March 01
By Claire Hansen
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is not yet officially running for the 2024 Republican nomination, but he is acting more and more like a man campaigning for president.
After months of remaining ensconced in Florida and leveraging his statehouse supermajority to pass controversial policies that have made national headlines, DeSantis left the Sunshine State last week as part of a noticeable and recent effort to gently ramp up his national profile and his as-of-now-unofficial campaign for the GOP nomination.
DeSantis traveled to New York and the suburbs Chicago and Philadelphia, speaking to enthusiastically receptive groups of law enforcement about criminal justice matters, regaling the crowds with commentary on culture wars and “wokeness” – messages he has attempted to take ownership of within the GOP field, even going so far as declaring Florida the state where “woke goes to die.”
Then, over the weekend, DeSantis hosted a three-day event in Palm Beach, Florida, with high-profile Republican megadonors and politicians from around the country. The conference, which was billed as a policy retreat, gave DeSantis a platform to tout his policy wins. It had the added benefit of being held just miles down the road from former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, where Trump – who has already declared his candidacy for the presidency – held his own competing fundraiser Thursday evening.
And DeSantis will soon embark on a series of events with GOP activists in Texas, California, Alabama and other states following the publication Tuesday of his latest book, “The Courage to Be Free: Florida’s Blueprint for America’s Revival.”
The book, according to its blurb, “delivers something rare from an elected leader: stories of victory.” And it appears to be the next move in what DeSantis may hope is a path to victory for the nomination. One place he’s currently not slated to go is the Conservative Political Action Conference, the annual GOP confab being held on the outskirts of Washington. The event in recent years has skewed heavily toward Trump and his wing of the party.
He had already been building a national profile ahead of the November elections, but his star ascended with an overwhelming reelection victory – just as Trump’s star fell with an underwhelming performance from MAGA candidates and Republicans in general, and the GOP started casting around for other options. DeSantis carried even Democratic strongholds in the swing state, including metropolitan Miami-Dade County.
In the months since, DeSantis has appeared mostly content with letting presidential hype swirl around him, playing coy about 2024 as he draws national attention with politics and speeches that ostensibly appear state-focused – policies that he has passed with no resistance, thanks to his supermajority in the statehouse.
“He’s developed a remarkable national profile by the way he has leveraged what he’s done in Florida,” says Whit Ayres, president of North Star Opinion Research – a Republican pollster and strategy firm – and a longtime political consultant.
DeSantis has tussled with Disney, enacted sweeping changes and restrictions in education, touted his COVID-19 approach, and placed culture war issues at the heart of both his policy-making and his rhetoric.
Each policy has added another line on the resume in which he is expected to use as the foundation for a White House bid.
“It was clear a year ago, this is all about 2024. There is zero doubt this is a well-orchestrated plan,” says Michael Binder, a professor of political science at the University of North Florida and the director of the university’s Public Opinion Research Laboratory.
Still, DeSantis’ moves in the last few weeks represent an escalation of his political maneuvering. His stops in Philadelphia, New York and the Chicago area were nominally centered on crime but provided him an initial opportunity to tout his record directly to residents of other states.
“I think a lot of these events are very much central themed, if you will – the key things that he’s campaigned on as governor and has been governing on as a governor,” says Matt Terrill, managing partner at Firehouse Strategies, a political strategy firm. Terrill previously worked as a consultant for the Republican Party of Florida and as chief of staff for Florida Sen. Marco Rubio’s presidential campaign.
DeSantis’ book tour, which includes events with GOP figures in several different states, will also afford him the chance to do so – as will the publication of his book. He joins those like former Vice President Mike Pence and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in releasing books ahead of potential 2024 runs.
During the policy retreat over the weekend – which was advertised as a celebration of the “Florida blueprint” – he held a panel discussion with Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds and pitched his viewpoint to a number of high-profile attendees, like Republican governors from a handful of states, major donors and others – including figures who had previously aligned themselves with Trump.
He also waded into foreign affairs last week, criticizing White House actions on Ukraine and telling Fox News hosts that Russia does not pose a high threat to American allies in Europe.
He has started to rake in the cash, too – something he has proven good at. DeSantis broke the gubernatorial fundraising record during the 2022 contest.
He recently received seven-figure checks from wealthy GOP funders. Investor Jeffrey Yass donated $2.5 million to DeSantis’ state political committee earlier this month, and Jude and Christopher Reyes – who run a massive beer and food distribution company – each contributed $1 million to DeSantis’ campaign, according to CNN.
That cash, combined with $71 million left over from his gubernatorial campaign, put DeSantis on almost equal footing with Trump.
Though DeSantis has not officially declared himself a 2024 candidate, polling consistently shows a tight fight for the top spot between DeSantis and Trump, with other potential candidates – including former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who announced her bid earlier this month – trailing far behind.
In hypothetical head-to-head matchups, DeSantis edges Trump out in some polling. But in a larger field, where the non-Trump vote is split among several candidates, Trump prevails. That measure is important because, unlike Democratic primaries in which delegates are awarded proportionally, GOP contests are winner-take-all.
DeSantis’ challenge, then, is to try to chip away at Trump’s loyal base, which will mean engaging in on-the-ground politicking across the country.
“People in Florida know him, but guess what, Florida doesn’t vote in the Republican primaries till after quite a few other states have done that,” Binder says. “So he needs to get name recognition in New Hampshire. He needs to get known in South Carolina and Iowa, and he needs to start going to these places and get seen.”
It will also mean carving out a distinct enough position within the GOP field – and distinct enough from Trump – to entice primary voters.
“The Republican Party is split into three groups. So the ‘never-Trump’ group is about 10%. The ‘always-Trump’ group is about 30%, but there’s somewhere in the vicinity of 60% who are ‘maybe-Trump’ voters. They’re people who voted for Trump in the past twice, supported him when he was president but are at least interested in an alternative who they think has a better chance to win in 2024, who carries less baggage and is more focused on the future than the past,” Ayres says, leaning on research his firm has conducted.
“That’s not an ‘anti-Trump’ lane. Not a ‘never-Trump’ lane. It’s a ‘beyond-Trump’ lane, if you will, but I don’t know that that’s a defined lane. It’s more a matter of creating an appeal that crosses those boundaries within the Republican electorate,” Ayres says.
DeSantis’ foray onto the national stage also brings up a question central to his odds: How will his aggressive Florida-specific agenda translate nationally?
He appears now content with carrying on with an unofficial campaign, letting his silence on a run feed the rumors and hype around him as Trump takes aim at him online.
He is not expected to announce an official bid until late spring or summer, after the Florida legislative session.
“I think in the end, I go back to: When you’re an incumbent in office, whether you’re the governor of Florida or the president of the United States, you own the news, for better or for worse, for right or wrong. And time will tell how some of these headlines take shape,” Terrill says, noting that the national mood will shift and change as the economy does and as news and norms develop closer to elections.
Regardless of DeSantis’ moves, it’s still incredibly early yet, warns Terrill – and both the Republican primary in 2016 and the Democratic primary in 2020 showed that those leading in the polls early on in the race weren’t necessarily those who prevailed.
“You’re going to see movements and travel, you’re likely to see certain activities taking place, but if you’re going to announce your candidacy for president, running for president is a marathon, not a sprint,” Terrill says.