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After months of speculation, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has officially filed the paperwork to run for president in 2024, setting himself up for a battle with the party’s current frontrunner — Donald Trump.
Trump responded to the news on Wednesday evening by trolling DeSantis on Truth Social with a series of posts, images of the recent polling, and even some opinions of social media users.
“I’d like to personally congratulate ‘Rob’ DeSanctimonious on finally announcing that he will be entering the race for President of the United States. Hopefully, he will get the full experience of being attacked by the Marxists, Communists, and Radical Left Lunatics of our Country, without which he will never know the kind of job he is doing. These Lowlifes & Misfits are far worse than the leaders of hostile foreign countries. They must be soundly defeated in order to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!” Trump posted.
Check it out:
“Ron DeSantis’ decision to announce his 2024 White House bid in a conversation with Elon Musk on Twitter on Wednesday will make a typically blunt statement about his campaign, the unruly populism of the modern Republican Party, and an accelerating conservative media revolution,” CNN’s Stephen Collinson wrote in an analysis Tuesday ahead of DeSantis’ launch.
Fox News added that DeSantis’ announcement coincided with a meeting he had this week in Miami with top financial backers.
Meanwhile, the New York Times reported earlier Wednesday that, in support of DeSantis’s presidential campaign, a prominent political group is gearing up for an extensive voter-outreach initiative.
The ambitious endeavor aims to reach every potential DeSantis supporter in New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina at least four times, with an additional fifth contact in the pivotal Iowa caucuses. To accomplish it, the group is preparing a substantial $100 million investment in their outreach efforts.
“As part of a comprehensive on-the-ground organizing operation, the campaign plans to hire over 2,600 field organizers by Labor Day. This substantial number of personnel is quite extraordinary, even for campaigns with substantial funding, highlighting the significant scale and scope of their organizational efforts,” the Times added.
The outlet noted further:
Top officials with the pro-DeSantis group, a super PAC called Never Back Down, provided their most detailed account yet of their battle plan to aid Mr. DeSantis, whom they believe they can sell as the only candidate to take on — and win — the cultural fights that are definitional for the Republican Party in 2024.
The group said it expected to have an overall budget of at least $200 million, including more than $80 million to be transferred from an old DeSantis state political account, for the daunting task of vaulting the Florida governor past former President Donald J. Trump, who has established himself as the dominant early front-runner.
The group has taken on a multitude of responsibilities typically handled by a campaign, including securing endorsements in early primary states, distributing mailers, organizing activities on college campuses, running television advertisements, raising small campaign donations in an escrow account, and discreetly mobilizing crowds for the governor’s events.
They are actively recruiting staff in 18 states, and there are plans underway to establish diverse pro-DeSantis coalitions, such as those focused on veterans, abortion, gun rights, and agriculture-related concerns, the Times report continued.
“No one has ever contemplated the scale of this organization or operation, let alone done it,” Chris Jankowski, the group’s chief executive, told the outlet. “This has just never even been dreamed up.”
In Iowa, the group has established a training facility on the outskirts of Des Moines, cleverly codenamed “Fort Benning” in homage to the former Army training outpost.
The facility has already seen 189 individuals successfully complete an intensive eight-day training program, forming the initial wave of a larger organizing force. The campaign’s door-to-door canvassing efforts will commence in New Hampshire began on Wednesday, said the Times.
As “DeSantis prepared for his first campaign events as a declared candidate, his allies for the first time detailed the show of force they are mustering to advance their strategy for prying away supporters of Mr. Trump,” said the outlet.
