NEW YORK (AP) — Ron DeSantis ’ entry into the 2024 White House race against former President Donald Trump sets up a clash of the Republican Party’s two leading figures as the Florida governor attempts to topple a man who has dominated the GOP for the last seven years.
— Ron DeSantis ’ entry into the 2024 White House race against former President Donald Trump sets up a clash of the Republican Party’s two leading figures as the Florida governor attempts to topple a man who has dominated the GOP for the last seven years.
Trump, who has established himself as the clear front-runner for the Republican nomination, has spent the months since he launched his own campaign working to hobble the once-ascendant DeSantis, whom he and his team have long viewed as his most serious challenger. DeSantis so far has tried to remain above the fray, ignoring Trump’s escalating attacks on everything from his record to his personality.
“The campaign is about to get a lot more intense. He can’t just lay low in Tallahassee signing bills,” said GOP strategist Alex Conant of DeSantis’ strategy. “Now he has to hit the campaign trail, take media questions and punch back at his opponents.”
But DeSantis, during a series of events Wednesday night launching his campaign, took only veiled swipes at his chief rival without mentioning him by name. It is a strategy reminiscent of 2016, when Trump’s army of Republican rivals failed to go after the candidate directly for fear of alienating his supporters and assumed — wrongly — that he would flame out on his own.
“There is no substitute for victory. We must end the culture of losing that has infected the Republican Party in recent years,” DeSantis said on a Twitter Spaces debut that was plagued by technical difficulties. “We must look forward, not backwards,” he added.
In an interview later with Fox News, he said he believed all candidates should participate in the planned GOP primary debates, which Trump has threatened to boycott. “Nobody’s entitled to anything in this world,” he said.
The rollout made clear that, at least for the time being, DeSantis intends to leave the dirty work of attacking Trump to his allies, who see openings that they plan to exploit, particularly on policy.
Now that he’s officially in the race, DeSantis’ well-funded super PAC is poised to intensify its attacks against the former president. His team plans to focus on policy differences between the two Republicans, making the case that Trump has “lurched left” on some issues — most notably, abortion.
