With national polls showing former President Trump holding a significant lead over Florida Governor Ron DeSantis for the GOP presidential nomination race, Florida Gov. DeSantis is fighting back and seeking to reduce that margin of victory for Donald Trump.
Trump has accepted his challenge but has chosen to skip all three GOP primary debates as he doesn’t feel it necessary to appear alongside potential rivals on stage.
Polls
With only four weeks remaining until the first votes in the 2024 White House race are cast, former President Trump holds an overwhelming lead over Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and other Republicans vying for their party’s nomination. Public opinion polls conducted by Quinnipiac University reveal support from two-thirds of Republican and GOP-leaning voters surveyed for Trump.
Trump remains immensely popular in Florida despite media scrutiny of his policies and legal issues, providing DeSantis with the opportunity to build upon early enthusiasm while expanding his own base of support.
At private fundraising events, DeSantis has sought to disprove any claims that he trails Trump in polls across both national and Iowa polls. His main priority has been building momentum in those states hosting first Republican presidential caucuses next month – where he must show he can lead his party as its leader.
Debates
Donald Trump has expanded his lead among likely Republican primary voters as Florida Governor Ron DeSantis struggles to recover. Rivals such as multimillionaire entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie remain at single digit levels compared to Trump; even with legal issues clouding his prospects of the GOP nomination.
His supporters view him as the most electable candidate and have already donated over $20 million to his campaign through super PACs that support it, raising millions more in his name than anyone else’s efforts combined. Furthermore, his campaign is well organized; supported by super PACs spending tens of millions for him alone; with strong get out the vote operations built into its infrastructure.
Debates will play an integral part in DeSantis’ chances. Iowa caucus-goers will cast the first vote for nominee, so DeSantis needs a strong performance to gain any traction there and increase his standing with voters face to face. He’s trying to do this by visiting all 99 counties – something experts agree will be difficult given Trump’s dominance of polls and key early states.
Organization
DeSantis hopes he can draw enough of Donald Trump’s backers away to secure himself the nomination, though polling indicates it will be challenging.
Trump leads DeSantis by eight points in Iowa and holds an advantage two weeks ahead of Florida primary elections in New Hampshire primary voting.
DeSantis’ large investment in retail campaigning and ground organization hasn’t resulted in increased polling numbers. One factor could be President Donald Trump’s impending Manhattan arraignment on state charges related to his payments of hush money to adult film star Stormy Daniels; it appears this has galvanized support among GOP voters for him.
Voters
Trump strengthened his lead in the GOP primary with the release of new polls, such as one conducted by Des Moines Register/NBC News/Mediacom Iowa which showed him leading DeSantis by 51% to 43% among likely caucus-goers; national Real Clear Politics average of the same polls showed him ahead by 40 percentage points.
DeSantis may have attracted support from donors who previously supported other candidates; however, it remains uncertain how long that support will remain if he gets drawn into an argument with President Trump. Trump has attacked DeSantis via social media with insulting tweets against the Florida governor as well as using names to attack DeSantis – this could alienate some of his own supporters and even draw additional ones away from him.
DeSantis may face challenges of his own; however, it seems unlikely he can capitalise on former President’s problems and win the nomination without significant support from outside Florida. Previous challengers have used voter turnout as leverage against Trump – something DeSantis must also do successfully for success against him.