Regrets, Florida governor Ron DeSantis has a few.  On Sunday, the once rising political star announced that his presidential campaign was kaput.  Returning to the platform, "X," where he had launched his bid just eight months ago, DeSantis confessed there was no "clear path to victory."  After finishing a distant second in the Iowa caucuses, DeSantis conceded that "amajority of Republican primary voters want to give Donald Trump another chance."  And with that, the man who the New York Post once dubbed "DeFuture" threw his support behind The Don.

Beltway scribes and the consultant class are ruthlessly dissecting the corpse of the DeSantis campaign.  DeSantis lacked charisma.  His campaign was a profligate mess.  And as DeSantis,himself, admits, he "should have been blanketing" the airwaves if only to spar with a hostilemainstream media.  But even if the 45-year-old Navy veteran, who won his 2022 gubernatorialreelection in a 19-point landslide, had put every foot right, he still had a near impossible obstacle to overcome: Donald J. Trump.

Throughout the primary, Trump's approval rating among GOP voters never fell below 40%.  When Democrats launched their barrage of 91 indictments across four criminal cases, the MAGA maestro became a colossus.  As DeSantis told the Christian Broadcasting Network in December, "If I could have one thing change, I wish Trump hadn't been indicted on any of this stuff."  In 2028, DeSantis won't have to wish.