Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has officially quit the presidential race.

Walker formally ended campaign this evening and called on other GOP candidates to follow his lead so Republican voters can find a 'positive conservative alternative' to front-runner Donald Trump.

'Today, I believe I am being called to lead by helping to clear the field in this race so that a positive conservative message can rise to the top of the field,' Walker said at an early evening press conference. 'With this in mind I will suspend my campaign immediately.'

While Walker blamed his goodbye on the toxic name-calling nature of the GOP primary, a source close to the governor's campaign, who was well -versed in its financial needs, told DailyMail.com the White House hopeful concluded that there's no way for him to win, and he'd rather 'bow out pretty than be forced out ugly' later on.

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GOOD BYE: Scott Walker said tonight he was suspending his presidential run and implored other Republicans to join him so that a strong conservative could emerge to go up against frontrunner Donald Trump

SECOND ONE OUT: First Rick Perry and now Scott Walker has decided to leave the 2016 presidential race in his rear-view mirror

BETTER DAYS: In mid-July Walker's star was on the rise as the motorcycle-riding governor toured a Harley-Davidson dealership in Las Vegas, Nevada

The New York Times drew the same conclusion after speaking with three unnamed Republican sources who were briefed on Walker's decision.

'The short answer is money,' one of them told the Times. 'He's made a decision not to limp into Iowa.'

At the presser, Walker made no mention of money, and instead pointed his finger at the current state of Republican politics, blaming Trump, but refusing to mention the frontrunner by name.

'Sadly, the debate taking place in the Republican party today is not focused on that optimistic view of America,' he said. 'Instead it has drifted into personal attacks.'

Walker talked about having a lightbulb moment while he was sitting at church yesterday as the pastor reminded him that 'the Bible is full of stories of people who were called to be leaders in unusual ways.'

For Walker, that meant walking from this campaign, and suggesting that thinning out the field is the only way for a conservative to emerge strong enough to take down Trump.

'I encourage other Republican presidential candidates to do the same so that the voters can focus on a limited number of candidates who can offer a positive conservative alternative to the current frontrunner,' Walker said.

Conservative ideas, not smack talk, will win the White House back from the Democrats, Walker argued.

'These ideas will help us win the election next fall and more important these ideas will make our country great again,' he said, strangely echoing Trump's popular motto.

'In the end, I believe that the voters want to be for something and not against someone,' Walker added.

In his remarks, Walker sounded a lot like Jeb Bush, who has also been hitting Trump for not being a true conservative.

Crowded room: Walker spoke in front of several reporters and photographers during his new conferenct in which he suspended his Republican campaign on Monday

Searching for civility: Walker blamed the current state of Republican politics as the reason behind his suspension

Problems: Walker blamed Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump for the state of national politics, but refused to mention the frontrunner by name

Trump's rise was also something the Republican National Committee feared as they had all of the candidates sign a loyalty pledge, promising to back whoever won the GOP primary.

Now with the pledge signed and Walker out, the hope, the Wisconsin governor insinuated, is that an alternative to Trump will emerge.

Walker, who had a fundraiser scheduled for later tonight in Indianapolis, is the second in a field of 17 Republicans to exit the presidential contest in just two weeks.

Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry pulled out of the race on Sept. 11.

Walker was an early favorite to win the Republican Iowa caucuses as he governs Wisconsin, an adjacent state.

But his main claim to fame – winning a bruising victory over public sector unions at his capitol – was a poor match for his comparatively mild manner.

After the Sept. 16 debate, his numbers tumbled down to a rounding error, coming in at less than one-half of one per cent in a CNN/ORC national poll of GOP voters.

Walker brushed off news reports suggesting that with the air out of his tires and that he was considering bringing in a new pit crew.

'It didn't come up at all,' Walker said of a conversation he had with donors about a potential change of staff, according to the Washington Post.

On Friday Walker spoke in South Carolina and he told DailyMail.com he was still in.

'The frontrunner at this point in the election isn’t typically the winner, and we’re gonna do the good hard work that it takes to win the election,' Walker said.

The campaign did let on over the weekend that they would be laser-focused on Iowa and the candidate would be spending 10 days a month in that state.

His decision-making was uncertain until the end, judging from his social media footprint on Monday.

Just before noon Eastern time, he signed a tweet thanking Iowa State Sen. Dan Zumbach for endorsing him.

More of the latest news on the Republican Presidential Primaries

Despite a lousy debate performance, Scott Walker's people continued to say he was in it to win it, amid rumors that a staff shake-up would be happening and all of Walker's resources would be directed toward Iowa

WHISTLING PAST THE GRAVEYARD: Walker tweeted less than five hours before his concession press conference was announced that he was 'here to fight and win in Iowa!'

'We're here to fight and win in Iowa!' Walker tweeted.

Minutes before, a Walker aide had told DailyMail.com in a phone call that the governor would be, as he said on the night of the last debate, 'planting a flag' in Iowa.

'So it would follow that we would spend more time there and devote more resources to the state.'

'He will still be traveling to the early states,' an aide said, pointing out that Walker had events on the books in New Hampshire on Wednesday and a weekend trip planned for South Carolina.

Asked if the strategy is that they are 'all in for Iowa' because the campaign believes it has to win the neighbor state in order to win the nomination, the aide said, 'That's not necessarily what anyone has said at this point, so, I think that would be adding to his comments that he made.'

As for the rumors of a campaign shake-up circulating, the Walker campaign hand said, 'At this point there's a lot of rumors and a lot of speculation, and at this point, there are no changes happening at this point.'

Four hours later, the campaign told reporters in an email that there would be a press conference at 6 p.m. Eastern time at the Edgewater hotel in Madison, Wisconsin.

The Times reported that high-dollar donors had become disenchanted with Walker and doubted his odds of capturing the Republican nomination.

Two of them were reportedly having difficulty finding commitments from other contributors to attend a New York City fundraiser on Thursday at the home of Todd Ricketts, one of Walker's national finance co-chairs.

'Donors have totally dried up for Walker, and getting people to come on Thursday was unbelievably hard,' one of them told the Times.

Looking for change: Walker said during the conference that voters need a 'positive conservative alternative to the current frontrunner'

Hoping for the best: Walker said that it's important to believe that conservative ideas 'will make our country great again'

'Everyone I know was just totally stunned by how difficult the fund-raising became, but the candidate and the campaign just couldn’t inspire confidence.'

The debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library proved to be Walker's Waterloo.

Amid blistering exchanges between billionaire Donald Trump and former tech CEO Carly Fiorina, between Trump and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, and between Trump and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Walker was hardly noticed.

Afterward in the debate 'spin room,' he hung around later than all the other candidates, trying to garner some additional media attention.

He cracked his only memorable line several times, a joke about there already being an 'apprentice' in the White House so American didn't need a Donald Trump.

And he told MSNBC that his campaign was 'putting all our eggs in the basket of Iowa; we’re committed to Iowa, and I think that’ll help us make the case all throughout the country.'

That, it turns out, was whistling past the graveyard.

On July 1 the respected Quinnipiac University Polling Institute put Walker atop its Iowa rankings with 18 percent support. By September 11, when Perry dropped out, that number was down to just 3 percent.

Word percolated out of Madison on Thursday that at least two state-level chairmen in the Walker camp were preparing to defect to Texas Sen. Ted Cruz.

By that time, he had already been sour-graping about his ill-fated debate night and its standout star, Fiorina.

'I think going in, we knew the narrative, no matter what was going to happen, was that they were going to say Carly had a big night, no matter what, and obviously they said that,' Walker told conservative radio host Glenn Beck.

Fiorina now trails only Trump in the Republican power rankings, with retired neurosurgeon Dr. Ben Carson falling to third place.

Not the first: Walker is the second Republican presidential candidate to suspend his campaign for the 2016 race

BACK TO WISCONSIN: Walker (left) joins former Texas Gov. Rick Perry (right) as the 2016 Republican primary field's first two dropouts

Dwayne Lister, a volunteer for the campaign in South Carolina, told DailyMail.com on the sidelines of Walker’s Spartanburg stop on Friday that after watching the GOP debate two nights before, his eyes began to wander to other candidates, whom he knew little about before but became interested in after hearing their views on the issues.

‘Sometimes while you support your candidate,’ he said, bad polling and poor debate performances make ‘you waiver a little bit.’

‘But you gotta stick fast,’ he said. ‘Because when you start to waiver, other people start to waiver.’

Justin Bradley, a Spartanburg County Councilman and Walker organizer who has been a supporter of the governor since before his recall election, told DailyMail.com at the same event that rumors of Walker’s demise had been greatly exaggerated.

Bradley said the week before he was on a call with the national campaign and other elected officials in South Carolina and had spoken to some of Walker’s donors, ‘and it seems like everyone’s still on board.’

‘I haven’t heard anyone saying anything like that,’ he said in reference to reports that Walker was considering a staff shake up. ‘And it seems like they have a clear path forward. And really at this point it’s just executing that path, and I think they’re doing a good job [with it].’

Asked earlier in the conversation for his take on Walker’s current positioning, he said, ‘I think it’s going well.’

‘I think there are still a lot of people who don’t know anything about him, ’ he said, but that is why the campaign is hosting meet and greets – so people ‘can see that side of him.’

Confronted with the polling numbers, which suggested that it was not, in fact, going ‘well,’ Bradley pointed to two candidates who surged early in their races and flamed out fast - Rudy Giuliani in 2008 and Rick Perry circa 2012.

His point was that polling this early is ‘still in flux’ and as such is not a good indicator of the final outcome of the nomination process.

The comparison ended up being more apt than Bradley intended, though, with Walker suspending his campaign a little more than 72 hours later.