Ron DeSantis rolls out ‘Women for DeSantis’ coalition

With a week left in his campaign for Governor, Republican Ron DeSantis formally rolled out his “Women for DeSantis” coalition Tuesday in Jacksonville.

DeSantis was joined by his wife, former Jacksonville broadcast journalist Casey DeSantis, his running mate Rep. Jeanette Núñez, and Núñez’s legislative colleague, Rep. Cyndi Stevenson.

Additionally, a few dozen supporters were on hand at the event, held in the backroom of the local Republican Party of Florida headquarters in a strip mall in Jacksonville’s Mandarin area.

Stevenson, a first-term Republican representing St. Johns County, noted the diversity of the coalition, which believes in a “future for Florida that represents boundless opportunities.”

“Ron DeSantis and Jeanette Núñez are the future of our state. We stand with them. And they stand with us,” Stevenson said.

Stevenson lauded progress on a number of fronts, including women-owned businesses and a 47-year low in the crime rate, even as Democrat Andrew Gillum‘s city “remains an outlier.”

Gillum, said Stevenson, is “not an option that we should accept for our state.”

Núñez, up next, kept the remarks mostly sparkly and anodyne, stroking the volunteers on hand as “recognizing what’s in the balance” in this election, before vowing to “create an [economy] even better than what we have today.”

Núñez eventually dished up some red meat, contrasting her running mate with Mayor Gillum.

“I know the difference between a man of principle, a man who has served our country, and a man who has a vision for Florida,” Núñez said, “as opposed to what our opponent has to offer, which is radical left wing ideology that has never worked and never will.”

Mrs. DeSantis was next up, extolling her husband (“the epitome of the American Dream”) and telling stories about the couple’s young children.

The candidate closed it out, with compliments to his running mate and his wife, and stories of domestic life, including a familiar story about inadvertently using the baby’s “rump cream” to brush his own teeth.

In a hard-hitting campaign, one full of negative attacks on both sides, an event like this is designed with optics intended to humanize the candidate.