Why the GOP fantasy about an 11th-hour Trump challenger is about to 'turn into a pumpkin'

Many Never Trump conservatives are openly rooting for President Joe Biden's reelection campaign, stressing that democracy itself is on the line and arguing that the Republican Party has become terminally dysfunctional.

But others on the right are quietly hoping that a Republican candidate will dislodge Trump from his position as the 2024 GOP presidential frontrunner. That candidate doesn't appear to be Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is trailing Trump by 43 percent in a Morning Consult poll released on September 12 and by 49 percent in an I&I/TIPP poll released on September 11.

Reporting for NBC News, journalists Jonathan Allen and Ben Kamisar lay out some reasons why it's unlikely that Trump's frontrunner status will be taken away by a Republican who has yet to enter the race.

POLL: Should Trump be allowed to hold office again?

Republican Nick Trainer, who worked on Trump's 2020 campaign, told NBC News, "The runway for someone to realistically run for president is basically over. To get on the ballot in states isn't that hard, but it's time-consuming and can be expensive. These folks' carriage in their fantasy land is about to turn into a pumpkin."

Mike DuHaime, a former Republican National Committee (RNC) political director and ex-adviser to former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, is also quite skeptical about the chance of someone jumping in the primary and taking away Trump's frontrunner status.

"Candidates have been studying policies for months, raising money for months, campaigning in early states for months, going through debates and debate for months," DuHaime told NBC News. "It is hard to jog into a race when everyone else is already sprinting at a varsity level."

READ MORE:How America may be facing its 'biggest constitutional crisis since the Civil War'

NBC News' full article is available at this link.