Republican senator predicts Gaetz wouldn’t win Florida governorship after he teases run 

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) dismissed the idea of former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) successfully running for governor in Florida during an interview on Politico’s Playbook Deep Dive podcast.

When asked whether he thinks Gaetz will run for the governorship in Florida, Cramer said, “Not successfully, I don’t think. But I don’t live there. Florida is a big, complicated state.”

Gaetz appeared to tease the possibility of running for governor, responding to a Saturday tweet suggesting the idea.

“@mattgaetz will be the next Governor of the State of Florida,” Lake County GOP leader Anthony Sabatini wrote in a post on the social platform X on Saturday.

Gaetz responded within an hour of Sabatini’s post with a clip of Florida’s state flag waving.

Gaetz recently withdrew from consideration as President-elect Trump’s attorney general after it appeared he would not have a smooth path to confirmation. The former Florida congressman came under fire within the last two weeks amid a House Ethics Committee probe into allegations of sexual misconduct and illicit drug use, among other claims, against Gaetz. The investigation was effectively killed after Gaetz resigned from Congress, and the committee decided not to release the report following a meeting earlier this week.

Gaetz said Friday that he will not return to Congress for its next session.

Cramer expressed doubts before Gaetz’s withdrawal last week about the Florida Republican’s ability to get confirmed in the Senate. Cramer suggested that Gaetz might not get “across the finish line” in the upper chamber of Congress.

Cramer also wondered if confirming Gaetz to head the Justice Department would be worth all the “political capital” GOP leaders would have to spend to convince reluctant colleagues to vote for the lawmaker.