s favour by aggressively criticising the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the then-president rewarded Mr DeSantis’ loyalty with an endorsement when he ran in the 2018 Florida gubernatorial primary. After winning the GOP nomination, Mr DeSantis barely beat his Democratic opponent, former Tallahassee mayor Andrew Gillum, winning his place in the Florida Governor’s mansion by less than a percentage point. His ascent in Florida coincided with large levels of inward migration into Florida, a state with no income tax. At the same time, a steady drumbeat of GOP messaging which cast even the most moderate Democats as “socialist” helped push Latino voters — many of whom were immigrants from countries with actual socialist governments — to begin casting votes for Republicans. With those winds at his back — and a newfound prominence in right-wing media thanks to his rejection of Covid vaccines and public health measures such as masks — Mr DeSantis won re-election in 2022 by slightly less than 20 points, even flipping historically Democratic areas like Miami-Dade County. His win atop the midterm election ticket coincided with historic Democratic losses on the state level, leaving Florida Democrats in a weaker minority status in the state legislature and leaving the party without a single representative among statewide elected officials. But when Mr DeSantis departed Washington after winning the governor’s mansion in 2018, he did so with few friends other than Mr Trump, whose support among the Florida delegation remained strong enough that the Florida governor’s much-hyped visit to the Capitol earlier this year ended with multiple Florida congresspersons walking out of a meeting with him to declare that they were endorsing the former president once again. One of those members was Representative Byron Donalds, a second-term congressman who represents the Sunshine State’s 19th District. Mr Donalds, who in the past has been a close ally of the Florida governor, said in a statement that he was backing the twice-impeached ex-president over his own state’s governor. “There is only one leader at this time in our nation’s history who can seize this moment and deliver what we need — to get us back on track, provide strength and resolve, and Make America Great Again,” he said. He had previously praised Mr DeSantis as having done a “tremendous job” during a recent appearance on right-wing commentator Megyn Kelly’s satellite radio show, but he also said Mr Trump’s prior experience gives him “muscle memory” that will provide an advantage in next year’s battle with President Biden — and in a second term. “Donald Trump has been through these fights. He knows where these landmines are and so he can walk in and be effective,” he said. That visit and the subsequent loss of support among his own congressional delegation was an early sign that the factors that led Mr DeSantis to newfound celebrity on the right may not be enough to overcome his awkwardness and apparent aversion to social interactions. And those same factors — his rejection of anti-Covid measures, his support for culture war bellicosity, book bans, restrictions on gender-affirming care and opposition to the teaching of Black history — could make him toxic on a national stage. As a result, Democrats hope a White House run will show him to be little more than a delicate flower who will wither under the hot lights of a presidential campaign. Rep Maxwell Frost (D-FL), a vocal critic of Mr DeSantis who heckled him at an event years ago, told The Independent that he is relishing the idea of a Trump-DeSantis primary fight. He said he’d take pleasure in “arguably two of the worst people in politics going at each other” and acknowledged that the sniping between the two thus far has provided “some entertainment”. But he also noted that there’s a danger to giving either Mr DeSantis or Mr Trump a chance to get into the White House. “The unfortunate part is that, you know, the impact is real,” he said. “It’s important and I’m gonna be one of the people out there beating the drum for people to know how horrible both of them are, but specifically DeSantis.” Rep Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL), who briefly served with Mr DeSantis in the House of Representatives, said she took no enjoyment from watching Mr Trump and Mr DeSantis bicker. “There’s nothing pleasurable about Ron DeSantis or Donald Trump,” she told The Independent. “The hell that he’s wreaked on us in our state has been devastating to education, to health care, women’s reproductive decisions.” Ms Wasserman Schultz said she hoped Mr DeSantis’ run would be the beginning of the end of his political career. Read More Ron DeSantis news – live: Florida governor’s wife launches his 2024 presidential run Ron DeSantis 2024: Everything we know about the Florida governor’s presidential bid Who is Casey DeSantis? What we know about Florida governor Ron’s wife who could become America’s first lady Former Guantanamo prisoner: Ron DeSantis watched me being tortured

A poem written for President Joe Biden’s inauguration has been placed on a restricted list at a South Florida elementary school after one parent's complaint

Ron DeSantis will officially enter the 2024 presidential race on Wednesday following months of speculation. The Florida governor will take part in a live Twitter event with Elon Musk on Wednesday night, NBC News reports. Afterward, the campaign will release an official launch video. On Tuesday night Casey DeSantis kicked off her husband’s campaign by posting a video of him getting ready to go on stage in front of an American flag. “America is worth the fight... Every. Single. Time,” Ms DeSantis tweeted along with the expensively produced video. Mr DeSantis, 44, is seen as Mr Trump’s biggest rival for the Republican vote with several Republican lawmakers and right-wing media rallying behind him after the midterms. However, the latest polls show Mr DeSantis trailing Mr Trump. This comes at a time when Mr DeSantis is going to war with Disney and pushing back on the NAACP‘s advisory warning travellers that Florida is “openly hostile” towards Black people, people of colour and LGBT+ people due to his laws. Read More DeSantis’s wife launches his presidential campaign with first 2024 video: ‘America is worth the fight’ Ron DeSantis to launch 2024 presidential bid on Twitter with Elon Musk Everything Elon Musk has said about the 2024 election so far David Sacks: The controversial entrepreneur hosting Ron DeSantis 2024 event with Elon Musk Casey DeSantis gives cheeky response to reports husband is launching 2024 campaign

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is considered Donald Trump's strongest Republican rival in the crowded 2024 contest, but many voters are only starting to get to know DeSantis

Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley will participate in a live CNN presidential town hall next month in Iowa, the network announced Wednesday.

Donald Trump tried to steal the spotlight away from Ron DeSantis’ 2024 campaign announcement day by launching into an insult-packed rant about the Florida governor on his Truth Social platform. The former president began his day on Wednesday morning by spewing a series of attacks at the man expected to be his biggest rival for the Republican nomination in the 2024 presidential race. Resorting to his nicknames of “Ron DeSanctus” and “Rob DeSanctimonious”, he repeated his usual talking points for the Florida governor and one-time close ally saying he “desperately needs a personality transplant” and calling him a “disloyal person” and a “disciple of horrible RINO Paul Ryan”. He also once again tried to take credit for Mr DeSantis’ successful 2018 gubernatorial bid. “Look, Rob DeSanctimonious came to me asking for help. He was losing badly, by 31 points, to popular Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam,” he fumed. “He was getting ready to drop out of the race - Ran a terrible campaign! Ron told me he had one last chance, my Support & Endorsement, which Putnam, and everyone else, wanted also. I gave it to Ron, and the race was over. In one day, he went from losing badly, to winning by a lot. With 3 LARGE TRUMP RALLIES, he WON THE GENERAL ELECTION in an upset. DISLOYAL!!!” Mr Trump continued in another post: “Ron DeSanctus can’t win the General Election (or get the Nomination) because he VOTED TO OBLITERATE SOCIAL SECURITY, EVEN WANTING TO RAISE THE MINIMUM AGE TO 70 (or more!), VOTED TO BADLY WOUND MEDICARE, AND FOUGHT HARD AND VOTED FOR A 23% “TAX ON EVERYTHING” SALES TAX. He was, and is, a disciple of horrible RINO Paul Ryan, and others too many to mention. Also, he desperately needs a personality transplant and, to the best of my knowledge, they are not medically available yet. A disloyal person!” In another post, he resorted to an all-caps rant making several dubious claims about his own record during his one term in the White House. “I BUILT THE GREATEST ECONOMY IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD, NO INFLATION, ENERGY INDEPENDENCE, AND SOON DOMINANCE, THE STRONGEST BORDER EVER, RECORD BEST EMPLOYMENT NUMBERS, BIGGEST TAX & REGULATION CUTS, REBUILT OUR MILITARY, NO WARS WITH RUSSIA/UKRAINE OR CHINA/TAIWAN (OR ANYWHERE!), AND THE USA WAS RESPECTED ALL OVER THE WORLD! WHAT ELSE CAN I SAY?” he wrote, before adding: “ELECTION INTERFERENCE!!!” Mr Trump’s fury comes as Mr DeSantis is expected to officially enter the 2024 race on Wednesday in a Twitter Spaces event with Elon Musk. The audio-only event will involve a live interview with Musk, moderated by controversial tech entrepreneur David Sacks. Following the event, Mr DeSantis is expected to release an official launch video and make an appearance on Fox News. On Tuesday night, the governor’s wife Casey DeSantis kicked off his campaign by posting a video of him getting ready to go on stage in front of an American flag. “America is worth the fight... Every. Single. Time,” she tweeted. Mr DeSantis, 44, is seen as Mr Trump’s biggest rival for the Republican vote with several Republican lawmakers and right-wing media rallying behind him after the midterms. However, the latest polls show Mr DeSantis trailing Mr Trump. Read More Ron DeSantis news – live: Florida governor’s wife launches his 2024 presidential run Trump news – live: Trump seeks meeting with Garland over special counsel probes as hush money trial date set Ivanka and Jared split over attending Trump 2024 launch – follow live Why was Donald Trump impeached twice during his first term? Four big lies Trump told during his 2024 presidential announcement

Greeks will head to the polls for a second time after the three main party leaders rejected a mandate by Greek President Katerina Sakellaropoulou to form a coalition government, following Sunday's inconclusive vote.