Republican DeSantis to announce 2024 presidential run

"He needs to sort of say, 'Here is a flavour you haven't tried," said Brown University political science professor Wendy Schiller, "but I'm going to be better and more satisfying in the long run than Donald Trump and I can actually win the White House.'"

DeSantis will make the announcement on Twitter during a discussion with Twitter CEO Elon Musk, DeSantis' political team confirmed. At the same time, he will file a document with the Federal Election Commission declaring his candidacy.

DeSantis was re-elected handily to a second term in November. His rising profile among Republicans and fundraising prowess likely make him the biggest threat to Trump’s hopes of becoming the Republican nominee for the White House again.

But his decision to wait until now to join the fray has allowed Trump to batter DeSantis with a fusillade of attacks, costing him standing in national polls.

"He's got a big war chest already," Schiller said. "I think as he introduces himself and his family to Republican voters, I do think his poll numbers will rise."

The two men were close allies during Trump’s four years in the White House – Trump endorsed him during his first campaign for governor - but DeSantis has since forged his own political identity. At 44 he may represent the future of the party more than does the 76-year-old Trump.

"DeSantis has both legislative and executive experience," said Tevi Troy, a senior fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington and a presidential historian. "He's also served in the military, which is an increasingly rare trait among our presidents these days, and I think a welcome one."

During the coronavirus pandemic, DeSantis became the national face of resistance to mask and vaccine mandates and has been a virulent critic of Dr Anthony Fauci, who headed the government’s Covid-19 response in both the Trump and Biden administrations.

In the months leading up to his presidential bid, DeSantis has toured the country, visiting states like Iowa and New Hampshire that will hold early presidential nominating contests next year and talking up his accomplishments in Florida.

When Walt Disney Co (DIS.N), one of Florida's biggest employers, opposed the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” law that limited discussion of LGBTQ issues in schools, DeSantis moved to strip the company of its self-governing status. Disney has since filed a federal lawsuit against the governor, accusing him of weaponizing the state government to retaliate against the company.

He has made crusading against what Republicans call “woke” education policies a centrepiece of his politics while supporting conservative candidates for local school boards.

"DeSantis has touched some hot-button cultural issues," Troy said, "but it looks to me like you need to touch some of the cultural issues in order to be able to win over the Republican electorate these days. The cultural issues, concerns about 'wokeism' and critical race theory and corporate wokeism I think are issues that really inflate the base and get the base excited. "

He backed a legislative measure that prohibits the teaching of "Critical Race Theory" – an academic doctrine that views U.S. history through the lens of oppression – in-state public schools despite little evidence it was being taught.

Republican lawmakers in Florida handed DeSantis a bevvy of conservative victories in its recent session: They expanded the state's school voucher program, prohibited the use of public money in sustainable investing, scrapped diversity programs at public universities, allowed for the permitless carry of concealed weapons and, perhaps most notably, banned almost all abortions in the state.

On the stump, DeSantis has a wholly different style than the bombastic Trump: low-key, buttoned-down and prone to favouring policy over personal attacks. His campaign speeches can sometimes feel like PowerPoint presentations.

Said Schiller: "We don't know if he has the charisma and the force and the camera-attractiveness to really make an impression on voters. And we're about to find out."

Analysts say he likely will try to walk a careful line between not denigrating Trump while making clear he favours many of the same policies with perhaps a steadier hand on the tiller.

"I do see him peeling off some of the Trump bases," said Schiller, "and being more appealing to Republicans who just really want a champion in the form of Donald Trump without the baggage of Donald Trump."

Reuters