Ray, why do you think DeSantis wouldn't want to run for President?
The BIG gorilla in the room is Trump. Without his endorsement DeSantis can't win in 2024 -- that's my opinion. Knowing Trump's ego and history, he won't let another chance for the presidency pass him by. He knows that if he wins, he will go down in history as the ultimate "come back kid", (comparisons with Teddy Roosevelt will abound) and that he thwarted his enemies at every turn. That means everything to a guy like Pres. Trump -- it means vindication.
Agreed on Trump's ego, disagree with DeSantis chances. I think there's a window when you can run for president and not only have a reasonable chance of winning, but first getting your own party's nomination. If you want it, you need to grab it while you can. I don't think Trump's endorsement will make or break DeSantis, if anything I think it will be negligible. And I don't see him settling for a VP slot under such an unstable person.
Trump has used up his chances IMO. For example, I really think he handled the Covid crisis fairly well overall, but he said so many dumb things while it was going on that it obscured the job he did. A lot of people preferred Trump's policies to Biden's overall, but people had so much Trump fatigue that they either voted for Biden or just didn't vote for president at all rather than vote for Trump. If Trump couldn't beat Biden in 2020 while he was campaigning from his basement, with as poor a job as Biden has done there's no guarantee he'll beat him in '24.
We can't take the chance on Trump again. This one is too important. If DeSantis and Trump both run, I'm betting we'll see something like what we saw on the Democrat side in 2008. Hillary was the frontrunner and it was looked upon as the nomination was her birthright, but once Obama started getting some momentum the old guard Democrats who thought they were stuck with her dropped her like a hot potato for the emperor with no clothes.
The worst thing in the world is unpredictability, and nobody wants to go through four more years of Trump drama when they can get policies just as good with a sane candidate.