What’s left of the Bush-Cheney wing of the Republican Party doesn’t like Ron DeSantis. But it’s eager to see him run for president anyway. For if DeSantis challenges Trump for the 2024 GOP nomination, the old establishment stands to gain no matter who ultimately gets the nod. The Florida governor certainly seems to be ideologically closer to Trump-style populism than to the neoconservatism that prevailed among elite Republicans from the end of the Reagan era to the defeat of Mitt Romney in 2012. Why, then, would those who pine for the likes of Bush and Romney want to see a choice between Trump and DeSantis, both right-wing populists, two years from now?

Many of the old guard’s most prominent pundits and officeholders — past and (in dwindling numbers) present — publicly denounce Trump and DeSantis alike. But pay attention to those Republican mouthpieces of yesteryear who have not followed Bill Kristol and Max Boot into the embrace of the Democratic Party. Media outlets and individual voices who opposed Trump in 2016, then reluctantly supported him once he was in power, are now boosting DeSantis. This is not because they think DeSantis will be a more effective populist president, though to be sure many risk-averse Republicans believe the governor has a better chance of winning in 2024.