When people think of the US’s big states, the places that most frequently come to mind are probably California, New York, Illinois and Texas. But Florida is now the third-largest state by population after California and Texas, following years of in-migration from the Northeast and upper Midwest on climate (and a lack of state income tax) grounds, as well as in-migration from Cuba and the rest of the Caribbean’s island nations.

The advent of nearly universal access to air conditioning has made living in Florida a year-round possibility for millions, rather than just a popular winter destination for the rich, or a place for beach time or attractions like Universal Studios or Disneyworld — or Miami’s South Beach.

In practice, what this means for presidential elections is that since Florida has 29 electoral votes out of the national total of 538 in presidential races (electoral votes are essentially a reflection of demographic weight apportioned via the number of congressional representatives), Florida is now one of the big boys in an election. This also becomes important in the way candidates position themselves to appeal to winning majorities.

Republicans have, more often than not, won Florida in presidential races over the past 60 years, in contrast to Florida’s earlier history as part of the Democrats’ “Solid South” in presidential politics — with solid support from white voters for racial segregation and harsh restrictions on African Americans’ voting in the state’s political life. Nevertheless, no Floridian has yet been successful in becoming a nominee for president, let alone gaining the big prize of the White House. That may change in two years.

It is increasingly possible, in fact, that two Floridians will be colliding in the race for the Republican presidential nomination. The first of these is newly minted Florida resident Donald Trump, while the other is the state’s incumbent governor, Ronald DeSantis.

Trump used to be a New Yorker of course, but after losing the 2020 presidential election, he decamped to Florida where he already had that residence inside his pricey members’ club of Mar-a-Lago, after he had effectively intuited that returning to New York City would see him being shunned as a political leper in that overwhelmingly Democratic Party-supporting city.

His daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, similarly made their move to Florida after their four years in Washington, for much the same reasons. New York City doesn’t much like truculent losers, much less unrepentantly, obsessively sore-headed ones like Trump. (One also wonders how Melania Trump feels about their move, given her “ladies that lunch” reputation and her inclination towards enjoying those fashionable restaurants in Manhattan and her reluctance towards entering into much of Washington’s social life during her time in the White House.)

Anyway, even as Trump has been giving those simpering, teasing “maybe I will, maybe I won’t” sounds of his interest in a third run for the presidency, another Floridian — DeSantis — is also beginning to position himself as the logical alternative to Trump. He is portraying himself as a smarter version of Trumpism, but without all the melodramatic drama-queen ickiness of the actual Donald Trump.

Crucially, too, DeSantis is positioning himself as a potential candidate who comes along without the tawdriness of all those lawsuits, investigations and indictments that are starting to stick to Trump like a trail of loo paper attached to his heels.

Ponder the image of the kind of baggage that might well stay with Trump in a run for the 2024 nomination (and potentially affect other Republicans down the ballot across the nation), even as Trump tries to fend off getting a term in the pokey, being hit with massive fines, or having his business empire shrivel as it is snarled in litigation or bans from fraudulent business practice. The latter seems the goal of New York state’s attorney-general.

A well-rounded CV

This is where DeSantis comes into focus in the national picture. DeSantis is smart, first of all, Harvard University and Yale Law School smart, all while being the child of a working-class family and with his strong athletic skills as a university baseball star. He did military time as a US Navy lawyer and legal adviser to Navy Seal teams. Thereafter, he moved on to being elected as a Republican congressman from Florida. Then it was the leap to the governorship of one of the most populous states in the country. He is now running for his second term of office against the former Republican governor and now Democrat, Charlie Crist.

DeSantis is now weighing carefully — and rather publicly — whether he should challenge Trump for the presidential nomination (if Trump actually does decide to run), or if he has the stomach to trounce the gaggle of others who would also try for the nomination if Trump is forced to give up that quest.

That tribe of wannabes includes a clutch of senators such as Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, several other governors such as Texas Governor Greg Abbott (with whom DeSantis shares many political feelings and some degree of policy coordination, something we will come back to in a minute), or former South Carolina governor and UN ambassador Nikki Haley. The latter, of course, would be a two-fer challenge, being both female and of South Asian (ie, not white) descent.

While it may seem like there is a great deal of time before the next presidential election cycle (primaries and caucuses commence at the beginning of 2024), in actuality, there is really only a little more than a year before active campaigning and positioning begin — if, in fact, they haven’t already begun in all but name. Political action committees (PACs) must be activated and Super PACs organised around issues (rather than, ostensibly, candidates) must be nurtured.

Importantly, too, generous donors must be cultivated at events like the annual Conservative Political Action Conferences — to contribute to the running costs of a campaign before there actually is a formally declared campaign for the primary season. (Once that happens, a whole regimen of regulations and accounting processes kicks in, keeping track of who gives how much to whom.)

And, of course, the essential requisites of a successful campaign must start to be organised. These include the procurement of vast (and valuable) databases of potential donors and supporters, as well as the recruitment of campaign operatives and specialists in data management and all the other skills needed for a successful campaign. Crucially, much of this must be locked into place as early as possible, lest competitors capture them for their own campaigns.

A kind of natural advantage

Successful winners of gubernatorial races in big states are presumed to have a kind of natural advantage in this, having already succeeded in large, complex electoral contests, although their actual governing record can become problematic for being a candidate for the presidency.

Accordingly, they are seen as coming to the fight with an understanding of the many pieces, resources, and skills that must be assembled for a strong campaign. Moreover, they already have connections to many of the people who will help them materially, financially and managerially, and in the creation of thinking about and formulating their proposed policies and how they must be rolled out. Messaging matters almost as much as money.

The argument — not yet formally articulated since he is not yet a declared candidate — is that that particular someone, presumably, should be someone who looks and sounds like DeSantis. At the very least, that is so if you are a Republican activist or political officeholder eager to jettison all that disruptive and distracting Trumpian baggage but who, simultaneously, is not getting rid of much of the messaging and policies espoused by Trump in his saner moments.

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In truth, among committed Republican activists and a significant share of that party’s dyed-in-the-wool voters with those tendencies and conspiratorial, grievance-laden turns of mind, such people have already embraced the Maga rhetoric and policies — even if those things remain a hard sell for many other voters — and so they simply need to latch on to a better version of their chosen candidate.

Florida also represents a kind of US in miniature, demographically and politically. The northern part of the state — besides the core of its larger cities — has much in common with the more traditional styles and histories of other Deep South states. The northern part is significantly more agriculturally based than much of the rest of the state, and it remains an important area for cattle ranching as well. Meanwhile, the centre of the state around Orlando has its core economic base in the tourism and service industries of the vast amusement park zone that’s nearby.

To the east of Orlando, there is an aerospace industrial base centred on Cape Canaveral. Meanwhile, the big cities on the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico coasts are hubs for retirement communities (including significant numbers of Jewish Americans) and others who have semigrated to the region for the climate and lower cost of living.

Further, the playgrounds of richer Floridians still centre on Miami Beach and Boca Raton. The state also has major African American populations, as well as conurbations of immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico (already US citizens) and some of the smaller Caribbean islands. In particular, the Cuban Americans are still largely those who fled Castro’s Cuba since 1960 — or, now, their children and grandchildren.

As a result of this intoxicating mix, the Florida congressional delegation includes a spread from starkly rightwing conservatives to stalwart progressives and minority group members — including Cuban Americans and African Americans. Winning in Florida — whether one is a Republican or a Democrat — means building and holding together a coalition that must draw support from a spread of interests and groups.

And, in fact, in this year’s gubernatorial competition between DeSantis and Crist, both candidates are trying to build and sustain such coalitions — but for DeSantis, it is one that embraces the conservative views of northern Florida, Cuban Americans and middle-class voters, while Crist is trying to cobble together a coalition — including many minorities — that veers towards a more centre-left stance. So far, by most polling, DeSantis is moving towards a comfortable victory, and that win would help solidify his credentials in the run-up to 2024.

Some big political wins

And what of DeSantis’ positions on issues? As WKMG’s ClickOrlando news site described him, since winning in 2018 in a very close race, DeSantis, “…the former congressman and Navy JAG [Judge Advocate General] officer has notched some big political wins, not to mention some public relations moves that have made him very popular with the ‘small government’ set. This especially includes his refusal to restrict businesses or close schools completely during the Covid-19 pandemic and pushing laws against mask and vaccine mandates. 

“He also has launched a highly public public-health battle against the federal government, President Joe Biden and Dr. Anthony Fauci over Covid-19 and vaccine guidelines (Florida does not support vaccines for children under 5, for instance)… 

“Then there are the social conservatives who applaud his recent culture war moves against sexual identity expression in schools and racial-equity school curricula and workplace training, his promise to bring constitutional carry for weapons to Florida and his support of abortion restrictions…  

“The culture wars will get a lot of play this midterms, as Republicans see a chance to push conservative policies through the state and local governments against abortion, so-called ‘woke’ education curriculum, sexual identity education and more. DeSantis has led the way on all of these issues, pushing the Stop WOKE Act and the Parental Rights in Education law (known by critics as ‘Don’t Say Gay’), restricting gender-affirming health care and supporting the 15-week abortion ban. He has also hinted at further expanding limitations on abortion. Supporters also love DeSantis’ aggressive style of attacking those who oppose him” such as the Disney company’s positions on a variety of social issues. 

However, “While DeSantis has led the way in raising starting pay for teachers, pay for veteran teachers continues to drag the state’s average teacher pay below the national average, according to the U.S. Dept. of Education. DeSantis also recently unveiled a plan to let veterans and first responders without a college degree get a five-year teaching certificate… DeSantis would also say he wants politics out of the classroom, except he claims there are schools and teachers that are indoctrinating students in anti-American values.”

More controversially (and potentially a violation of government funding practice), DeSantis has cooperated with his soulmate Abbott on charter flights of Venezuelan refugees from their entry into the US when they crossed over from Mexico to Texas, helping send them on to the island of Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts because Massachusetts was supporting a refugee sanctuary law. Many people see this as a political stunt designed to embarrass Democrats even as DeSantis and Abbott’s supporters see it as an out-of-the-box policy to “share the burden” of refugee entrants into the US. It has certainly received much news coverage, given the public focus on refugees and immigration.

Meanwhile, back in 2018, in an effort to stand out against his then-opponent, as The Hill newspaper described it, “Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) released an advertisement for his gubernatorial campaign on Monday in which he shows his support for President Trump by teaching his child to ‘build the wall’ with blocks. ‘Everyone knows my husband Ron DeSantis is endorsed by President Trump,’ DeSantis’s wife, Casey DeSantis, says to open the ad. ‘But he’s also an amazing dad. Ron loves playing with the kids.’  

“The clip then features Ron DeSantis saying ‘build the wall’ [a Trump catchphrase] as his child places blocks atop one another. The candidate also reads The Art of the Deal [Trump’s ghostwritten memoir] to a child and teaches another how to talk by saying ‘Make America Great Again.’

“ ‘People say Ron is all Trump, but he is so much more, I just thought you should know,’ Casey DeSantis says as the advertisement ends.”  

Smarmy and obnoxious doesn’t begin to do justice to that campaign ad, but it presumably helped him win, and it certainly was a way of differentiating himself from his opponent. Going forward, from his close embrace of Trump last time around, if as seems likely, DeSantis pulls off that win on 8 November for a second gubernatorial term, he will have positioned himself as the go-to Trumpian candidate in 2024, but without the personal baggage of the former president. If that happens, smart money and talent may well start drifting his way (and away from the others in the pack), thereby making him the man to beat in the primaries — a Trump without that ridiculous braggadocio and reality-warping energy. DM