DeSantis ignores super PAC drama as he stumps in Iowa

Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) appeared nonplussed during a campaign stop in Iowa in the wake of the most recent departure of a top executive at the super PAC that has supported his presidential campaign.

The Florida governor attempted to distance himself from the drama after chief strategist Jeff Roe resigned from Never Back Down over the weekend.

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“I’m not involved in any of that,” DeSantis said when asked about Roe’s resignation on Monday. “As you guys know, it’s a separate entity. And so stuff just happens. And it’s not in my purview. … It’s not a distraction for me. I mean, I know media may want to do it.”

The resignation came in the wake of a Washington Post story detailing the super PAC’s fall from grace. Never Back Down had once boasted that it had a $200 million war chest to aid DeSantis’s presidential ambitions, but now a new super PAC Fight Right has emerged to boost DeSantis amid the infighting with Never Back Down and DeSantis’s struggles to overtake former President Donald Trump in the polls.

“I cannot in good conscience stay affiliated with Never Back Down (NBD) given the statements in the Washington Post today. They are not true and an unwanted distraction at a critical time for Governor DeSantis,” Roe posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, in his note stepping away from Never Back Down.

Roe’s resignation is the sixth high-profile leader to depart from Never Back Down in recent weeks. The group fired its CEO Kristin Davison earlier this month, less than two weeks after she took over for former CEO Chris Jankowski. Erin Perrine, former communications director for the group, and Matthew Palmisano, its former director of operations, were also fired. Adam Laxalt, a former Nevada attorney general and chairman of the super PAC, left the group that same week to focus on his family and law practice.

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The drama at the super PAC has taken attention from DeSantis as he stumps in Iowa in the final weeks before the Jan. 15 Iowa caucuses. But the governor reiterated that his concern is not the super PAC.

“But at the end of the day, I’m focused on the mission,” he continued. “I know that the ground organization that was built up over there has been exceptional. And I think that that’ll come to good fruition on caucus night.”