The 2024 Republican Primary Is Heating Up. Time For Another FiveThirtyEight Primary Draft!
FiveThirtyEightJun 02, 2023
The Facts
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced Wednesday on the Twitter Spaces forum that he will be running for the Republican ticket for the 2024 US presidential election. The announcement experienced technical difficulties on the platform that immediately drew fire from GOP rival Donald Trump and US Pres. Joe Biden.
In DeSantis's launch video released earlier in the day, he said things such as "Crime infests our cities," "Righting the ship requires restoring sanity to our society," and argued that he "chose facts over fear, education over indoctrination, [and] law and order over rioting and disorder."
The Spin
Democratic narrative
The Twitter tech issue debacle sums up perfectly the disorganized nature of both the DeSantis campaign and the GOP race in general. The governor is trying to tout his culture war accomplishments while simultaneously seeking the approval of the Trump base, though it doesn't help that he polls better among college-educated voters than non-educated. As for distancing himself from Trump, DeSantis also promised to build the wall, a clear imitation of the former president. The GOP is still stuck between a rock and a Donald Trump.
Anti-Trump narrative
The most important question to ask when running for president is can you win the general election, and the answer is certainly in DeSantis' favor right now. Donald Trump may be leading in the primary polls, but only DeSantis has proven capable when it comes to defeating the incumbent Biden in swing states such as Arizona, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina. The GOP needs a big comeback win in 2024, and DeSantis is the shrewd, next-generation administrator to lead the party into the future.
Pro-Trump narrative
After months of "experts" claiming Trump could only win the primary, the tide seems to be shifting. Trump will undoubtedly crush DeSantis in the primary, but recent polls suggest he could even beat Biden by four points in the general election. This is because voters understand that, under Trump, the country was strong economically and from a security standpoint. We all know Biden only upholds the deep state and woke policies — the numbers also show rust belt voters are too unsure of rookie contender DeSantis to give him their full support.
