A.G. Gancarski
Ron DeSantis is facing challenges in the Hawkeye State.
A new Manhattan Institute poll of 625 likely Iowa caucus participants shows the Florida Governor and 2024 presidential candidate down by 25 points to Donald Trump.
Trump has 42% support compared to 17% for DeSantis, with 10% going to South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott. In single digits are candidates Vivek Ramaswamy, who has 6% support; Nikki Haley, who 5% of respondents say they back; Chris Christie and Mike Pence, at 4% each; and Doug Burgum, who has 3%.
This survey accords with another recent Iowa poll from American Greatness, which shows Trump ahead of DeSantis 42% to 15%.
A Fox Business survey released last month reveals just 5 points separate the Florida Governor and Scott. DeSantis has 16% support, with Scott at 11%. Both contenders are far behind Trump, who is at 46%.
A recent Coefficient Poll shows DeSantis has 16% support, with Scott at 10%. Again, Trump is at 46%.
In a recent National Public Affairs poll, Trump is up 41% to 18%.
The Race to the White House polling average of the state shows Trump up 44% to 16% over DeSantis, meanwhile.
The Governor was in Iowa last week, but Sunshine State drama followed him, as DeSantis found himself squabbling with a reporter about a Florida controversy.
After a meet-and-greet event in Chariton, Iowa, the Governor was asked about the state’s 216-page set of social studies guidelines that includes instruction in Black history. Specifically, DeSantis was asked to weigh in on the document’s assertion that people may have benefited from learning skills while enslaved.
“You have, I think it’s like 200-plus pages of all kinds of stuff that you can’t read that,” DeSantis said, using awkward phrasing before he turned the heat on the reporter, asking, “Have you read it?”
The reporter then responded, asking DeSantis what his “opinion” was.
“You haven’t read it. So I’m just making that clear, that makes it very clear about the injustices of slavery in vivid detail. So anyone that actually read that and then listens to Kamala would know that she’s lying, and that particular provision about the skills, that was in spite of slavery,” DeSantis said.
The Governor naming “Kamala” was, of course, a reference to Vice President Kamala Harris, who denounced the standards in a speech last month in Jacksonville.
