A.G. Gancarski
As the GOP primary contest in the Governor’s race comes to an end, U.S. Rep. Ron DeSantis plans a “turnout tour” of the state, with an eye toward hitting six markets Monday.
Events kick off Monday in Jacksonville, with a 9:00 a.m. stop at “The Local” on the Southside.
From there, an 11:00 visit to “Tiffany’s Restaurant” in Palm Harbor, followed by a 2 p.m. in Fort Myers (Three Fishermen Seafood Restaurant.”
The road show moves on to Miami (4 p.m. at “Cafe Versailles”), then a 6 p.m. stop in West Palm Beach at “E.R. Bradley’s Saloon.”
The final stop of the day finds DeSantis in his home district: an 8 p.m. engagement at Daytona Beach’s Motorsports Hall of Fame.
DeSantis, when compared to primary opponent Adam Putnam, has not exactly been a road warrior (even as DeSantis’ camp contends they too have had a robust travel itinerary).
Putnam makes multiple stops a day, hammering his “Florida First” message home to crowds across the state.
“President Trump ran on a plan and he’s working on implementing that plan. No surprises. My opponent’s not running on a plan, he’s running on an endorsement. And Florida deserves better than that,” Putnam said in West Palm Beach — and in many other markets around the state.
The Putnam campaign has emphasized grassroots, with 400,000 doors knocked around Florida, and a lot of local endorsements piled up before Pres. Donald Trump “put his thumb on the scale” and endorsed DeSantis emphatically at a rally weeks back.
Trump described that endorsement colorfully this week in a rally in West Virginia.
“I don’t want to brag about it, but man do I have a good record of endorsements,” Trump told attendees. “In Florida, we have a great candidate, his name is Ron DeSantis, and he called me, and asked whether or not I could endorse him.”
“I said ‘let me check it out,’” Trump said he told DeSantis. “ … This was a few months ago. He was at three, and I gave him a nice shot, and a nice little tweet — bing bing — and he went from three to like twenty something.”
Shortly after the tweet, some polls showed DeSantis skyrocketing in favorability. A St. Pete Polls survey in July gave DeSantis a 20 point edge, a Mason-Dixon survey later that month gave DeSantis a 12 point lead.
Some new polling, however, suggests a bit of that lead has declined. A survey from Florida Atlantic University released on Tuesday gave DeSantis a single point lead, meaning the primary race is in a dead heat.
Material from Danny McAuliffe and A.G. Gancarski was used in this post.
