Governor of the U.S. State of Florida Ron DeSantis said on Wednesday he would seek the 2024 Republican nomination for president, but an audio interview on Twitter meant to showcase his entry into the race instead drew attention for technical snafus.

DeSantis made his announcement in a video ahead of joining Twitter CEO Elon Musk on the platform. The broadcast of the interview, which had been intended to be the formal launch for the DeSantis campaign, at times lost sound and some users were either unable to join or were dropped.

"We need the courage to lead and the strength to win," DeSantis said in the video posted on Twitter. "I'm Ron DeSantis, and I'm running for president to lead our great American comeback."

Supporters and donors will be keenly watching to see if DeSantis now takes the fight to the primary frontrunner Donald Trump, who has been relentlessly attacking him with little reaction, much to the frustration of some DeSantis allies who wanted him to respond more forcefully.

"Government is not about entertainment, not about building a brand," DeSantis said, taking a veiled swipe at Trump.

DeSantis' central argument for his candidacy likely will be that he is the only Republican who can defeat Democratic President Joe Biden, the winner over Trump in the 2020 election.

"Our president, while he lacks vigor, flounders in the face of our nation's challenges and he takes cues from the woke mob," DeSantis said.

But his much-touted online launch event started late – and then came off the rails entirely as the audio repeatedly cut out and many of the 400,000-plus users trying to listen were booted out of the conversation.

"We've got just a massive number of people online, so the servers are straining somewhat," Musk could be heard saying. "It is really going crazy."

While organizers sought to highlight the event's popularity – the Biden campaign was quick to capitalize on the glitches, tweeting a link to a fundraising page and stating: "This link works."

In the Republican camp, Trump joked on his Truth Social platform that "My Red Button is bigger, better, stronger, and is working."

Donald Trump Jr, Trump's eldest son, simply tweeted a hashtag: "#DeSaster," while a Trump campaign spokesman said: "Glitchy. Tech issues. Uncomfortable silences. A complete failure to launch. And that's just the candidate!" The hashtag #DeSaster was trending on Twitter.

The advertised conversation between Musk and DeSantis eventually began around 20 minutes late, although technical gremlins persisted – a setback mocked as encapsulating the downward turn the governor's image has taken of late.

"American decline is not inevitable. It is a choice, and we should choose a new direction – a path that will lead to American revitalization. We must restore sanity to our nation," the 44-year-old right-winger said during the talk.

Viable challenger?

Long viewed as the most viable challenger to twice-impeached Trump, DeSantis boasts deep midwestern roots, a large campaign fund, a record of ultra-conservative legislative wins and an unblemished record of election victories.

He was a baseball star at Yale, has a Harvard law degree and completed six years of active duty with the Navy, including service in Iraq, as well as five years in the U.S. Congress and four as Florida's governor.

While Trump has dominated headlines with his legal woes, DeSantis has presented himself as the tip of the spear in the struggle of ordinary Americans against progressive values he sees as divisive.

DeSantis has used his position as Florida's chief executive to stack up a list of conservative accomplishments, signing off on some 80 state laws targeting "woke indoctrination" in schools and other public institutions.

They include a ban on discussing gender identity and sexual orientation in schools, a block on funding efforts to promote diversity at public universities and one of the most restrictive abortion laws in the country.

DeSantis remains in a pitched battle with Walt Disney over the company's criticism of laws prohibiting the teaching of gender identity concepts in public schools. The company has filed a federal lawsuit accusing DeSantis of weaponizing state government to punish its operations.

DeSantis lacks Trump's national profile and the launch comes with his ratings in decline, as a number of policy missteps have prompted disquiet about his readiness to take on Trump.

He now faces the daunting task of closing an enormous polling gap, with Trump posting leads of close to 40 percentage points, despite being indicted on felony financial charges and being found liable for sexual abuse in a New York civil trial.

Technical malfunctions notwithstanding, the Twitter launch format gave him potential access to Musk's 140 million followers, many of whom are in Trump's base, and the attention of a large section of the moderate voters he will likely need if he wins the party nomination.

Musk said earlier that his presence at Wednesday's event would not constitute an endorsement but would reflect his desire to make the service more of a town square.

Trump on the attack

Behind the scenes, the Trump and DeSantis camps have been jostling to secure endorsements from state lawmakers while, at the national level, Florida's congressional delegation has broken heavily for Trump.

But DeSantis is seen as lacking the natural charm needed to peel away some of the 14 million voters who backed Trump in the last competitive Republican primary, in 2016.

Trump has not posted on Twitter since his two-year ban over the 2021 U.S. Capitol riot ended in November, but has been using his own social network to attack DeSantis almost daily.

In a Wednesday morning post, Trump said the governor "desperately needs a personality transplant and, to the best of my knowledge, they are not medically available yet."

Other declared Republican candidates include Nikki Haley, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, and Tim Scott, a U.S. senator from South Carolina.

(With input from Reuters, AFP)