Politics

(WASHINGTON) — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who was hailed for much of last year as a rising Republican star, is ending his presidential campaign after he failed to overtake rival Donald Trump in polling or in the early vote of the 2024 race.

DeSantis made his announcement in a four-and-a-half-minute video posted to X on Sunday with less than 48 hours until voting in New Hampshire’s primary, the second state in the nominating race.

“We don’t have a clear path to victory,” he said in the video, which he said was filmed in Florida.

His exit now leaves the primary battle as essentially a one-on-one contest between Trump and Trump’s former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who continues to trail Trump in polling and placed a distant third in the Iowa caucuses where DeSantis came in second (with 21%) to Trump’s first-place finish with 51%.

According to polls, Haley has her best chance at beating Trump in New Hampshire on Tuesday.

DeSantis on Sunday quickly endorsed Trump, a primary opponent whom he has increasingly criticized on the trail.

“It’s clear to me that a majority of Republican primary voters want to give Donald Trump another chance. … While I’ve had disagreements with Donald Trump, such as on the coronavirus pandemic and his elevation of [COVID-19 adviser] Anthony Fauci, Trump is superior to the current incumbent, Joe Biden. That is clear,” DeSantis said in his video. “I signed a pledge to support the Republican nominee and I will honor that pledge.”

DeSantis begins 2024 as a failed challenger to Trump, but he entered 2023 as the Republican seen as the most likely alternative to win the party’s presidential nomination.

After a dominant reelection to the Florida governor’s mansion in November 2022, winning by double digits in a famous swing state that had only barely elected him in 2018, DeSantis was buoyed through March 2023 by poll numbers that showed him less than 15 points behind Trump, according to 538.

DeSantis also often boasted of his track record of conservative victories in his state, where Republicans have increasingly won a number of local elections even as Trump-aligned candidates have struggled in high-profile races elsewhere in the country.

Among his achievements in Florida, he said, was his high-profile resistance to federal health authorities’ recommendations during the height of COVID-19 — which he likened to bureaucratic overreach — and his opposition to many K-12 students being instructed on LGBTQ issues, which he contended was often not age-appropriate.

The latter position, widely condemned as prejudiced by LGBTQ advocates, helped solidify DeSantis’ national profile as a Republican warrior but sparked a lengthy feud with The Walt Disney Company, ABC News’ parent company and one of the largest private employers in Florida.

Disney sued, claiming DeSantis and his allies retaliated against the company because it spoke out against the Parental Rights in Education Act, which critics call the “Don’t Say Gay” law.

As the battle wore on, DeSantis, who denied politically motivated retaliation, said the state had “basically moved on.” (Disney’s suit remains pending.)

In early 2023, before officially entering the presidential race, DeSantis used a new book — “The Courage to be Free” — to tout his wins in Florida while teasing that he would launch a White House bid after “the most productive legislative session” ever seen in his state.

But his official kickoff in May 2023, hosted by Elon Musk on X, formerly known as Twitter, was marred by glitches and soon evolved into a dense discussion on policy and culture war issues, the very things also came to define DeSantis’ campaign.

DeSantis’ stump speech on the trail was heavy with dense language like “indoctrination” and acronyms like “DEI,” or diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives that many conservatives oppose as unnecessarily race-conscious.

During the summer months, DeSantis ran an insular operation, keeping his distance from the mainstream press — just as he often did while running for reelection as governor — and holding his fire on Trump, the front-runner, only taking Trump on directly when asked by reporters or voters.

The strategy led to some awkward moments, as in New Hampshire in June, when he responded to a voter who asked him about Jan. 6 by saying, “I wasn’t anywhere near Washington that day.”

In the closing days and weeks of his campaign, DeSantis vocally criticized Trump’s record but was unable to build up much momentum in polls of Republican voters.

DeSantis also repeatedly endured cycles of negative headlines over staffing layoffs, infighting with his allied super PAC, which organized much of his campaigning, and his high rate of spending that saw him burn through a significant amount of his huge fundraising.

By the time the governor appeared to find his footing on the trail in the fall, his earlier strength in the polls had badly erode and he was hearing Haley’s footsteps. The former South Carolina governor delivered multiple well-received debate performances in the summer and fall and saw a steady uptick in the polls, even surpassing DeSantis in many surveys by the winter months as both sought to pitch themselves as the stronger Trump alternative.

DeSantis, responding to Haley’s rise, labeled her as less conservative — needing to prop up her campaign with anti-Trump voters outside the GOP base.

Haley on Sunday responded to the end of DeSantis’ campaign by praising him.

“I want to say to Ron: He ran a great race, he’s been a good governor and we wish him well,” she said.

“Having said that,” she added, “it’s now one fella and one lady left. … May the best woman win.”

An intense campaign schedule, and a bet on Iowa

DeSantis pitched himself to voters as the hardest-working candidate, and often had the receipts to prove it.

In late summer, DeSantis began campaigning intensely across Iowa, ticking off counties big and small as he sought to visit all 99 by the time of January’s caucus (he accomplished the feat by early December).

The tours through Iowa were led primarily by Never Back Down, the deep-pocketed super PAC supporting the governor.

Staff from the group guided DeSantis through each crevice of the state in a red and blue bus with his name stamped on each side.

The stops ranged from meeting the owners of a meat locker in rural Wright County, near the Minnesota border, to rallying in front of hundreds of supporters near the banks of the Mississippi River.

Along the way, DeSantis consistently chided Trump for not exerting the same effort, accusing the former president of taking voters for granted.

The governor’s problem, though, was that voters didn’t seem to care.

His deficit in FiveThirtyEight’s national polling average, already severe, widened, as did his marks in polls of Republicans in the early voting states.

By the end of the fall, DeSantis’ chance at the nomination had shrunk to one scenario: notch a stellar result in Iowa, whose evangelical Republican base was more aligned with his conservative policies in Florida, and hope that it would shatter Trump’s aura of invincibility.

With the backing of the state’s popular Republican governor, Kim Reynolds, and the evangelical leader, Bob Vander Plaats, DeSantis was confident in his chances.

Several times, he pledged to win the state.

Abby Cruz, Nicholas Kerr, Mike Pappano, Rachel Scott and Will Steakin contributed to this report.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(WASHINGTON) — A top White House national security official is defending the repeated U.S. strikes on Houthis in Yemen, amid attacks by the militant group on international ships in the Red Sea, which has drawn America into a pattern of back-and-forth retaliatory operations.

“In terms of how this is playing out, I think one thing that’s important to keep in mind is deterrence is not a light switch,” the White House deputy national security adviser, Jon Finer, told ABC News “This Week” co-anchor Martha Raddatz on Sunday. “It requires a pattern and a practice of activity over time and can’t be accessed based on a snapshot of what’s happening at any given moment.”

Raddatz had asked Finer: “Where does this end? It’s in this stage of tit for tat.”

President Joe Biden acknowledged to reporters last week that the strikes weren’t stopping the Houthis but that they would continue.

“The purposes here go well beyond deterrence,” Finer told Raddatz. “We are also seeking to degrade the Houthis’ ability to continue launching these attacks.”

Since strikes on Red Sea ships began escalating in recent weeks, the U.S. has also announced an international task force to, essentially, help police the Red Sea area from further attacks.

The U.S. has taken diplomatic steps, too, Finer said on “This Week.”

“We’ve imposed sanctions on the Houthis, we have gotten dozens of countries to issue statements condemning their attacks,” he said.

Last week, the Biden administration announced that the Houthis would once again be classified as a terrorist organization, reimposing a designation the White House had earlier lifted out of concerns about how it could affect Yemen’s ongoing civil war.

“This is not an attack just on the United States,” Finer said. “This is an attack on the entire global economy and the world is standing up and saying they won’t tolerate that.”

Both the Houthis in Yemen and Iran, whom the U.S. calls a key backer of the Houthis, have said they are carrying out strikes in response to Israel’s bombardment of Gaza in order to take out Hamas in the wake of Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attack.

The altercations in the Red Sea, at Israel’s border with Lebanon and at U.S. military sites in Iraq and Syria, as well as elsewhere in the Middle East, have raised concerns that Israel’s war with Hamas could spill into a wider regional conflict.

That’s something the U.S. has maintained it doesn’t want.

At the same time, U.S. officials have said they must respond to strikes from Iranian-allied groups like the Houthis and others.

On Saturday, an American airbase in western Iraq came under fire from Iranian-backed fighters, military officials said. Finer, on “This Week,” said, “I’m not going to get ahead of any decisions the president may make, but you can be sure that we are taking this extremely seriously and we’ll have more to say about it soon.”

Raddatz asked Finer about the U.S. decision to not take more direct actions against Iran.

Finer said the U.S. rejects “the justification and the rationale that because there is a conflict going on between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, that entitles a group to take action, military actions, against the entire global economy, against shippers … that have nothing to do with that conflict.”

He went on to say that “we have held Iran responsible for this in a number of ways.”

“We have taken military action against sites in Iraq and Syria tied to [Iran], which supports these militias,” Finer said.

“I’m not going to sit here and say we are going to take this or that action ahead of decision-making,” he said, “but we have been quite clear and we have been quite willing to take action to hold Iran responsible for these attacks in the past.”

Raddatz also asked Finer about the dire humanitarian conditions in Gaza, where Israel is continuing its now monthslong campaign against Hamas and where approximately 25,000 people have been killed, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.

Finer said last month that the White House thinks Israel “did not show sufficient care for civilian life” in Northern Gaza — echoing what various other high-level Biden administration officials have been saying, trying to balance opposition to Hamas with public concern for Palestinian civilians.

Referring to his previous comments, Raddatz asked on Sunday, “Have things changed and what do we do about them?”

“We have stood up for Israel’s right to take defensive actions against Hamas so that this threat cannot be perpetrat[ed] against them again. But we’ve also been quite clear that the way in which Israel conducts this conflict is of great concern to us,” Finer said.

He told Raddatz that the U.S. had seen a a recent “shift” in the fighting in which Israel has begun “to focus more on high-value targets, on Hamas leadership.”

Still, “There needs to be more humanitarian assistance going into Gaza,” Finer said.

And while he called out “small but consequential steps” like progress with a border crossing opening and the arrival of some goods, he said that was “not enough.”

“And so we’re gonna continue to put the pressure on and continue to try to work day in, day out, in excruciating detail to make sure that the humanitarian assistance in Gaza is improved as this conflict shifts to a different phase,” Finer said.

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(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden’s campaign is dismissing threats that a third-party candidacy, like a potential No Labels “unity” ticket, could siphon crucial votes from him in a close election in November, arguing that voters won’t be “fooled” by those options.

“At the end of the day, there’s only going to be two parties that have an ability to get to 270 electoral votes and that’s going to be Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee and whoever emerges from the extreme Republican primary that’s going on right now,” Quentin Fulks, the Biden campaign’s principal deputy manager, told ABC News “This Week” co-anchor Martha Raddatz on Sunday.

“So, you know, look, we’re gonna stay focused on the issues and make this about freedom and democracy,” Fulks continued. “The Americans that have the most at stake understand that and they’re not going to be fooled by anything else.”

The Biden campaign’s projected confidence comes as Democratic Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota, who is mounting a long-shot primary challenge against the president, recently said for the first time that he would consider accepting No Labels’ nomination if the election becomes a rematch between Biden and former President Donald Trump and it looked like Biden was “almost certain to lose.”

That’s a reversal for Phillips, who had said that if he loses in the Democratic primary, he would support Biden.

No Labels is a group that is fielding a possible bipartisan “unity” third-party ticket.

While Fulks said Sunday that third-party groups do not pose a major risk of spoiling Biden’s campaign, Biden himself said last fall that the group would “help the other guy,” in reference to Trump.

No Labels officials have insisted they don’t want to run a ticket merely to hurt Biden over Trump.

Fulks said Sunday that the campaign is approaching the race as two-way matchup between Biden and the eventual Republican nominee and will work to create a split-screen of their policy differences.

“Our campaign is going to continue to make sure that we’re delivering a message to draw that contrast about what this election is all about and that’s restoring democracy and protecting freedoms for millions of Americans across this country,” Fulks told Raddatz.

But, while the 2024 campaign is only still ramping up, Biden is running with weak approval numbers and what polling shows is widespread voter sentiment that he’s too old and without enough mental sharpness or physical health to serve in office.

Something else that could spell trouble for Biden in November is a potential underperformance with Black voters, who are core to the Democratic Party’s base and whose support appears to be softening in the polls.

Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, a close Biden ally, recently said he was “very concerned” about Black voters showing up for the president.

The campaign has tried to push back, with Vice President Kamala Harris telling ABC News in an exclusive interview last week that they are responding to the community’s needs.

Fulks argued on “This Week” that Biden’s administration has done more for African Americans than any other, citing an increase in Black wealth and a shrinking of the racial wealth gap.

He told Raddatz that the campaign is working to “send a clear signal that, one, we don’t take them for granted; two, we recognize that we need to earn their support in this campaign and communicate with them … all the work that this administration has done to make their lives better.”

Selling the administration’s record is also the campaign’s plan to counter the voter concerns about Biden’s advanced age, Fulks said. The president would be 86 at the end of a second term. (Biden is just three years older than Trump.)

“We have a simple formula for that and that’s results,” Fulks said. “Age equals wisdom equals results and experience.”

“This election is not going to be about age,” Fulks maintained. “This election is about freedom and democracy and the fact that Democrats, under President Biden’s leadership, believe that people deserve more freedom, not less and Republicans want to roll that back and rip it away.”

Raddatz followed up, however, to note that “that is what your opponents are hammering about President Biden. Donald Trump talks about it constantly.”

“I’m sure it’s much easier for them to talk about age than it is to talk about the fact that they want to rip away a woman’s right to choose or take away reproductive freedom from a third of women across this country that are living under national abortion ban because of Donald Trump,” Fulks responded.

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(MANCHESTER, N.H.) — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ended his presidential campaign on Sunday amid dour poll numbers in New Hampshire and South Carolina, marking a major shift in the primary field and the downfall of a politician once seen as former President Donald Trump’s chief rival.

Meanwhile, Trump and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley are growing increasingly combative on the trail ahead of New Hampshire’s primary on Tuesday, where polls show Haley has her best chance at beating Trump.

As Trump defends his racially charged attacks on Haley based on her name, Haley has been going after Trump over his age and, she argues, his decline in mental stamina.

Here’s where the trail stands with less than two days before New Hampshire votes.

DeSantis leaves the race

DeSantis announced in a video shared to social media that he was leaving the race for president, marking the exit of another major candidate shortly before Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary. The race essentially consists of Trump and Haley.

DeSantis in the video endorsed Trump while noting disagreements with the former president over issues like his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

His departure will now see his support in New Hampshire divvied up by the remaining field. Trump is looking to build an early winning streak, after last week’s Iowa caucuses, while Haley is looking at her best chance to best Trump, per state polling, which shows her a relatively close No. 2.

Trump won more than 50% of the vote Iowa, and DeSantis — who had previously projected he would win there — got a distant second place, with 21%. That was a major setback for a rising Republican star who had cruised to reelection in 2022 in a famous swing state where he built a track record as a successful, often hard-line conservative.

DeSantis’ decision to leave the race had been the subject of mounting speculation this weekend after he canceled high-profile scheduled appearances on Sunday on NBC and CNN and on WMUR, a New Hampshire TV station.

He had also been set to spend most of this weekend campaigning in South Carolina in events hosted by his allied super PAC, Never Back Down, but then planned to return to New Hampshire on Sunday for an event in Manchester.

DeSantis’ campaign even insisted less than a day before that he would remain in the race.

“The media hits were canceled due to a scheduling issue and will be rescheduled. The governor will be traveling Sunday morning with the campaign and has public events scheduled Sunday evening through Tuesday in NH,” campaign spokesperson Bryan Griffin posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.

Trump and Haley go at it with different attacks

Trump has, more and more, been mispronouncing or misstating Haley’s given first name — Nimarata — in his social media posts and in public, echoing his repeated emphasis on Barack Obama’s middle name, Hussein.

Trump has also elevated the racist conspiracy theory that Haley is not eligible to be president of the United States because her Indian immigrant parents weren’t yet citizens when she was born in South Carolina. He infamously floated a similar baseless claim about Obama.

Asked about him mocking Haley’s name, Trump told Fox News’ Bret Baier on Sunday that he had done something similar to former primary opponent Asa Hutchinson.

“It’s a little bit of a take-off on her name and her name, wherever she may come from,” he said.

“I have fun with it. And sometimes to tell you the truth, it’s a very effective tool,” he added.

Haley brushed off Trump’s new slams, telling CNN on Thursday: “I know President Trump well. That’s what he does when he feels threatened. That’s what he does when he feels insecure.”

Trump dismissed that on Sunday. “I’m not concerned with her,” he told Baier.

Haley has also returned fire of her own, casting Trump, 77, as too old to return to the White House and questioning his mental acuity after he repeatedly confused her with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., in recent comments about the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

“The concern I have is — I’m not saying anything derogatory — but when you’re dealing with the pressures of a presidency, we can’t have someone else that we question whether they’re mentally fit to do it,” Haley said Saturday in New Hampshire. She has repeatedly indicated both Trump and President Joe Biden, who is 81, are too old for office.

She reiterated her criticism of Trump on Sunday on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

“You don’t be surprised if you have someone that’s 80 in office, their mental stability is going to continue to decline. That’s just human nature. We know that,” she said. “What I’m saying is, first of all, you’re talking about somebody who’s only going to be an office for four years. Secondly, you’re talking about someone who continues to I mean, look, I don’t know if he was confused. I don’t know what happened. But it should be enough to send us a warning sign.”

Biden’s campaign weighed in as well, with a sarcastic post on X that read “I don’t agree with Nikki Haley on everything, but we agree on this much: She is not Nancy Pelosi.”

On Saturday night, Trump said his mind is “stronger” than it was 25 years ago and jabbed at Biden, who has made a number of verbal gaffes and slip-ups himself.

Sununu boasts of Haley’s chances in NH but dodges on path forward

New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, one of Haley’s top surrogates, boasted of her chances in his state — but he sounded less bullish when discussing her path forward beyond that race.

According to 538, Haley is behind Trump in New Hampshire by about 15 points, though she is banking on the state’s independent voters rallying to her over him.

“I’m looking at the next 72 hours,” Sununu said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday. “We’re going like gangbusters. She’s crisscrossing the state. She’s hitting every voter. She’s going everywhere.”

Still, when pressed on whether Haley would remain in the primary contest if she loses next month in her home state of South Carolina — where 538’s polling average shows Trump with a roughly 30-point advantage — Sununu demurred, saying that Haley could “build on momentum” from a strong finish in New Hampshire.

“I think after every state, you look at your campaign, obviously, but that’s a month away. I mean, it’s really a month away,” he said.

ABC News’ Gabriella Abdul-Hakim, Libby Cathey, Hannah Demissie, Fritz Farrow, Lalee Ibssa and Soo Rin Kim contributed to this report.

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(SOUTH CAROLINA) — Newly released audio files show that the Marine Corps called 911 after one of their F-35 fighter jets went missing in South Carolina last September.

The F-35 experienced what Marine Corps officials referred to as a “mishap” over the skies of the state’s Lowcountry region on Sept. 17, 2023, according to military authorities.

The pilot survived after reportedly being ejected from the jet and parachuting down to a residential neighborhood in North Charleston, but the F-35 continued traveling until it disappeared from view, prompting officials to try to track down its location.

“I believe we potentially have an aircraft that went down in Williamsburg County earlier today,” a major from Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort told a Williamsburg County 911 dispatcher.

“You believe you have an aircraft that went down in Williamsburg County?” the dispatcher asked in response.

“That is correct,” the major replied. “We are trying to look for it and we are coming up dry so far.”

The call, which was one of dozens of files obtained by ABC News under South Carolina’s Freedom of Information Act earlier this month, shows that on the day of the crash, the Marine Corps was able to provide coordinates of the area where they believed the jet went down.

It was previously unclear whether the F-35’s transponder was functioning during the incident.

Dispatch audio shows that a medical crew was subsequently assigned, with a dispatcher informing them that there was believed to be one person aboard. The crew was then told to disregard the alert after officials learned that the pilot was safe, but the jet was still missing.

Other Williamsburg County dispatch recordings show confusion locally over where the remains of the jet could have been since there was limited information at the time.

“If it’s military and they’ve got a helicopter, they’ll find it quicker than us,” one official said. “They’ve got more resources than we do.”

Williamsburg County was not the only place where residents and first responders were baffled by the incident. In Charleston County, a previously released 911 recording showed that a resident called law enforcement after being surprised that the F-35’s pilot landed in their backyard. The resident even handed the phone to the pilot, who explained the situation to the dispatcher.

Updated grid coordinates of possible locations where the jet may have crash landed were later provided to Williamsburg County emergency officials. A field of debris from the F-35 was found the day after the jet went missing in a rural area near the border of Williamsburg and Florence counties which is more than 75 miles from the neighborhood where the pilot landed.

It is not yet known what caused the incident, which led to a roughly $100 million loss.

The Marine Corps announced in September that the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing would conduct the investigation and that it would likely continue for several months.

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(FLORIDA) — The Sarasota, Florida Police Department announced Friday they won’t be charging Christian Ziegler, the former chair of the Florida Republican Party, following an investigation into a reported sexual assault.

However, investigators said they have forwarded a probable cause affidavit for the felony crime of video voyeurism, after Ziegler allegedly filmed the sexual encounter with a woman without her consent.

Ziegler was accused in October of sexually assaulting a woman with whom he and his wife, Moms for Liberty co-founder and Sarasota County School Board member Bridget Ziegler, had a consensual sexual relationship.

Ziegler, who investigators said was cooperating with the investigation, denied the sexual assault allegations. He has not immediately commented on the latest accusations.

An attorney for him said in a statement in December to news outlets, in part, “We are confident that once the police investigation is concluded that no charges will be filed and Mr. Ziegler will be completely exonerated.”

The police said that it “conducted nearly one dozen interviews, issued numerous subpoenas, reviewed hours of surveillance footage, and searched through a substantial number of images and videos on cell phones and their respective cloud data backups.”

During the probe, investigators said they discovered a video of the sexual encounter between Ziegler and the victim that was allegedly recorded on his cell phone.

The video allegedly showed the encounter was consensual and detectives were unable to develop a probable cause to charge Ziegler with sexual battery, according to the Sarasota Police.

When detectives showed the victim the video, she alleged that she did not give consent to being filmed, the police said.

Investigators said they have sent their video voyeurism probable cause affidavit to the State Attorney’s Office for further review.

Earlier this month, the Florida GOP voted him out of his position due to the allegations.

The state party’s vice chair, Evan Power, was elected as the new chair.

“What we did today was come together and close this chapter and move on to move forward to continue to win elections in Florida,” Power told reporters after the vote.

ABC News’ Hannah Demissie contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — The White House on Friday announced that the U.S. conducted more strikes against Iran-backed Houthi militants in Yemen Friday morning.

“This morning, U.S. forces conducted three successful self-defense strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen. This is the fourth preemptive action that the U.S. military has taken in the past week against Houthi missile launchers that were ready to launch attacks — -in this case, anti-ship missiles,” spokesman John Kirby told reporters at the daily press briefing.

The strikes come a day after President Joe Biden said that the U.S. military actions were not deterring the Houthis from attacks in the region, but that he would continue ordering the airstrikes.

Tomahawks were used in the last two days of strikes, launched from either a surface ship or submarine, a U.S. official said.

Kirby told ABC’s Karen Travers that the previous U.S. strikes have had “good effects on degrading some of these Houthi capabilities. They still have some offensive capability and we’re going to keep taking the actions we believe we need to take to defend ourselves.”

Travers pressed Kirby on what he meant Thursday about the U.S. having “additional options available” to take concerning the Houthis, but he did not reveal what that could look like, other than being of the “military realm.”

“The Houthis need to stop these attacks,” he said. “They can make that choice. Clearly, they’ve made opposite choices. So, we have choices to make, too. And — and we have options available to us as well. We’ll continue to explore those options. Clearly, one of the options that we are and will continue to take are in the military realm as needed.”

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(AUGUSTA, Maine) — Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows on Friday asked the state’s highest appeals court to consider her decision to bar former President Donald Trump off of Maine’s GOP primary ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment — before the U.S. Supreme Court rules on the Colorado 14th Amendment case disqualifying Trump.

In a news release, Bellows said, “Maine law provides the opportunity to seek review from the Maine Supreme Judicial Court,” something she requested on Friday.

Her request comes after Maine’s Superior Court on Wednesday deferred ruling on Bellows’ earlier decision, which was appealed by Trump’s team, until the U.S. Supreme Court settled the Colorado case.

The state’s top trial court punted the case back to Bellows for a decision to wait until there’s a ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court.

Bellow’s request Friday is an appeal of the Superior Court’s decision to defer. If considered by the Maine Supreme Court, as Bellows is requesting, the timeline for a ruling on this case might be sped up and settled ahead of the state’s March 5 GOP primary.

“This appeal ensures that Maine’s highest court has the opportunity to weigh in now, before ballots are counted, promoting trust in our free, safe and secure elections,” Bellows said in a statement.

“Like many Americans, I welcome a ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court in the Colorado case that provides guidance as to the important Fourteenth Amendment questions in this case,” she said.

“In the interim, Maine law provides the opportunity to seek review from the Maine Supreme Judicial Court — which I requested today,” she said. I know both the constitutional and state authority questions are of grave concern to many. This appeal ensures that Maine’s highest court has the opportunity to weigh in now, before ballots are counted, promoting trust in our free, safe and secure elections.”

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(WASHINGTON) — Sen. Tim Scott is expected to endorse former President Donald Trump for president at a rally in New Hampshire Friday evening, sources confirmed to ABC News — delivering a blow to Nikki Haley, who appointed Scott to the Senate when she was South Carolina governor.

The news, first reported by the New York Times, comes after a source confirmed to ABC News that Haley and Trump reached out to Scott for his endorsement. The source told ABC that Trump kept in touch with Scott since he suspended his presidential campaign in November.

A source told ABC News that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis reached out to Scott as well, although the nature of their conversation was not confirmed.

A spokesperson for Trump did not immediately respond for comment.

The endorsement comes just a few days before the New Hampshire primary, set for Jan. 23.

Throughout his campaign, Scott was plagued by rumors that he was vying to be Trump’s vice president. Many voters told ABC News that they saw Scott more as a No. 2. Scott slammed the rumors, saying he did not run for president to be in second place.

Scott, who has pledged not to run for reelection in the Senate, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” in December that his endorsement “certainly won’t happen this year, if I do it at all.” A source confirmed to ABC News that he arrived at this decision only recently.

Haley, who served as South Carolina governor from 2011 to 2017, appointed Scott to the Senate in 2012.

Haley finished in close second to DeSantis in the Iowa caucuses — both of whom lost to Donald Trump. She’s trailing the former president in New Hampshire polls, according to 538’s most recent polling averages. A primary win could be used as a way to build momentum for her campaign as Haley heads into her home state of South Carolina, where she is still polling far behind Trump.

In a statement, Haley drew on Trump’s own words to criticize Scott’s endorsement.

“Interesting that Trump’s lining up with all the Washington insiders when he claimed he wanted to drain the swamp,” Haley said in the statement. “But the fellas are gonna do what the fellas are gonna do.”

ABC News’ Nicholas Kerr contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — Donald Trump is doubling down on his claims of “complete and total” presidential immunity as he awaits a decision from an appeals court on his effort to have his federal election interference case dismissed.

Trump, appearing to go further than before, wrote on his social media platform on Thursday, in all caps, that even “events that ‘cross the line’ must fall under total immunity” or else there would be “years of trauma trying to determine good from bad.”

Later that day, during an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity, Trump continued to make his case — unprompted.

Hannity asked Trump to deliver a closing message to New Hampshire voters, who will cast their ballots in the GOP primary on Tuesday.

The former president briefly responded that his message is “Make America Great Again” and then launched into remarks on his legal troubles.

“If a president is afraid to act because they’re worried about being indicted when they leave office — a president of the United States has to have immunity. And the Supreme Court’s going to be ruling on that,” he said. “If they don’t have immunity, no president is going to act. You’re gonna have guys that just sit in office and are afraid to do anything.”

Constitutional scholar Michael Gerhardt, a law professor at University of Chapel Hill, expressed deep skepticism about Trump’s claim that he is entitled to total immunity from criminal prosecution.

“I would describe it as a dangerously bad argument,” Gerhardt told ABC News. “It contradicts nearly everything we know about the Constitution and the intent of the framers.”

Gerhardt continued, “It would be an argument that might make sense if the president were king, but he’s not king.”

Trump’s latest comments also received pushback from one of his Republican rivals.

Nikki Haley, who is looking to beat Trump in New Hampshire’s open primary, was asked to respond to Trump’s social media post on immunity during a CNN town hall on Thursday night.

Haley said it should be “common sense” that presidents can’t do whatever they want with no repercussions.

“It should be common sense, right? Common sense,” she said. “Obviously, if a president is doing something and it’s related to, you know, whether it’s terrorist threats or something like that and people die, that’s one thing.”

“But do you get just total freedom to do whatever you want? No, that’s never the way it was intended to be,” she continued. “There needs to be accountability. No one is above the law.”

Still, Haley said if president she would pardon Trump if he is convicted because him going to jail would only “further divide our country.”

The three-judge panel from the U.S. Court of Appeals also seemed extremely wary of Trump’s case when they heard arguments earlier this month.

One judge called Trump’s arguments “paradoxical” and another asked if his team was saying a president could sell pardons or order the military to assassinate a rival with no consequences.

Trump’s attorney argued that any criminal prosecution of a president for action taken while in office is only possible if they are both impeached and convicted first.

The appeals court has not indicated when a decision will be made. But the case could well wind up before the U.S. Supreme Court depending on how the process plays out.

The Supreme Court previously ruled, in a case involving former President Richard Nixon, that presidents can’t be held liable in civil cases for actions they undertook as part of their official duties.

There are no Supreme Court rulings, however, on whether sitting or former presidents are immune from criminal charges related to their actions while in office. That’s because Trump is the first current or former president to ever be criminally indicted.

-ABC News’ Abby Cruz, Lalee Ibssa and Soorin Kim contributed to this report.

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