A.G. Gancarski
Former U.S. President Donald Trump said Gov. Ron DeSantis would be no match for him in a potential 2024 matchup.
“If I faced him, I’d beat him like I would beat everyone else,” Trump told Yahoo! Finance, noting that DeSantis likely would stand down.
“I don’t think I will face him,” Trump said. “I think most people would drop out; I think he would drop out.”
The comments come as a new poll showed DeSantis competitive with Trump in the 2024 field. The poll from the John Bolton SuperPAC showed Trump and DeSantis tied with 25% support. The survey revealed a seemingly strange aversion to Trump among likely Republican voters, with just 26% of the 1,000 polled wanting Trump to run at all.
Another poll from the Center for American Political Studies at Harvard University and the Harris Poll paints a different picture.
That survey says that Trump is still the overwhelming favorite, and it’s actually Vice President Mike Pence who would be the second choice. Trump drew 58% support when included, compared to Pence’s 13% and DeSantis’ 9%. Without Trump, Pence was the choice of 32%, and DeSantis just 20%.
Other metrics reveal more distance between Trump and DeSantis.
“It’s all one-way traffic in the betting for 2024, and it’s Donald Trump who has the momentum … and he’s not far from going on odds-on to be the Republican candidate contesting the election,” said a spokesperson from BoyleSports, an oddsmaker that has made the case that DeSantis has cooled off as a 2024 prospect.
DeSantis is coy when asked about 2024. He has called the chatter about it “nonsense,” addressing the question during state news conferences and national television appearances alike.
“There’s a lot of huge issues. It’s way down the road. It’s not anything that I’m planning for,” DeSantis said during a Fox News Channel appearance last week.
DeSantis has kept up a robust travel schedule, “huge issues” notwithstanding, with regular fundraising trips out of state. He has demonstrated little interest in talking about political travel with the Florida press.
For his part, Trump is looking and acting more like a 2024 hopeful ready to move into a more formal phase of the campaign, with high profile hire Pam Bondi taking over the helm of his Super PAC just last week.
Meanwhile, casting a shadow over this 2024 drama is the reality that DeSantis needed Trump in 2018 to get through the Primary. This reality has not gone unnoticed by Trump himself, who has told audiences he made DeSantis.
“I don’t want to brag about it, but man do I have a good record of endorsements,” Trump said at a West Virginia rally in 2018. “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 20-something.”
Trump and DeSantis have maintained a united front publicly, but suggestions have mounted that the dynamic could have frayed, especially since Trump lost the presidency.
“Trump f***ing hates DeSantis. He just resents his popularity,” one unidentified “Trump confidant” told Vanity Fair’s Gabriel Sherman this summer.
Among the purported grievances: DeSantis prematurely committed Trump to speak at the Florida GOP Statesman’s Dinner in 2019; he didn’t close beaches in 2020 despite Trump’s wishes, and the Governor skipped a Trump rally while appearing instead with President Joe Biden in Surfside after the Champlain Tower South collapse.
Also worth noting, Trump continues to work with Susie Wiles, the veteran politico who was instrumental to DeSantis’ win in 2018 but was jettisoned unceremoniously by DeSantis soon after.
15 comments
Alex
October 3, 2021 at 11:29 am
What else COULD he say?
He has to be better than everyone – the generals, the scientists, the lawyers, the supreme court justices, his “friends”, his family, and his partners – everyone – and he doesn’t have to read, or learn, or think – he “just is”
Classic narcissistic personality disorder.
Alex
October 3, 2021 at 11:35 am
Symptoms of Narcissistic Personality Disorder
Here are the 9 criteria psychiatrists use to diagnose it. 5 have to be observed and verified;
A grandiose logic of self-importance
A fixation with fantasies of infinite success, control, brilliance, beauty, or idyllic love
A credence that he or she is extraordinary and exceptional and can only be understood by, or should connect with, other extraordinary or important people or institutions
A desire for unwarranted admiration
A sense of entitlement
Interpersonally oppressive behavior
No form of empathy
Resentment of others or a conviction that others are resentful of him or her
A display of egotistical and conceited behaviors or attitudes
Trump has all 9.
Ton
October 3, 2021 at 11:45 am
A G, I told you this days ago.
Stop instigating. What about the 2000 new jobs on the space coast with Orbiton.
None of the candidates excluding 45 would really have a chance in defeating him in a long
primary.
No reason for America’s Gov to do so, except for the extremist like Alex and Peter H.
Linda
October 3, 2021 at 12:13 pm
Well, I did see my first DeSantis presidential-run bumper sticker last week that read:
DeSantis 2024
Make America Florida
😜
Tom
October 3, 2021 at 1:35 pm
Florida is in very good shape and America’s Gov would do a great job for honest working, middle class Americans. Not fraudster Dems.
Compared to this present kclown show. Alzie Joe & giggles Harris. Unemployment exploding, minorities suffering under Biden/Harris. Over 9% unemployed, African Americans not working.
Surrender on border. 2 million illegals. 20% with disease and per DHS chief, 400,000 more coming. Total invasion.
Afghanistan,, Total surrender. .
Lies, 1000’s America’s behind.
Lying Biden approval -13, 40% approval. 38 states negative approval.
Really Linda you fool. Stupid
DeSantis, America’s Governor total reverse in all those areas.
Total winner!
Tjb
October 12, 2021 at 10:32 pm
Just a reminder Tom. Both Trump and Biden has the same approval rating at this time in their tenure as President … 38%.
Frankie M.
October 3, 2021 at 3:10 pm
It’s Trump vs Trump lite. Pence is an empty suit who doesn’t get anybody excited including his own wife. Trump beat everybody except sleepy Joe. Oh wait I forgot that election was rigged so it doesn’t count. My bad.
Tom
October 3, 2021 at 3:58 pm
Love the Dem A Dolts pass judgement on either one in Repub. primary. As if either of you would vote for them.
Oh wait, you support/likely voted for Alzie/sleepy Joe & giggles idiot Harris. To be clear America’s Gov would defeat either one. Harris falls like Gillium.
Do you socialist clowns know what a disaster you have? How ignorant can you be. Your cocoon is sound proof to.
Biden is upside down negative in 38 states. He’s -13 in Florida at 40%. He’s a joke.
Surrender in Afghanistan
Surrender on southern border
Surrender on economy, Biden/Harris cause higher unemployment. Minorities over 9% unemployment.
Surrender on monoclonal, he didn’t know we had it. Abysmal.
DeSantis is anything but Trump lite,
He’s the real deal, all kahones. A work horse not a show horse.
Frankie your a fool like peter h, JD & socialist Alex.
As I said a few times before no reason to run vs 45. Biden is making Trump look great on his own.
Frankie M.
October 3, 2021 at 6:19 pm
If you’ll remember sleepy Joe beat Trump like a redheaded stepchild. I doubt DuhSantis will pose much of a challenge. The only poll that matters is on election day. Ronnie is a joke without a punchline. Same as you.
Tom
October 3, 2021 at 7:07 pm
You can kiss my ass.
You are pathetic hater u PUD.
Run away from the facts.
Alzie Joe & giggles Harris don’t have a clue but you & curb crawler Alex think you know.
DeSantis craps bigger than you and Alex, plus your pal JD.
Whose going to defeat DeSantis? Nikki Fraud, Crispy critters? Are you serious? You are a bigger idiot than I thought.
Sleepy Joe makes Trump look good.
You liberals live in your cocoon and can’t figure it out. Biden made America the old Soviet Union.
DeSantis the best! U dumb ass.
Johnny The Democrat
October 4, 2021 at 8:26 am
How about kissing your own ass, you ridiculous Fascist turd. Its abundantly clear by now that you are either woefully ignorant or deeply mentally ill; perhaps you’re both. That having been said, facts are facts: Desantis is a pathetic governor whose only claim to relevance is that he was Trump’s most prominent public ass kisser.
I’m sure you would have preferred that title yourself however.
In any case, COVID, and Desantis’ gross mismanagement of it, has alarmed many Florida voters–and forced quite a few folks in the Trump cult to reassess how they view this very foolish and overly bombastic politician. What they are now seeing is what us Democrats saw all along: A buffoonish, self-absorbed, and incompetent man who is not suited for the job he barely beat Andrew Gillum to acquire.
Charlie Crist, a former governor with actual accomplishments, is a solid alternative to greasy haired Trump acolyte Desantis. And he’s gonna restore confidence in the governorship.
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October 4, 2021 at 8:40 am
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Harold Finch
October 4, 2021 at 8:43 am
Both Trump and DeSantis are dullusional physcho’s. I question weather Biden will actually run in 2024 and most any republican candidate beats Kamal Harris.
I am a Pence supporter and feel he would be best overall for the country!!
Derek J Evans
October 4, 2021 at 12:01 pm
Hahahaha….sure guy, whatever you say, #Trump2024
Linda
October 4, 2021 at 5:41 pm
Tom. you know nothing about me nor my politics by my comment, but I will tell you I am FAR from being “stupid”. I follow no party and never have, but especially now as they have too many members who are both crazytown and frankly, dangerous. However, your name calling and what you write tells me a lot about you, and I literally laughed out loud when I read your comment about lberals living in a cocoon and can’t figure it out as that’s really hypocritical, for Trumpers are the ones who follow blindly, believing everything he says and can’t figure it out that he cares only about himself and his status quo, both of which will truly end our democratic republic as the Religious Right glommed onto him and are now pushing through their agenda. It’s not what you said about Biden bringing us to Communism, for I don’t think you understand what Communism truly is as NOWHERE did any Demcrat state that all businesses and the distribution of goods would be owned/done by the state, which IS Communism.
And if you have a 1984 flag up or believe the fanatical Right wing nonsense that we are living it, I hate to tell you, but having taught the novel for years, Orwell was the Bernie Sanders of his time as he was a Democratic Socialist and even fought the fascists in Spain. He used a lot of Mussolini’s rhetorical ploys to show how easily people can be manipulated, and the loss of freedom of the press occurred when the government took it over. But besides this, the masses constantly choose lies over facts, there is a one party rule who uses propaganda to stay in power esp using the “us AGAINST them” mentality to sow division, and then there’s the sexual repression… hmmmm does any this sound familiar? (Rhetorical question as I am DONE.)
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