Presidential candidate Ron DeSantis was pressed on Thursday in a Fox News interview about his voting struggles and the emerging story, spurred on by analysts on both sides. , that he was “not connecting” with voters who should have supported his message.
Fox News host Will Cain began by mentioning the fact that Steve Cortes, a top DeSantis PAC official, went public admit Sunday that the Florida governor’s campaign is considering an “uphill battle.”
DeSantis is currently trailing Donald Trump by about 28%, according to FiveThirtyEight’s Average of The GOP’s preliminary polls, though, were within a few percentage points of the former president in February.
After making sure to tell DeSantis that he believes he has “done a great job” as governor, Cain asked him “when will that work—if any—start to resonate?” of your presidential candidates.”
“There are people who say there’s something about you that doesn’t connect for whatever reason — doesn’t connect with voters, whether it’s personality, Donald Trump says it’s about loyalty,” says Francis Suarez that it’s about your relationships,” Cain said, referring to the mayor of Miami, who announced his presidential candidate last month.
When asked about the reasons for these criticisms, DeSantis pointed Cain to his recent fundraising numbers.
“Well, I thought – did you see the news today about the record fundraising we had? No one can match that in the history of modern presidential politics,” he declared.
DeSantis .’s Campaign put into $20 million since launching in May, it announced earlier in the day, with a super PAC called Never Back Down raising $130 million, though more than $80 million of that is from funds. DeSantis’ 2022 reelection run for governor.
“So we had a huge amount of support to get the case out to people. We haven’t actually started that yet. We’re in the process of building a great organization, and I think we’re going to be in all of these early states,” DeSantis said, later claiming he’s stood his ground better than anyone. other in the past 5 years. for “hardworking Americans”.
“It would be a great story to tell because if we did it in Florida, we could absolutely do it as president,” he continued, before deploying one of the your favorite campaign goals. “It means the border invasion stops, it means the economy is restored, and it means the awakened ideology ends up in the dustbin of history.”
Later in the interview, DeSantis was asked more directly about what it took to beat Trump in the primaries.
“I have… been attacked more than anyone,” DeSantis declared. “Trump spent more than 20 million dollars attacking me. That’s more than he spent supporting Republican candidates in last year’s midterm elections.”
Trump, for example, has speak that DeSantis “needs a personality transplant.”
DeSantis then suggested that he’s better equipped than Trump to reach Independent voters and those who haven’t voted Republican in years.
“I’ve shown I can do it, and I think we can do it nationally,” he said.
