The “Who is running in 2020?” tea leaves thread, Part 3

[sparkey]

Boston Herald columnist Joe Battenfield thinks Bill Weld could announce on Feb. 15 in New Hampshire: https://www.bostonherald.com/2019/01/23/ex-mass-gov-weld-weighs-presidential-run-against-trump/

He speculates that Weld could switch back to being a Republican while he's at it, but that would be a bit absurd considering that Weld was talking about being in the 2020 Libertarian Party race less than a week ago.

[sparkey]

I'm trying to make sense of these reports that Weld will announce as a Republican despite having been active nowhere but in the Libertarian Party since his 2016 VP run. I can think of these justifications:

1. He wants to run as a Republican first and thinks it will be easy to switch to the Libertarian Party as a backup, ala Gary Johnson 2012.
2. He figures that he will get much more attention being the first primary challenger to Trump than he will get announcing as a Libertarian off the bat, regardless of which party he ends up running with.
3. He knows of a strong challenger planning to run for the LP nomination who would clean his clock (Amash?) and thinks a losing effort for the LP nomination isn't worth anything.
4. Some combination of 1, 2, and 3.