A year ago, the Silicon Valley billionaire Peter Thiel received a pitch from a longtime associate, the right-wing pundit Ann Coulter, encouraging him to throw his weight behind Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, an emerging contender for the Republican presidential nomination.
Thiel was torn. Coulter was one of many people urging the onetime political kingmaker – who supported Donald Trump in 2016 and bankrolled a roster of Trump-aligned contestants in the 2022 midterms – to back a candidate in the 2024 race, according to three people familiar with private conversations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
