The 2024 GOP Primary Is About to Get More Crowded

By many accounts, a few more names could be added to the list of declared Republican candidates vying for the 2024 nomination in the coming days.

As early as today, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott is expected to formally declare his candidacy following his exploratory committee in late April.

Scott must have spent that time exploring and found the surroundings to be somewhat inviting:

Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina made it official Friday: He’s running for president.

Scott, the Senate’s only Black Republican, filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission declaring his intention to seek his party’s nomination in 2024. His candidacy will test whether a more optimistic vision of America’s future can resonate with GOP voters who have elevated partisan brawlers in recent years.

The deeply religious 57-year-old former insurance broker has made his grandfather’s work in the cotton fields of the Deep South a bedrock of his political identity. Yet he rejects the notion that racism remains a powerful force in society, and he has cast his candidacy and rise from generational poverty as the realization of a dream only possible in America.

Scott is expected to make the announcement today and then jet off with events lined up over two days in Iowa and New Hampshire.

As far as polling goes, Scott is still hovering around 2% nationally give or take depending on the pollster. A formal declaration and entrance to the race should goose those numbers a tad but he’s still sitting down in the single digits at the starting gate.

Next on the lineup is famed New Jersey loudmouth Chris Christie who swears, on the holiest of Bibles, that he and he alone is the man to take down Donald Trump on a kamikaze mission.

Reports indicate that Chrisis could be days away from formally declaring his intention to try and destroy Trump’s chances in 2024:

Chris Christie will reportedly be entering the 2024 presidential race soon.

The Republican former New Jersey governor will make an announcement in a matter of days, and focus on the key primary state of New Hampshire, according to New Hampshire Today, citing multiple anonymous sources with knowledge of the campaign.

The campaign will reportedly be backed by billionaire New York Mets owner Steve Cohen.

Mr Christie, a former Trump ally turned vocal critic, has not yet publicly announced a campaign.

Well, alright. Christie wants to get in again and have another go at it. Are Chris Christie’s presidential aspirations nonsense? Probably.

Candidates that run for office with the sole intention of destroying another candidate running for the same office usually don’t go very far. “Vote for me so I can lob insults at someone else” isn’t a very inspiring message. If Christie thinks he can join the race, act like a jerk to Trump, and somehow that will help DeSantis, there doesn’t seem to be a clear path forward.

Nonetheless, expect a possible Christie announcement soon.

The biggest and most serious name on the list is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis who may join the race as early as this week according to reports from late last week:

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is expected to enter the 2024 GOP presidential race next week, two Republicans familiar with the matter told CNN, initiating his much-anticipated bid to wrestle the future of the party from former President Donald Trump.

DeSantis will file paperwork declaring his candidacy next week with the Federal Election Commission, one Republican said, with a formal announcement expected the following week in his Florida hometown of Dunedin. DeSantis is likely to soft-launch the campaign as early as Wednesday to coincide with the filing of the paperwork, according to a Republican consultant close to the governor’s political team.

Sounds like the paperwork will be filed on Wednesday, perhaps, to get everything in order which will be the “soft launch” of the campaign. This will set up June for a more formal announcement and campaign kickoff.

The other name lingering around is former Vice President Mike Pence who says he’ll decide by the end of next month:

“I expect before the month of June is out, we’ll let people know of our decision,” he said. “If we choose to go forward, this race doesn’t really start until the August debate in Milwaukee.”

If Pence does decide to enter the race, he’ll be little more than a footnote among the better-positioned candidates around him.

According to the most recent poll numbers, however, the race is still a two-person contest at best:

Former President Donald Trump is widening his lead over the rest of the Republican primary field, according to a new Harvard CAPS/Harris poll.

In a hypothetical nine-way Republican presidential primary, Trump takes 58 percent support among GOP voters, adding 3 percentage points to his already-staggering lead since last month. His closest rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, notched only 16 percent in the survey – a 4-point downturn since the previous survey.

No other candidate, declared or potential, comes anywhere close to Trump or DeSantis. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley and former Vice President Mike Pence, who hasn’t yet announced a campaign, are tied for third place at just 4 percent, the poll found.

Here we go, folks, it’s about to begin in earnest.