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“Florida Governor Ron DeSantis ended his fading presidential campaign on Sunday and endorsed Donald Trump just two days before the pivotal New Hampshire primary, leaving former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley as Trump's last long-shot challenger for the Republican nomination.” Reuters
The right argues that Republican voters were just not ready to move on from Trump.
“Running as an explicitly anti-Trump candidate, so the theory went, would doom him to failure and destroy his career — as it had already done to a long list of Republicans. So his idea was that he would attack Trump but only from the right. To succeed, there would need to be a large number of Republicans who were disappointed that Trump had caved to woke corporations and Big Tech; that he had let Anthony Fauci dictate Covid policy…
“It turns out that the sort of people who care about Section 230 reform don’t exist much beyond social media and that the Covid wars didn’t motivate voters who were years removed from lockdowns. And ultimately, the number of Republican voters who were ready to move on from Trump dwindled with each of Trump’s successive indictments.”
Philip Klein, National Review
“[DeSantis] had a fair expectation that GOP voters were looking for a fresh start after the Trump-led defeats of 2018, 2020, 2021 in Georgia and again in 2022. What he couldn’t have anticipated is that Democrats would indict Mr. Trump so many times that they would turn the former President into a political martyr…
“Mr. DeSantis [also] lost many voters open to a Trump alternative when he seemed to be afraid to support aid for Ukraine lest he offend Trump voters. This made him look weak. Signing a six-week abortion ban in Florida wasn’t enough to win over evangelical voters in Iowa but alienated some moderates… Maybe [in 2028] Mr. DeSantis will offer a conservative vision that offers more than second-string Trumpism.”
Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal
“DeSantis will go back to being America’s finest governor for a few more years, and then probably will regroup for a 2028 run. I’m sure he’ll be joined by lots of other people, and we’ll start the merry-go-round again. In the meantime, the focus right now must be on one thing, and one thing only. How will Donald Trump and the Republican Party turn that primary plurality that’s closing in on a majority of their base into a plurality of general election voters?…
“Virtually any other Republican nominee would have beaten the current president outside the margin of error. Trump still might do it, but it’s going to be a much tougher lift with suburban moms, independents, and seniors… And if Trump’s negatives become the Democrats’ turnout engine as it did in 2020, the collateral damage in the House, the Senate, governorships, and state legislative seats are too dire to contemplate.”
Duane Patterson, Hot Air
The left argues that DeSantis’s campaign was doomed by miscues and strategic errors.
The left argues that DeSantis’s campaign was doomed by miscues and strategic errors.
“I’m neck deep in a long feature about whether the 2024 GOP presidential primary could have turned out any other way besides the likely re-coronation of Trump (There’s still time! Not really but…!) And everyone who indulges me in what one GOP advisor called ‘fan fiction’ says the only possibility at all goes back to the end of 2022…
“DeSantis won his re-election overwhelmingly. Meanwhile, Trump’s 2022 picks for Senate, House, and governor – remember Kari Lake, Blake Masters, Dr. Mehmet Oz, Doug Mastriano, Herschel Walker and Sarah Palin – all lost winnable purple seats. DeSantis looked indomitable. Trump looked…sad. So eventually (some admirers say he waited too long) DeSantis declared he was running. It was all downhill from there.”
Joan Walsh, The Nation
“His launch via a glitchy Twitter rally—replete with server meltdowns, hard-right rhetoric, dodgy facts, and a cameo from Elon Musk himself—proved that the competence aura around DeSantis might be more hallucination than halo. Once officially a candidate, DeSantis proved an awkward fit for the hagiography that preceded him…
“The Trump, But Less Bad pitch went only so far, and his team failed to effectively craft him as Trump, But Better. The candidate being sold didn’t match the hype, and voters knew it instantly. Money woes, staff infighting, strategy brawls, even wardrobe choices befell DeSantis’ orbit. While counting on Trump’s supporters to transfer their loyalty to him, DeSantis was careful not to lay too tough a case at his former ally’s feet… Ultimately, DeSantis couldn’t make the case why MAGA-styled Republicans would line up behind his facsimile when the original article was just as viable—at least for now.”
Philip Elliott, Time
“[DeSantis] wasn’t helped by his wooden manner on the stump. And it wasn’t just that his campaign never seemed to pick a lane — as one Trump ally pointed out last year. ‘He’s trying out too broad of a coalition; he’s trying to have this coalition of Gateway Pundit readers and National Review readers under the same tent.’ DeSantis ended up with the support of neither camp…
“He also faced a constant barrage of criticism from Trump and his allies designed to belittle him: they literally made fun of his height and the house style of campaign communications was abject mockery — they called him Rob, not Ron, and his super PAC, Never Back Down, was mandated to be referred to as Always Back Down. He could never figure out how to appropriately respond.”
Ben Jacobs, New York Magazine
A libertarian's take
“[DeSantis] was a candidate who could tout the benefits of giving parents greater access to school choice and then talk proudly about how his state government has seized greater control over school curriculums—sometimes with hardly a breath in between. He'd brag about how so many Americans were moving to Florida because of its freedoms, then declare that the federal government should do more to stop people who are moving to America for the same reason…
“Through it all, it's been impossible to escape the feeling that DeSantis' notion of freedom extended only as far as the preferences of his political tribe. DeSantis could have been something different… In his first political book, Dreams From Our Founding Fathers, DeSantis argued for the merits of constitutionally limited government. During his three terms in Congress, DeSantis backed plans to balance the budget and reform entitlement programs… The older version of DeSantis might have offered an actual vision for the future.”
Eric Boehm, Reason
