According to some, the writing is on the wall for Ron DeSantis. And nothing says that more than the supposed staff cuts going on over at the DeSantis campaign.
Media outlets such as ABC, the Associated Press, The New York Times, Politico, NBC, and quite a few others have all recently reported that at least ten staffers are being cut from the campaign. And seeing how the presidential race is only heating up and not slowing down, it seems to be a sign of the end for the entire dream of President DeSantis, at least in 2024.
To be sure, cutting down on staff has nothing to do with strategy or even the hope that DeSantis will overcome. Instead, it all has to do with finances. And that says everything about where the campaign is currently sitting, in both terms of polling and his future chances.
CNN’s Jake Tapper recently had the opportunity to discuss some of the supposed issues with the campaign with DeSantis himself. Tapper noted that most of us, given the hype DeSantis had received prior to him entering the race, assumed that the Florida governor was a near shoo-in when it came to GOP presidential candidates.
After all, he is like Trump in most of his political views and has the same no-nonsense attitude for the most part, but, as Tapper said, “without the baggage.” This immediately made him “more electable” to the Republican base worried about Trump’s ego and history. As a result, initial polling and financial support gave him a tremendous bump.
However, as Tapper pointed out, since DeSantis has thrown his hat in the ring, he’s only seemed to move farther to the right on certain issues, some would say even farther than Trump. And that has many worried DeSantis will divide the Republican Party more than bring them together, possibly even alienating certain demographics such as “moderate suburban moms.”
To be sure, Tapper’s conclusions certainly seem to make sense.
Naturally, DeSantis doesn’t exactly see things the same way.
Instead, he says that he will keep doing what he’s doing because that’s what got his state to where it is today. And as he notes, that place is one where Florida went from a 1-point state to winning “by 20 percentage points.” As he said, a whole slew of those 1.5 million votes came from what he calls “bread and butter” people like suburban moms.
DeSantis recounts that during his time as Florida governor, he has tackled issues like parents’ rights in schools, inflation, etc. And in all of them, he has come out on top, with even more supporters than before. Additionally, his state is thriving.
But nationally, sure, things don’t look good regarding polling.
He then noted that, in the current stream of things, that doesn’t exactly matter right now, and neither does his lack of funding or staff. Instead, his campaign is focused on the not-so-glamorous work of getting his people to caucus centers in states like Iowa in a timely manner, which is where the real magic happens.
According to him, it may take some time, but come the first primaries, he expects all his hard work to pay off, despite the doubts of many within the party at present.
I guess only time will tell. In any case, he will have to do that hard work without quite so many hands.
