Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* Following Donald Trump’s latest indictment, his former vice president, Mike Pence made no effort to defend his former boss. “Today’s indictment serves as an important reminder: Anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be President of the United States,” the Republican Hoosier said in a written statement.
* GOP presidential candidates who are struggling to qualify for the Republican National Committee’s upcoming debate are now confronting some discouraging news: The thresholds to qualify for the party’s second debate will be even more difficult.
* Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis challenged Vice President Kamala Harris to debate him over his state’s controversial news history standards. Yesterday, appearing at an event in Orlando, the Democrat offered her response: “I’m here in Florida, and I will tell you there is no roundtable, no lecture, no invitation we will accept to debate an undeniable fact. There were no redeeming qualities of slavery.”
* As conservatives in Ohio hope to stop voters from approving new abortion rights in the Buckeye State, conservative billionaires are throwing money at the effort, including Richard Uihlein, a billionaire GOP megadonor in Illinois.
* While former Ambassador Nikki Haley’s presidential campaign has struggled thus far to make gains, a super PAC supporting her candidacy has made its first ad buys in Iowa and New Hampshire, investing more than $13 million in the two states.
* With time running out in Louisiana’s gubernatorial race, Jeff Landry, the state’s Republican attorney general, has picked up an endorsement from Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy. The senator is not without GOP critics in the state: The far-right is still displeased that Cassidy voted to convict Donald Trump in his second impeachment trial.
* And while it’s highly unusual for professional sports team to support presidential campaigns, Popular Information appears to have uncovered evidence of the Orlando Magic basketball team donating $50,000 to the super PAC backing DeSantis’s Republican presidential bid.