DeSantis, who has not said whether he will run for president, won his seat in this year’s midterms, beating his Democratic opponent Charlie Crist by around 20 points.
In Florida’s current resign-to-run law, a candidate must file for resignation if they run for a new office and the two offices overlap.
In 2008, a reversal to the law was made to allow then-Gov. Charlie Crist to seek the vice presidency. But four years ago legislators reversed course, demanding that candidates seeking federal office would be required to resign before an election, Politico reports.
Former President Donald Trump, who announced his third presidential run from his home on DeSantis’ home turf, has gone on the attack against the governor, dubbing him “Ron DeSanctimonious,” either because he’s threatened by him or because someone taught him a new word. One never knows.
“Ron DeSanctimonious is playing games! The Fake News asks him if he’s going to run if President Trump runs, and he says, ‘I’m only focused on the Governor’s race, I’m not looking into the future.’ Well, in terms of loyalty and class, that’s really not the right answer,” Trump posted on his Truth Social account.
According to U.S. News and World Report, Trump has also claimed that in 2018, he sent law enforcement to Florida to take charge of the elections in order to protect DeSantis’ win.
“I also fixed his campaign, which had completely fallen apart. I was all in for Ron, and he beat Gillum, but after the Race, when votes were being stolen by the corrupt Election process in Broward County, and Ron was going down ten thousand votes a day, along with now-Senator Rick Scott, I sent in the FBI and the U.S. Attorneys, and the ballot theft immediately ended, just prior to them running out of the votes necessary to win. I stopped his Election from being stolen,” Trump said.
Terri Burl, an early member of Women for Trump who has long lost her verve for the former president, told The Guardian there’d be “a lot of blood on the floor” if DeSantis runs.
“I will back whoever the Republicans choose to run in 2024. That’s a given. But I want them to go through the primaries, and I hope it’s not Trump. He has too much baggage now. We need new blood because it’s obvious that he can’t get to business now without doing things to make people angry. His behavior hasn’t changed,” Burl added.
When Passidomo was asked by Politico on Tuesday who she’d support in a Trump versus DeSantis scenario, the Senate president said, “What?” And when the question was repeated, she replied with the same, “What?” and then scuttled into her office.
A recent Emerson College poll found that Trump’s support from GOP voters far outweighed that of the governor—55% for Trump and 25% for DeSantis.
And in the same poll, a rematch of Trump versus President Joe Biden, Biden would beat Trump 45% to 41%.
