Donald Trump news live: DeSantis met with 2024 chants after Florida win as ‘rattled’ Trump vows to leak dirt on him

Who will be the true Maga king after tonight’s dust has settled? My colleague Andrew Buncombe explores the growing rivalry between Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis.

“Two clear indications of how Trump may feel threatened by the younger, Yale-educated DeSantis emerged this week,” writes Andrew.

“On Saturday he tested a mean-spirted nickname for the Florida governor – ‘Ron DeSanctimonious’ – the kind of thing he did when he felt threatened by “’Crooked Hillary’ Clinton, ‘Little Marco”’ Rubio and ‘Lying Ted’ Cruz…

“Todd Belt a professor of political science at George Washington University, says that when DeSantis refused in his debate with Crist to commit to serve a full second term if elected, it underscored the widely held belief he plans to run for the presidency.”

Former president Donald Trump has quietly settled a lawsuit against him by protesters who were allegedly beaten by his private security staff in the days after he announced his first presidential campaign in 2016.

Attorneys for both Mr Trump and the protesters told NBC News that the case had been settled just as a jury was being selected for trial in a Brooklyn courtroom.

The lawyer who represented the protesters, Benjamin Dictor, said the settlement represented “an incredible day” for his clients, who he described as “lifelong activists in the community … who stood up to defend the right to speech on the public sidewalk and have litigated for seven years”.

“Today, the matter was resolved on terms that they are very, very happy with,” he added.

Andrew Feinberg has more.

The mood has turned sour in pro-Trump online communities, where users are already blaming election fraud for the GOP’s weaker than expected results.

“These results are farcical,” wrote one poster on The Donald, which models itself as a successor to Reddit’s banned TheDonald board. “There’s no rhyme or reason. You don’t get a blowout from counties in Florida and then magically cross state lines into ‘highly competitive’ territory in Georgia.”

Pennsylvania, Arizona, Georgia, and New York state were singled out as centres of supposed shenanigans (to be clear, there is no evidence of widespread election fraud in today’s vote).

“They keep finding votes for Fetterf*** in rigged Pennsylvania,” said one user, referring to Democratic Senate candidate John Fetterman. “They are 100% about to steal Georgia for [Raphael] Warnock,” said another.

One user was surprised by New York state governor Kathy Hochul’s apparent victory, saying: “There is absolutely no fucking way in God’s green earth [Kathy] Hochul has won…. the entire f***king map is red except like three counties.” (Most of New York’s counties do indeed lean Republican, but nearly 43 per cent of the state’s population live in deep blue New York City.)

Many users blamed establishment Republicans for squandering the radical energy unleashed by Mr Trump.

“RNC/GOP, McConnell, McCarthy got the results they wanted,” said one. “Tonight was all about splitting the party and strangling populism out of the party. And they accomplished it. Trump will run, but perhaps he should not after tonight.”

Another said: “Trump gave the GOP a winning message since 2015. Instead of working with him, they have worked against him every step of the way. This election just further proved that with how they did more to stop the America First candidates than they did the radical Dems.”

Donald Trump has blamed the apparent defeat of New Hampshire US Senate candidate Don Bolduc on his insufficient zeal for the so-called Big Lie.

“Don Balduc was a very nice guy, but he lost tonight when he disavowed, after his big primary win, his longstanding stance on election fraud in the 2020 presidential primary,” said Mr Trump on Truth Social just now. (“Primary” seems to be a typo for “election”).

“Had he stayed strong and true, he would have won, easily. Lessons learned!”

Mr Bolduc, a former US Army brigadier general was tipped by some as a potential winner, but now looks likely to lose to Democratic incumbent Maggie Hassan.

During the Republican primary, Mr Bolduc had falsely claimed that Mr Trump won the 2020 presidential election, but reversed his stance after winning the nomination.

For anyone wondering, Mr Trump has still said nothing about Ron DeSantis’s victory in Florida.

South Carolina senator and Trump ally Lindsey Graham has said the former president will have the 2024 race to himself, whatever Ron DeSantis decides to do.

Asked about the blossoming Don-Ron rivalry on NBC News just now, Mr Graham said: “Here’s what I think. President Trump, if he announces next week, which I think he’s likely to do, will have about six months to himself.

“He has the chance to get a wall of money, a [lot] of support, and close this thing out. And if he fails to do that, I think a lot of people will run.

“But he’ll have his shot for four or five months, where he’ll have this to himself, and we’ll see how he does.”

Commenting on the wider results for Republicans, which were not as strong as some polls had suggested, Mr Graham said: “It’s not a wave for sure, but I think it’ll be a very good night.”

Former president Donald Trump on Monday ended an hours-long rehashing of old grievances at a rally for Ohio Senate candidate JD Vance without announcing his intention to run for president in 2024.

The twice-impeached ex-president failed to declare his candidacy for a presidential election that won’t happen for another two years despite allies and confidantes spending most of the day before the 2022 midterm elections stoking rumours and hyping a possible 2024 announcement from Mr Trump.

One staunch ally of the ex-president, Florida Representative Matt Gaetz, even took to Twitter to encourage Mr Trump to pull the trigger on a third presidential run, writing: “Trump should announce tonight.”

Read Andrew Feinberg‘s full report:

Mr Trump appears not to have mentioned Ron DeSantis at all in his speech at Mar-a-Lago, instead praising various other Republican candidates that he had endorsed.

“You know, JD Vance is now leading 52-47. We had an incredible rally last night in Ohio,” he said.

“And in Florida, Marco Rubio – we had an unbelievable rally for Marco, the night before, with the heaviest rain I’ve ever been involved with.”

(He spent a little while describing the “massive pails of water” and other inclement weather that he endured during the Florida really.)

“But Marco had a fantastic evening,” Mr Trump continued. “That’s really tremendous.

He praised Katie Britt, who has just won Alabama’s US Senate election, and Herschel Walker, who is currently neck and neck with sitting senator Raphael Warnock in Georgia.

He also offered a little barbed praise for the media, saying: “They are not the nicest people in the world, but they are brilliant financially… thank you all for being here. Have a good time.” Cheers, Don.

Donald Trump appears to have finished his speech at Mar-a-Lago after just a few minutes, which he spent boasting that candidates he endorsed had won their elections.

The audio cut out during the beginning of his speech, but I didnt hear him mention Ron DeSantis.

Here’s a fun fact for Donald Trump: Ron DeSantis appears to have far outpolled the former president’s own performance in the 2020 election.

Whereas Mr Trump won Florida by 51.2 per cent, roughly four points ahead of his Democratic opponent, Mr DeSantis is predicted to win by 59.4 per cent, according to The New York Times. That is a staggering margin of 19 points over Democrat Charlie Crist.

Senator Marco Rubio, once dubbed “Little Marco” by Mr Trump, also appears to have outperformed his detractor, winning the state by 58 per cent according to the Times.

MSNBC pundit Steve Kornacki also pointed out that Miami Dade, which went heavily Democratic in 2016, voted for Mr DeSantis by an estimated 53.6 per cent. “Look at that!” Mr Kornacki exclaimed.

We are now awaiting a speech from Donald Trump at his residence in Mar-a-Lago, where aides are currently moving things around the stage.

It has been more than two hour since The Associated Press called Florida’s race for governor for Ron DeSantis, and we’ve still seen no congratulations from Mr Trump.

Here’s our live stream of the Mar-a-Lago event: