Is the Trump circus about to push DeSantis into 2028?

The Trump circus has rolled right into the middle of the Republican primary, pounded its tent pegs deeply into the ground, and won’t be moving anywhere until after the 2024 election.

Bad news if you are a Republican challenger to Trump. Most especially for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who arguably has the most to lose on multiple levels. 

Counterintuitively — at least for many Democrats, their supporters in the media and all of the Republican “Never-Trumpers” — the more that local district attorneys and the Biden Justice Department go after Trump, the more a large percentage of the Republican base rallies around him. Is it a majority of the GOP vote? No. But, by and large, those lining up behind the former president — who pleaded not guilty on Tuesday to charges that he violated the Espionage Act and obstructed justice with his handling of classified documents — will be voting in the Republican primaries. 

The most recent CBS News/YouGov poll on the Republican primary shows: Trump 61, DeSantis 23, Pence 4, Scott 4, Haley 3.

Trump leads DeSantis by 38 points. Thirty-eight points.

No matter how the DeSantis camp may try to spin it, that is a devastating number for the Florida governor. Worse news for DeSantis in some respects — because it came right after Trump was indicted — is that Trump just won the straw poll at the Western Conservative Summit last Saturday.

“We need Trump back in. We owe it to him,” attendee Peter Boddie said. “All the stuff he did for us when he was in office, he got more accomplished for conservatives, more for Christians. He followed through on almost every one of his promises except when his party, like Mitch McConnell, or somebody held it up.”

Like it or not, Boddie is echoing the voice of millions of angry voters who believe Trump is the target of a partisan witch hunt. Voters who are becoming more emboldened by the day. 

DeSantis has everything to lose should Trump defeat — or worse, humiliate — him in the Republican primaries. DeSantis is seen by millions of voters in Florida and tens of millions around the country as not only the savior of the Sunshine State, but the person best equipped to save the nation from the far-left policies those same tens of millions see as destroying from within the nation they love. 

That kind of “it” factor and political cachet is almost impossible to buy or duplicate. To his supporters, DeSantis has earned every bit of it by taking on the “Covid dictators,” “woke education,” the Disney machine and most of the mainstream media.

But guess what? It can, and will, all disappear in a nanosecond should the Trump circus roll over DeSantis in the primary.

I spoke this week with a major Republican fundraiser who strongly supports DeSantis but no longer believes it makes sense for the Florida governor to stay in the primary fight. “He has got to get out now,” said the CEO. “Myself and every Republican I know believe DeSantis can win the general election in 2024. But he must get there first. The Trump dynamic is getting more surreal by the day. His supporters are digging in. DeSantis has built up all that good will and admiration. It will evaporate if Trump defeats him. Better for DeSantis to keep his powder dry until 2028. A message I and others are transmitting to his campaign.” 

None of these risks are news to DeSantis. One of the reasons he waited so long to commit to the 2024 race is that he and some of his top advisers knew he was taking a tremendous gamble.

Over the last three years, DeSantis has proven that he does have good instincts and a very wide political radar screen. The worry of the fundraiser I spoke with, as well as several others, is that DeSantis may have allowed himself to get pushed into a race that a voice in the back of his own mind told him to avoid.

He may have gone against his own very good instincts.

Politics — most especially that which takes place on the presidential level — is always a fickle and often a very cruel business. DeSantis has a powerful army of supporters behind him. Unfortunately for him, many are behind him only because of what they believe he can do for them should he succeed in his quest. Should he lose to Trump in the primaries and become nothing more than a lame-duck governor, those people will cast DeSantis aside in a second as they turn their eyes to the next potential savior of the party and country. 

Other than Trump and that surreal, totally unpredictable energy behind him, there is no one in the Republican Party who has the “it” factor of DeSantis. No one. 

If he gets out of the race now, most of that will transfer to 2028. If he does not and loses to Trump, all will most likely be gone.

Douglas MacKinnon, a political and communications consultant, was a writer in the White House for Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, and former special assistant for policy and communications at the Pentagon during the last three years of the Bush administration.