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Why do we put this item at the very end of the page? Because there is no lower spot available. If there was a way to put it two or three spots after the last item, then we would do that, because that would capture how likely this news is to affect the GOP presidential race.
As we noted yesterday, Miami mayor Francis Suarez has been hinting at a presidential run for several months. He was front and center for Tuesday's arraignment, trying to get as much camera time as possible. And yesterday, Suarez took the plunge and filed the paperwork necessary for a presidential run.
There is zero chance Suarez is going to be the Republicans' presidential candidate. He's not only up against the 800-pound gorilla that is Donald Trump and the 250-or-so pound gorilla that is Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), he's also up against a bunch of lesser candidates who are largely better known than he is and who got going before he did. The money isn't there for him to collect, the staffers aren't there for him to hire, and the voters aren't there for him to attract. It's hard to see how he might overcome these issues if he had 6 months to try. And he doesn't have 6 months; the first GOP debate is in 9 weeks.
There is also zero chance that Suarez is going to be the Republicans' vice-presidential candidate. A somewhat moderate (by the standards of the modern-day GOP) Latino from Florida could potentially be an interesting pairing under certain circumstances. But electors can't vote for both a president and a VP from the elector's home state. That effectively means that DeSantis and Trump can't run with Suarez, because even if they won the election, they would be at risk of getting stuck with a Democrat as VP. If you can't be on a DeSantis ticket or a Trump ticket, you can't be the GOP VP candidate in 2024. Even if we imagine that those two both collapse, Suarez isn't much of a fit with the folks in the second tier, for various reasons, and would face fierce competition for the "honor" from dozens of other Republicans.
That means that the Mayor is presumably in search of name recognition, for when his time in his current office is up, and he shoots for a promotion. Could he challenge Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), who is up next year and is not very popular? It's possible. Otherwise, Suarez may be thinking about the Florida governor's mansion once DeSantis vacates it. (Z)