Split Variations

I am having a problem splitting variations. This use to work perfectly, not sure why it is not now. I select the variations I would like to split and then click the button to split product by selected variations. It splits to a new product, and I can publish the newly split product BUT when I try to publish the remaining variations I get an error stating the SKU Exists. So I go check the product that I split from the original and the remaining skus are not in it. So how do they already exist? How can I split one product into two?

I also tried changing the skus on the remaining variations, but I get the same error. Please help…