'Crashed to the ground': How Ron DeSantis' 'luster' has been replaced by 'temper tantrums'

20 May

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin on July 16, 2024 (Image: Shutterstock)

In a handful of years, Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis has gone from heir apparent of the GOP to a pariah even within the Florida Republican Party.

That's according to a Tuesday article in the Guardian, which delved into how and why DeSantis' reputation has been all but destroyed since his unsuccessful run for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. The outlet remarked that DeSantis has gone from being dubbed "DeFuture" by the conservative New York Post after his landslide reelection in 2022, to losing the faith of the Florida legislature and being unable to pass his agenda through a Republican-dominated statehouse.

Daniel Perez, who is the Republican speaker of the Florida House of Representatives, told the Guardian that the governor frequently tells "lies and stories that never happened" and sometimes is consumed by "temper tantrums." He's also one of a number of Republicans pressing DeSantis on how $10 million of $67 million in money meant for Florida residents went to a charity run by his wife, Casey, which was then funneled into efforts to defeat abortion and legal marijuana-related ballot initiatives.

"He’s completely crashed to the ground at this point and is certainly being treated like a more standard, average governor now," University of Central Florida political science professor Aubrey Jewett told the outlet.

"He’s lost the ability to push things through. He’s lost that luster he had that at one time seemed like he could do no wrong in Republican conservative circles," Jewett said. "He’s definitely come back down to earth and some of it is his own doing because if you govern with an autocratic style, that doesn’t usually make you a lot of allies."

Jewett further observed that as DeSantis' reputation has declined, he's since been eclipsed by other Republicans to be the favorite in 2028, including Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. He traced the beginning of DeSantis' fall back to his embarrassing defeat in the 2024 primary, and dividing President Donald Trump's MAGA base against him.

“It came out while he was running that he doesn’t have the great personality that a traditional politician has. He just didn’t seem well suited for shaking hands, eating hot dogs and kissing babies, the kind of typical American political things," Jewett told the Guardian. "It destroyed his air of invincibility.”

Click here to read the Guardian's report in full.

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