Though his 2024 presidential campaign fell short of expectations and Republican voters have largely moved on, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is still doing his thing, with his crackdown on illegal immigrants paying off, the Florida Supreme Court upholding his firing of Soros-backed prosecutor Monique Worrel, and his school choice focus being wildly successful all examples of recent victories he now has under his belt.
As we’ve also noted, he’s scored important wins against Disney as well as the plaintiffs in the Florida Parental Rights in Education Act case, has taken action against so-called “squatters’ rights” and retail theft, signed five laws cracking down on sexual predators, and put his signature on a law that calls for teaching the atrocities of Communism to elementary school students.
All in a day’s work for DeSantis, who understandably took a well-deserved victory lap after an acknowledgment made by the Biden campaign about the Sunshine State headed into the summer presidential campaign months:
President Joe Biden and Democrats have been insisting that Florida’s gettable for them in November.
But not everyone seems to have gotten the memo. In a podcast interview with Puck News’ John Heilemann released Monday, Biden campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon responded bluntly when asked if Florida was a battleground state: “No.” Heilemann then joked that he “was afraid you were going to lie” about Florida’s status.
The comments seemed to throw Florida politics into a tailspin, with even many Democrats viewing them as contradicting an April memo from Biden campaign manager Julie Chávez Rodríguez that declared Florida “winnable.”
This prompted the following reaction from DeSantis:
For decades, Florida was the largest, most-important battleground state in presidential elections.
Today, even the Biden campaign acknowledges that those days are over.
Florida is not in play in 2024. https://t.co/C8XgyZxFXD
— Ron DeSantis (@RonDeSantis) June 24, 2024
Back in April, my colleague Ward Clark wrote about Florida’s sharp turn red and the impetus behind it:
During Governor DeSantis’s terms, Florida has gone from being a nail-biting swing state to a reliably Republican state. Now, it’s important to note that in-migration from failing blue states is partly responsible for this; we can blame Democrat governors for driving the productive (who tend to lean right) out of their states. But Florida has made the Sunshine State a welcoming place for those same people, and for that, Ron DeSantis can take his share of the credit.
On the migration of folks from blue states to Florida, DeSantis had this to say at the time:
Today, we have close to 900,000 more registered Republicans than Democrats. So, you’re talking about a million-plus voter registration shift. And, yes, part of that I think is a response locally, where people are more likely to switch from Democrat to Republican in Florida, nonparty to Republican, then vice versa.
And that’s been an important component of it. But I do think the migration has skewed amongst people who come to Florida, not because they want to change the policies to reflect in Illinois or California, New York, but because they appreciate how Florida has done it different from where they’re coming to. And so I think that’s contributed to this really record thing.
Rock on, Gov. Rock on.
Flashback: NBC News Raked Over Coals After ‘Migration’ Hit Piece on Ron DeSantis and Florida Falls Flat
