Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who’s seen as a possible challenger to Donald Trump within the 2024 Republican presidential major, has distanced himself from the previous president’s claims of election fraud.

DeSantis mentioned on Friday that Trump’s allegations weren’t backed by proof and that the election outcomes must be accepted.

“The election is what it is. All those theories that were put out did not prove to be true … It was not an election that was conducted the way I think that we want to, but that’s different than saying [Venezuelan President Nicolás] Maduro stole votes or something like that,” DeSantis advised reporters in Iowa, the place he was attending a conservative convention.

“And I think those theories, you know, proved to be unsubstantiated,” he added.

Trump, who has refused to concede his defeat to Joe Biden, was indicted on Thursday by a federal grand jury in Washington, DC, on expenses of conspiracy and obstruction for allegedly making an attempt to overturn the 2020 election.

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Prosecutors say that the previous President made “knowingly false” statements about voter fraud, pressured state officers to alter the vote counts, tried to put in faux electors in swing states, and urged his vp to reject Biden’s victory.

One of the emails from a senior marketing campaign adviser to Trump described his technique as “conspiracy s— beamed down from the mothership.”

The Florida governor expressed his opposition to the indictment shortly after it was introduced on Tuesday night time. He tweeted that he believed Americans ought to have the proper to maneuver their circumstances from Washington, DC, to their dwelling districts, as a result of Washington, DC, was a “swamp” and its jury pool was biased. He additionally mentioned that he would finish the “weaponization of the federal government” and the “politicization of the rule of law.”

Trump stays the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican nomination, based on nationwide polls, however his assist has eroded in some key states.

A New York Times/Siena College ballot launched on Friday confirmed that Trump had 44% assist amongst doubtless Iowa GOP caucus-goers, whereas DeSantis had 20%. The ballot additionally discovered that DeSantis had increased scores than Trump on morality and likability.

DeSantis mentioned he was busy with different issues and didn’t watch a lot of Trump’s arraignment on Thursday. “Unfortunately, one of the things as governor that you have to do is oversee executions,” he mentioned. “So we had an execution yesterday, so I was tied up with that for most of the day.”

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The 44-year-old has averted immediately attacking Trump, however has hinted at a “culture of losing” after the Republicans misplaced management of the House, the Senate, and the White House in recent times. He has additionally criticized some facets of the 2020 election, such because the growth of mail-in voting as a result of pandemic and the censorship of The Post’s reporting on Hunter Biden’s laptop computer.

“The way you conduct a good election that people have confidence in [is] you don’t change the rules in the middle of the game,” DeSantis mentioned.

“You don’t ballot harvest. You don’t do Zuckerbucks, and clearly, having the agencies work with Facebook to censor things like Hunter Biden, that’s unfair.”