Rupert Murdoch reportedly has a new idea to defeat Donald Trump.

Among the many things revealed during the Dominion voting machine company’s lawsuit against Fox News was that Rupert Murdoch, for all his wealth and influence, does not appear to be any more savvy or knowledgeable about politics than the average person reading the news. Emails uncovered during discovery showed that Murdoch thought Trump would concede to Biden after losing the 2020 election, and then that Trump was done for as a political entity after Jan. 6. Wrong and wrong.

Having underestimated the ex-president twice, Murdoch did so again, albeit indirectly, by directing Fox and his other media properties to hype the 2024 candidacy of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. His logic, as reported by various outlets, was that DeSantis was “a sanitized version of Trump” who would appeal to MAGA Republicans because of his right-wing views and to a general-election audience because of his relatively dignified and competent stewardship of the Sunshine State.

But DeSantis’ campaign, launched officially in May, has failed to build any momentum, and he still trails Trump by 30-plus points in most polls. In a Wednesday Financial Times column, Edward Luce succinctly sums up one reason why this might be happening: “The case against Trump in 2016 was that he was not electable,” he writes. “His base nevertheless recklessly voted for his nomination, then he went on to win. If part of the thrill of backing Trump is precisely because he is not electable—that he is unsafe and not respectable—it takes some brass to announce yourself as the electable version of Trump.”

The deployment of influence on DeSantis’ behalf by Murdoch has, in this view, been self-defeating. (The same could be said for the substantial amount of money given to the Florida governor and his super PAC by Wall Street donors. In May, the super PAC’s leaders told reporters they planned to spend $200 million to support DeSantis in the primary alone.) It recasts Trump as an anti-establishment insurgent—an underdog, somehow, in a race he was already winning. Whoops.

DeSantis has also been widely panned as a low-charisma campaigner who is doing too much pandering to the far right. According to a new report in Rolling Stone citing sources close to Murdoch, the media executive has now come to the conclusion that, hmm, yes, in fact DeSantis is “awkward” on the trail and has erred by making his campaign a “nonstop cultural-grievance factory.” One of Rolling Stone’s sources tries to spin this as evidence of shrewdness: Murdoch “can smell a loser a mile away,” the source says, even though his critique of DeSantis is obviously derivative of takes that have been appearing in the mainstream press for at least the past nine months. (It raises the question of how many miles away Murdoch was from the Florida governor when he spent two and a half years promoting his candidacy.)

What next, then? According to Rolling Stone, Murdoch realizes that he, and the United States, may be stuck with Trump as the Republican nominee. But according to the New York Times, he has another idea, too … and maybe it’s just crazy enough to work:

Mr. Murdoch has privately told people that he would still like to see Gov. Glenn Youngkin of Virginia enter the race, according to a person with knowledge of the remarks.

Glenn Youngkin is the governor of a large Southern state who is known to appeal to wealthy donors, has been strategically cautious about tying himself too closely to Trump, and won election after campaigning against “critical race theory” and the other purported threats to public schools presented by “woke” Democrats. Does that remind you of anyone? In six months, you might be reading that it reminds Rupert Mudoch of Ron DeSantis.