WEST DES MOINES, Iowa — “Thank youuuuuu!” Ron DeSantis thundered into the microphone, producing a harsh static suggestions. “Are you ready to make some history on Monday night?”
The Florida governor requested this query of his supporters on Saturday as a blizzard whipped outdoors the West Des Moines headquarters of Never Back Down, the tremendous PAC accountable for organizing a lot of his floor sport right here over the previous 9 months.
“They can throw a blizzard at us, and we are gonna fight! They can throw a windchill at us, and we are gonna fight! They can throw media narratives at us, and we are gonna fight! They can throw fake polls at us, and we are gonna fight!” the Floridian shouted on the crowd, their applause not fairly matching his screeching decibel.
DeSantis did make historical past in Monday’s caucuses, however not for the explanations he or his allies had envisioned on the onset of this race for the Republican nomination.
In early 2023, the pugnacious Florida governor was seen as the following coming of Donald Trump — a Republican who shares the previous president’s more and more authoritarian imaginative and prescient for the nation however not his 91 felony costs.
But that promise for DeSantis diminished Monday with a distant second-place end within the nation’s first presidential nominating contest, the place he got here in effectively behind Trump and simply forward of former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, in line with unofficial projections. And although candidates don’t essentially must win the caucuses to change into their celebration’s eventual nominee (see: Donald Trump in 2016 and Joe Biden in 2020, for starters), it’s arduous to think about how this will get any higher for DeSantis as extra votes are forged within the coming weeks. Haley is poised for a powerful second-place end subsequent week in New Hampshire, the place DeSantis is polling in single digits.
It was by no means imagined to be like this for DeSantis, not right here at the very least. His operation has dumped greater than $150 million into this main (a lot of it in Iowa), knocked on 1000’s of doorways and scored a few of the most coveted endorsements from Iowa leaders. He visited all 99 Iowa counties, flipped a pork burger on the Iowa State Fair within the 100-degree warmth and trudged round in a snowstorm within the minus-10 chilly. He had what one Iowa operative referred to as a “gold standard” operation right here, checking all of the packing containers after which some. So why couldn’t he win?
“It’s probably the question of the campaign,” mentioned David Kochel, Iowa’s go-to GOP guide on all issues caucus (Kochel has been quoted on the race almost as a lot as, if no more than, the candidates themselves). “He started with good numbers and high hopes. He’s a very good fit for the Iowa caucuses. His record looks almost exactly like [Iowa Gov.] Kim Reynolds, who is wildly popular here among Republicans. But I think it’s Trump attacking him for the first six months of the campaign and almost no response out of DeSantis, that’s part of it. I think his voters are more likely to be with Trump, and once the indictments started coming down, you had the rally-round-the flag effect.”
“The problem is Donald Trump’s been organizing here for eight years,” mentioned Jimmy Centers, one other GOP operative, “and he is, of course, the former president of the United States and the two-time Republican nominee, and with that comes all sorts of institutional organizational advantages.”
A school scholar from Texas, one of many many political vacationers who flock to Iowa throughout the caucuses, had this to say after seeing Trump for the primary time in Indianola, his solely in-person occasion final weekend: “The only other person who can entertain like that is Taylor Swift.”
Interviews with almost two dozen voters and insiders over a number of days right here reveal this identical pondering relating to the inescapable drive of Trump (who didn’t marketing campaign right here as a lot as DeSantis or Haley), in addition to the final sense that DeSantis doesn’t possess no matter nebulous high quality — charisma? earnestness? likability? a simple smile? a way that he’s truly having fun with this? — that makes governors, former vice presidents and actuality TV stars presidential nominees.
“He’s probably not the most charming, charismatic motivator, but I don’t care. Once he gets in the White House, he’ll be more of a dog fighter. I’d rather have somebody like that than somebody who’s fluffy,” mentioned Carrie Fitzpatrick, a 64-year-old residence well being care employee who deliberate to caucus for DeSantis. Fitzpatrick traveled Sunday to the Chrome Horse Saloon in Cedar Rapids, not removed from her residence, to see DeSantis in a cold eating corridor the place folks stayed bundled up beneath a number of layers.
DeSantis, Haley, Trump and biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy all had full marketing campaign schedules over the weekend, regardless of advisories on Iowa’s I-80 warning of harmful journey situations in jap Iowa and jackknifed semis littering the shoulder and median.
Rachael Frigo, a 46-year-old paralegal from Aurora, Illinois, who volunteered as an Iowa precinct captain for Haley’s marketing campaign, used Gen Z slang to explain DeSantis’ lack of swagger at a Haley marketing campaign cease in Davenport. “Ron DeSantis doesn’t have that it factor. He doesn’t have that overall charisma or, as the kids are saying nowadays,” Frigo mentioned, turning to her 12-year-old son, “he doesn’t have the rizz for it. Did I use that right?
“And I was so excited for his Twitter launch,” she went on. “I thought, this is going to be groundbreaking. This is going to be amazing. What the hell?”
Frigo mentioned she’s a former Democrat who volunteered for Barack Obama and voted for Biden (“the poor guy needs to retire,” she mentioned). And although she will’t vote within the caucuses as a result of she’s not a registered Iowa voter, she’s consultant of the phase of GOP voters who appear to have powered her momentum — half of her help in a closing ballot of seemingly caucus-goers got here from independents and Democrats. “I consider myself to be an independent more than anything else,” Frigo advised HuffPost, “but the Democrat party has really just gone too far for me.”
James Mercer, additionally on the Davenport occasion, mentioned he was caucusing for Haley, including that DeSantis simply wasn’t capable of join with Iowa voters.
“I think he’s a great man who has been a good governor in Florida. But he doesn’t seem to be resonating, or the polls don’t seem to reflect that. And I don’t know why. What is the magic for people who have that?” mentioned Mercer, a 76-year-old who works in automotive gross sales. “Obviously, Nikki is an attractive person, she speaks well, she enunciates well, she makes her point clearly.”
Virginia Lors, a retired Iowan who induced for Haley in West Des Moines, mentioned DeSantis was “faltering” within the race’s closing stretch. “Especially in the last debate, he just wasn’t very strong.”
DeSantis on Monday gave the impression to be in what one reporter noticed as the ultimate stage of dropping an election to Trump — attacking him with a candor that many want he had proven at any level previous to the primary votes being forged.
“You could be the lousiest Republican in America, but if you kiss the ring, he likes you,” DeSantis, who shunned mainstream media all through a lot of his marketing campaign, advised an ABC News reporter Monday. “You could be the best Republican in America, if you don’t kiss that ring, then he’ll trash you.”
DeSantis spoke for lower than 5 minutes at a packed ballroom on the Sheraton West Des Moines Hotel on Monday evening, spinning his loss right into a victory and altogether ignoring the declared winner of the caucuses.
“You helped us get a ticket punched out of the Hawkeye State,” he advised supporters. “We have a lot of work to do.”
