Appearing on FOX News with Maria Bartiromo on Sunday, former acting Trump DNI Ric Grenell denied a report in Politico that he’s prepping a run for governor of California.

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Said Grenell: “Look, here’s my position: I just saw your interview with Ron DeSantis and I’m hoping that he can run for governor of Florida and governor of California. I’m not sure that that we couldn’t have somebody going back and forth. Certainly would do a better job than Gavin Newsom. We have a disaster here in California. And I’m not trying to be cute about your question, but I think what we have to do is concentrate first on the signature that we’re gathering and the verified signatures. The state of California is controlled by a whole bunch of Democrats. One-party rule, they are going to go through every single signature we have and throw out ones. The verification process is going to be unlike anything we’ve ever seen. We still have a long way to go to gather signatures to put this on the ballot because they are going to play games. They already are. So I would just say we got to keep focused on getting rid of Gavin Newsom.”

Politico spoke to a Republican strategist about Grenell’s plans: “The strategist said Grenell, the former ambassador to Germany and acting director of national intelligence in the Trump administration, told him he plans to announce his campaign once the recall effort qualifies for the ballot, as appears increasingly likely. A second strategist said Friday that Grenell is also speaking with major Southern California donors about a potential run.”