Erika Donalds says Casey DeSantis ‘teased a run’ for Governor, but Byron Donalds can better deal with Florida issues

Erika Donalds on Tudor Dixon podcast, 3/26/25

Republican gubernatorial candidate Byron Donalds is entirely aware of First Lady Casey DeSantis being a potential opponent.

Potential future First Lady Erika Donalds made that clear, saying DeSantis was “teasing a run” to succeed her husband, Ron DeSantis, as Governor.

However, Erika Donalds also suggested strongly that Byron Donalds, a current Congressman and former state legislator, is better suited to lead. She specifically cited his ability to handle the “insurance crisis” that has emerged during the current Governor’s tenure.

“She’s teased a run. I don’t know what she’s going to do, but I know my husband has an incredible track record, you know, both voting in the state House and in Congress,” Erika Donalds told podcaster Tudor Dixon.

“He spent 20 years in financial services and banking and insurance and those are the things that really bring something to the table for Florida. We have an insurance crisis and property taxes. He totally understands those issues and we want to be the financial and business capital of the world. We’re already well on our way there. So I just think that his background really aligns well with where we’re positioned as a state right now and the fact that he does have such a conservative track record really speaks to Floridians.”

It’s not entirely clear where Byron Donalds would ultimately fall on insurance costs, even though he seems to believe they are too high. He recently questioned whether “climate change risks” should factor into the pricing scheme.

However, the issue is potent. Polling last month from the Associated Industries of Florida Center for Political Strategy found that a third of voters see insurance costs as the biggest issue facing Florida.

Erika Donalds continued to discuss the “insurance market” as “really in crisis right now.” And while she noted a correlation between “direct hits” from “natural disasters” and the crisis, she fell far short of implying causation.

“We’ve had a lot of carriers leave the state, you know, because of some of the natural disasters,” she said.

“You know, there’s legislation that could be improved in order to better the insurance markets here. Both property insurance and car insurance. So that’s a big concern. So just the mechanisms of that. And he did serve as a Chair of that committee in the state House when he was there. But also in Southwest Florida, unfortunately, we’ve had a lot of direct hits while he has been a representative either at the state or congressional levels, so he has been on the ground in Southwest Florida.”

Casey DeSantis, for her part, has not discussed insurance costs. However, she has been instrumental in driving donations to the Florida Disaster Fund to help people after storms who have not been helped by insurance.

The intrigue continues about whether the First Lady actually runs, and at least one poll released this week says she would start off in a decent position against the Donald Trump-endorsed Donalds.

A Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy survey shows 53% of GOP voters in the state like Casey DeSantis, while only 9% do not. Donalds has 48% approval and 6% disapproval in the same survey. That gives DeSantis a leg up in terms of favorability.

However, another recent poll from the Trump-aligned Fabrizio Lee & Associates showed Byron Donalds leading Casey DeSantis 34% to 30% in a head-to-head matchup among Republican Primary voters.

The First Lady is being cryptic about her intentions at this point during interviews with friendly questioners.

She sidestepped a direct question at the National Review Institute’s “Idea Summit,” extolling her husband as “the GOAT” and offering vague criticisms of other politicians she wouldn’t name as part of a “long-winded answer” that ended with “we’ll see.”

“All that (Gov. DeSantis) has done is extremely fragile. You could get somebody in and it could revert back,” she said.

She also condemned politicians who “think about what’s next on the next political rung in their career.”

“The founders never thought that politics should ever have been a career, right? You were supposed to go up and serve, and you come home and you live under the laws that you pass. But it’s really changed,” said the wife of a man who ran for Senate while in Congress, and then ran for President immediately after being elected Governor a second time.

Her coyness about her political future started in earnest back in February.

“To quote the late Yogi Berra,” the First Lady said when asked if she was running, “if you see a fork in the road, take it.”

She also warned about “squishes wanting to go Republican lite by continuing to spend on massive boondoggles and not implementing the will of the people,” in comments vague enough to conceivably apply to Donalds, especially given what the Governor said about him directly.

“You got a guy like Byron Donalds, he just hasn’t been a part of any of the victories that we’ve had here over the Left over these last years. He’s just not been a part of it,” Gov. DeSantis said in Tampa.

“He’s been in other states campaigning, doing that, and that’s fine. But OK, well, then deliver results up there. You know, that’s what I want to see. I want to see them delivering results for the people of Florida. We deliver it here all the time for the people of Florida, and that’s what we need to be doing.”