Among the books still available in Florida despite Ron DeSantis’ ongoing purge of “inappropriate” material is one the Republican governor might want to read.
Dale Carnegie’s 1936 bestseller How to Win Friends and Influence People appears to be the antithesis of DeSantis’ push for his party’s 2024 presidential nomination as Donald Trump’s closest challenger the country turning off voters to his boring personality and extremist policies.
By almost every measure, the far right has had another lackluster week on the campaign trail, with “clumsy” missteps in New Hampshire, Texas, California and New York. Now, barely a month after his botched launch on Twitter, DeSantis finds himself collapsing at the pollscloser to the broad field of optimists below than to the twice-impeached, twice-impeached former president who maintains dominance of the Republican party.
“The more voters learn about him, the less they can stand the idea of him running the country,” online magazine Jezebel. he concluded.
There are competing theories about the reasons for DeSantis’ decline. Analysts warn that with seven months left in the primary season and with Trump mired in legal trouble, it is too soon to call it off.
“Primary elections are volatile and unpredictable. Don’t believe anyone who says they know how this is going to turn out,” he said Stephen Craigprofessor of political science and campaign expert at the University of Florida.
But it’s clear that many of DeSantis’ wounds are self-inflicted. In New Hampshire on Tuesday, she angered grassroots Republican women by scheduling a campaign event to clash with Trump’s appearance at his flagship luncheon, a “stupid” and “rookie” mistake in the eyes of Republican strategists.
In a similar breach of protocol in New York, he upset local Republicans holding a fundraising event without the courtesy of a notice that was in town, Politico reported.
Ron DeSantis upset early-voting New Hampshire Republican women with what strategists called a “rookie” blunder. Photo: Josh Reynolds/AP
Another fundraising trip, to California, whose Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, is openly at loggerheads over his controversial migrant flights to Sacramento, was also an opportunity for mockery. After DeSantis denounced homelessness and claimed in a campaign ad having witnessed people “defecating in the streets” for a “comically short” 20-minute trip to San Francisco, images of poverty in big cities in Florida started appearing on Twitter.
And in perhaps the highest-profile “failure” of the week, DeSantis’ big reveal of immigration policy, made Monday during a visit to the Texas-Mexico border, fell flat. Aggressive proposals like lethal force against drug traffickers, separating migrant families, building a border wall and pledging to end birthright citizenship enraged immigration advocates and offered no more to the republican base. than Trump’s own agenda.
“I used to characterize DeSantis as a lot like Trump, but smarter, and I’m not sure that applies anymore,” said Craig, the UF professor. “He seems to be doing things that aren’t so smart, his war with Disney, for example, and some of the other things he’s doing show a clumsiness that wasn’t so evident before he became a national figure.
“I think he’s still a credible threat. But he’s going to have to get his act together. He’s showing some weakness and you can’t really do that if you want to take the big man out.”
Craig said DeSantis was in an awkward spot as Trump’s primary challenger, led by both him and the camp below.
“He is vulnerable in his actions [and] if all the other candidates were running against him, hoping that one of them would replace him as an alternative to Trump, then I see the potential for him to collapse well before the primaries,” he said.
“I’m not predicting that’s what’s going to happen. I’m saying primaries are so volatile by nature that I don’t think we should take any poll now as definitive evidence of what’s likely.”
Some senior Republicans are even less convinced. Larry Hogan, the former governor of Maryland, said DeSantis had underperformed. “[His] The campaign is one of the worst I’ve seen so far, and it’s dropped like a stone. I think it’s coming to an end,” he said CBS’s The Takeout.
Veteran Republican strategist Rick Wilson told the Guardian last month that the anti-revival governor was “all hat, no cattle.”
The DeSantis campaign continues to project an air of confidence. “This is a marathon, not a sprint,” he told reporters in Texas. according to NBCafter the network’s poll showed him with just 22% support among Republican primary voters, down from 31% in April.
“[Joe] Biden beats Trump in swing states and I beat Biden handily in swing states. Ultimately, it’s the elections. If you don’t have a way to do it, make a nomination [Trump] does not make sense”.
Despite the challenge, there is evidence to suggest that DeSantis is increasingly aware that some of his extreme actions in Florida may not be popular on the national stage.
DeSantis held a press conference near the Rio Grande River in Eagle Pass, Texas, to promote his hardline immigration policies. Immigration advocates suggest it will turn away even more voters. Photograph: Suzanne Cordeiro/AFP/Getty Images
He has largely avoided the abortion debate after signing a six-week ban in his home state; and, significantly, made a legal move this week to try postpone the trial in the Disney lawsuit against him until after the 2024 election. A wave of Republicans, including former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a rival for the presidential nomination, have accused DeSantis of betraying conservative values by retaliating against a private company for not being agree with him
One national issue that DeSantis believes will be a winner for him is his stance on immigration. He has made several trips to the border, where he has committed Florida law enforcement resources to combat what he calls the “Biden border crisis.”
But immigration advocates think DeSantis’ agenda and proposals will turn away even more voters.
“He wants to roll back the 14th Amendment, detain children indefinitely and create a mass deportation regime that uproots families and destabilizes communities across the country. It’s as ugly as it is unworkable,” said Zachary Mueller, policy director for America’s Voice.
“It encapsulates the Republican Party’s continued descent into dangerous extremism on immigration, all politics and red meat for the base and no real solutions or efforts to move beyond perpetual chaos, fear and bigoted extremes.”
Meanwhile, Craig thinks DeSantis lacks time and personality.
“I used to see him as a bit charismatic, but his recent performance seems to belie that,” he said.
“Maybe he can soften it. Richard Nixon wasn’t Mr. Charisma and he got elected, so it’s certainly not impossible.
“But DeSantis is facing the big one and I don’t think he has much room left. He needs to gain momentum somehow in the next month or two or some of the people who would like to leave Trump may also decide it’s time to move on from DeSantis.
