Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, seeking to shift his run for president into a better gear after an early sequence of missteps, spent the final two weeks rolling out an immigration coverage and holding city halls with voters. But fairly than correcting course, he stumbled once more this week, elevating questions on the place his marketing campaign is heading.
First, Mr. DeSantis’s workforce was pressured to battle allegations, together with from fellow Republicans, that it had shared a homophobic video on social media. Then, a high spokesman for the primary tremendous PAC supporting Mr. DeSantis acknowledged that former President Donald J. Trump was the race’s “runaway front-runner,” whereas Mr. DeSantis confronted an “uphill battle.”
“Right now in national polling we are way behind, I’ll be the first to admit that,” the adviser, Steve Cortes, stated in a livestream Twitter occasion on Sunday. It was an admission notably at odds with the arrogance that the governor’s advisers normally mission in public.
To high it off — in a visible illustration of his current troubles — Mr. DeSantis bought soaked by a rainstorm as he marched in an Independence Day parade alongside a number of dozen supporters in New Hampshire — the essential early nominating state the place his tremendous PAC, Never Back Down, stopped working tv commercials in mid-May.
Meanwhile, Mr. Trump hosted a rally in South Carolina that attracted hundreds of individuals over the vacation weekend, a reminder of his enduring recognition with Republicans regardless of dropping in 2020 and now going through a minimum of two legal trials.
The race remains to be in its early days, however Mr. DeSantis’s tough week highlights the challenges his underdog marketing campaign faces because it seeks a coherent technique to interrupt by way of in opposition to Mr. Trump.
So far, Mr. DeSantis has tried to undermine his chief rival by subtly contrasting their ages, temperaments and information on points just like the coronavirus pandemic with out saying something too unkind concerning the former president, whom he virtually by no means mentions by title. He has additionally tried to maneuver to the correct of Mr. Trump on points like abortion and L.G.B.T.Q. rights, similtaneously he argues that he’s the Republican candidate finest positioned to draw swing voters and defeat President Biden.
But Mr. DeSantis, who has not proven that he’s a pure campaigner, has didn’t take off within the polls, and his fastidiously choreographed public occasions have supplied few headline-generating moments, as his marketing campaign, till just lately, has labored to defend him from doubtlessly awkward unscripted interactions with voters and the news media.
The wobbly launch of his presidential marketing campaign makes for a stark distinction with the assured means Mr. DeSantis has ruled Florida, the place he silenced opposition inside his personal occasion and crushed Democrats on the polls throughout the midterm elections. It additionally has given hope to different main candidates, a number of of whom have jumped into the race in current weeks, that they will change him because the occasion’s most believable various to Mr. Trump.
“DeSantis’s argument is electability,” stated Sarah Longwell, a Republican strategist who holds common focus teams with G.O.P. voters. “But he is undermining the electability argument by running to Trump’s right. He is alienating college-educated, suburban voters who want to move past Trump,” in addition to the independents he would want to beat Mr. Biden in a normal election.
Ms. Longwell stated Mr. DeSantis’s efforts to distinguish himself from Mr. Trump with out immediately criticizing him risked leaving the Florida governor with out a pure constituency within the primaries.
“You cannot go around Trump,” she stated. “You have to go through him.”
National polls present Mr. DeSantis trailing Mr. Trump by roughly 30 factors — a niche that has widened considerably since Mr. DeSantis started touring the nation this spring to introduce himself to voters.
Yet Mr. DeSantis stays the main challenger to the previous president. He has proven fund-raising prowess, and Never Back Down is coaching a military of discipline organizers in early voting states. And within the canine days of summer time, earlier than a main debate scheduled for August has even happen, it’s far too early to foretell how Iowans and New Hampshirites will vote subsequent 12 months.
Bryan Griffin, a spokesman for the DeSantis marketing campaign, stated in an electronic mail that Mr. DeSantis had been “underestimated” in each race he has gained.
“This campaign is a marathon, not a sprint; we will be victorious,” Mr. Griffin wrote.
Mr. DeSantis has rolled out his marketing campaign in deliberate phases, first with a sequence of speeches to introduce the candidate to audiences in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, then a spherical of city halls the place Mr. DeSantis took questions immediately from voters, and now gradual bulletins of in-depth coverage proposals, beginning with immigration.
His marketing campaign says it has targeted its spending on discipline operations fairly than on tv promoting, a technique that will not produce quick polling bumps however will, his advisers argue, repay when it comes time to vote.
There are precedents for Mr. DeSantis’s gradual technique. At this level within the 2016 cycle, Senator Ted Cruz of Texas was polling at below 10 % in Iowa. But Mr. Cruz then went on to win the state, thanks partly to a well-drilled get-out-the-vote operation that Never Back Down is looking for to emulate. Mr. DeSantis’s marketing campaign has thus far closely targeted on successful Iowa, the place polls final month confirmed him trailing Mr. Trump by roughly 20 factors.
Mr. Cortes, the spokesman for Never Back Down, stated his feedback concerning the difficulties of working in opposition to Mr. Trump, first reported by Politico, had been merely an acknowledgment of actuality. But he added that he believed Mr. DeSantis may win.
“Taking on an incumbent or former president in the primary always represents a significant challenge,” Mr. Cortes, who labored on Mr. Trump’s campaigns in 2016 and 2020, stated in an electronic mail. “I gladly embraced that reality in joining the team. All of us on Team DeSantis remain convinced that the governor has a strong path to the nomination, and the best chance of any Republican to defeat Biden in the general election.”
Mr. Trump, a gifted showman, is infamous for vacuuming up media protection and a focus, sucking away the oxygen from his rivals and attempting to stifle their campaigns earlier than they turn out to be bigger threats.
Mr. DeSantis has additionally turn out to be often known as a provocateur, efficiently drawing criticism from liberals and utilizing it to gin up help from his base. But a current try that appeared devised to garner such consideration — a video that condemned Mr. Trump for expressing help for L.G.B.T.Q. folks — appeared to backfire over the weekend, resulting in criticism not solely from Democrats but in addition from different Republicans, together with the biggest group representing homosexual, lesbian and transgender conservatives.
The video, taken from one other Twitter person and reposted by Mr. DeSantis’s rapid-response marketing campaign account, relied closely on obscure conservative memes.
Richard Barry, a former New Hampshire state lawmaker who attended a wet Fourth of July breakfast visited by a number of presidential candidates, stated he was wanting to help somebody apart from Mr. Trump. But Mr. DeSantis has turned him off, he stated, citing a criticism some voters have leveled in opposition to Mr. Trump — an indication that Mr. DeSantis isn’t but differentiating himself from the previous president in a significant means.
“He has a street kid attitude that says, ‘It is my way or the highway,’” Mr. Barry stated of Mr. DeSantis. “He doesn’t listen to people.”
Jazmine Ulloa contributed reporting from Merrimack, N.H., Jonathan Swan contributed reporting from Washington and Maggie Haberman contributed reporting from New York.
Source: www.nytimes.com