OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis continues to get good news ahead of the November election, while also providing inspiration for other Republican candidates.
A new survey provided exclusively to the Washington Examiner’s “Secrets” column on Tuesday, DeSantis is leading Democratic challenger Rep. Charlie Crist, a former GOP governor himself, by nearly double digits, 50-41 percent.
In addition, DeSantis — “the national leader against corporate America’s ‘woke’ agenda” — leads Crist by 24 points among men and conservatives in the Sunshine State, where conservatives now outnumber liberals by 3-to-1.
Also, DeSantis has a strong lead against Crist among Hispanics in the state and especially Cuban Americans.
“The governor led 50-42 among the 94% of respondents surveyed in English, and 38-29 with the 6% surveyed in Spanish,” said Rick Shaftan, of Neighborhood Research and Media, the firm that conducted the poll.
Crist, meanwhile, understandably leads with voters who identify as Democrats and those who say abortion is the top issue for them heading into the midterms. However, Shaftan said that the survey found only 2 percent of respondents put abortion rights atop their list of concerns.
Conversely, most respondents put the economy and education as their No. 1 issues and DeSantis has a commanding lead over Crist on both.
“DeSantis led 60-27 among voters mentioning inflation or the economy as the number one issue facing Florida,” said Shaftan.
“When asked what they liked most about Ron DeSantis, 14% say he is a strong and unafraid leader who stands his ground, 10% of his favorables said he is ‘for the people.’ Ten percent liked his COVID policies, 10% said he has done a good job as governor, 10% say he is honest or a straight-shooter,” said a memo sent by Shaftan.
Meanwhile, Crist supporters say he gets the nod because he’s not like DeSantis or former President Donald Trump.
“More than a quarter of Crist’s favorables are essentially that he’s the guy running against DeSantis. None of the leading answers reference anything in his past other than generalities about ‘experience,’ ‘honesty’ and a ‘good job.’ It’s all pretty weak,” said the GOP pollster.
He added that DeSantis should also do better in November because more voters do like his style. “While Crist appeals to an angry base that hates DeSantis, he struggles with a weak personal identity contrasting totally with DeSantis’s reputation for strength and dedication to principle — something Crist’s wishy-washy party-switching reputation only reinforces,” said Shaftan.
Crist was a one-term Republican governor but then switched parties to run for the U.S. Senate in a race he lost.
“DeSantis’s aggressive strategy of appealing to his base to gin turnout is the formula for GOP success in 2022, 2024, and beyond,” Shaftan said.
Late last week, the Republican leader got some great news from a noted libertarian-leaning think tank.
According to the CATO Institute, the Sunshine State is No. 1 in both fiscal and economic freedom, and comes in second overall for personal freedom, Breitbart News reported.
“Florida ranks #1 among the states for economic freedom!” DeSantis noted on Facebook following the release of CATO’s assessment.
According to the group’s assessment, Florida’s lack of an individual income tax was top on CATO’s list in measuring the state’s economic freedom.
“Florida’s state-level tax collections are more than 1.5 standard deviations below the national average, whereas its local tax collections are a little lower than average. Florida’s fiscal decentralization does not offer a great deal of choice to homeowners, however, because the state has only about half an effective competing jurisdiction per 100 square miles,” CATO said.
“Government consumption and debt are lower than average. Government employment is much below average, falling from 11.2 percent of private employment in 2010 to 8.3 percent in 2019,” the group’s assessment continued.
CATO noted further that Florida also tops in fiscal policy, and second in the ranking for overall personal freedom, the latter of which involves several measurements — gun rights, labor, health insurance, and education. The Sunshine State’s personal freedom measurement has increased significantly under GOP leadership, jumping from 37 in 2013 to 12 now, Breitbart reported, citing the CATO analysis.
