Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s (R) tumultuous week is underscoring the mounting challenges his campaign faces in the race against former President Trump.
On Tuesday, the campaign announced it was laying off 38 staffers in an effort to “streamline operations and put Ron DeSantis in the strongest position to win this primary.” The round of layoffs was the second in recent weeks.
The governor faced other awkward headlines as well, including news that his campaign fired a staffer who promoted Nazi imagery on social media. The recent stumbles and shake-ups are seen as further evidence that DeSantis’s campaign is struggling to find its footing a month away from the first GOP primary debate in August.
“He has not given anyone — donors, voters — any confidence that he is going to be the person that is going to be in the end the one who takes on Donald Trump,” said Ford O’Connell, a Florida-based GOP strategist.
O’Connell criticized DeSantis’s campaign as being “too-online” and too Florida-centric, which has led to a potential disconnect with early Republican caucus and primary voters.
“The idea that you are going to run to the right of Trump and be online, that is not going to work,” O’Connell said. “You’re going to have to run a more traditional campaign and you’re going to have to change your message from a Florida-centric message to a how-you’re-going-to-make-people’s-lives-better.”
“You can still take what you did in Florida and what gave you that name and that popularity and work it more into being Iowa-centric, New Hampshire-centric, South Carolina-centric,” he said.
On Tuesday evening, the DeSantis campaign sent out a messaging memo to supporters acknowledging the “reset” and how they “embrace being the underdog.”
“We will press the gas on what works and pump the breaks on what doesn’t,” the memo reads. “We will continue to make constant improvements as we move forward.”
Those improvements include cutting down on event and travel costs and using recent staff cuts to “reinvest” in DeSantis and his message. The campaign noted that the themes of its “Great American Comeback” message will be the economy, border, China and culture.
DeSantis donor Dan Eberhart told The Hill that the reset was “certainly needed.”
“Great moment in the campaign to reshuffle,” Eberhart said. “Dropping some ballast to ensure his house is in order and ready to sail as we head into the fall when it starts to actually matter.”
Next month will mark a crucial moment for the Florida governor and the other candidates as they prepare to face their biggest national audience in the primary so far at the first Republican presidential debate in Milwaukee.
It’s unclear whether Trump will attend the debate, but regardless, DeSantis will be target No. 1 as he holds the second-place spot in the race.
“The first debate, etc., is more about who will be the person to be the consensus alternative than it is about Trump,” O’Connell said.
While DeSantis continues to hold the second-place spot to Trump in the primary, other GOP candidates have started to gain traction. A Fox Business poll of Iowa voters released Sunday shows South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott clocking in at 11-percent support, just 5 points behind DeSantis. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, who was virtually unknown by most GOP primary voters last year, garnered 6 percent in the poll.
“I think his biggest problem right now is not that Trump is running away with the GOP nomination, it’s that the rest of the field appears to be catching DeSantis,” O’Connell said.
The RealClearPolitics polling average of the GOP primary currently has Trump at 53.1 percent, DeSantis at 18 percent and Ramaswamy in third place at 5.9 percent.
Others are throwing cold water on the notion that anyone other than Trump or DeSantis remotely has a chance at securing the nomination.
“It’s still a two-person race,” Eberhart said. “DeSantis needs to make a shift and make a decisive showing in Iowa or it’s going to be a one-man race.”
The governor’s defenders also argue that the campaign’s reset is a case of growing pains, given that DeSantis has only had experience running at the state level.
“I get the sense that what occurred is you have someone who’s used to running very rich, state-level campaigns being confronted with the reality of what it’s like to have to run a very lean national campaign,” said New Hampshire House Majority Leader Jason Osborne (R), who is backing DeSantis. “Going from the state of Florida to the national stage is like the most stark difference in terms of campaign resources.”
“It made perfect sense to me that he all the sudden realizes they’ve got to cut a third of the staff and cut down on the travel expenses and be more efficient with how they arrange their schedule and those kinds of things,” he added.
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Others say that it’s still too early to write off DeSantis, arguing that voters will know more once the first debate gets underway next month.
“I find it comical that we’re so early in the process. We’re not even done with July yet,” said Justin Sayfie, a Florida-based GOP strategist. “It’s extremely early and I think people have judged DeSantis’s campaign way too early.”
The governor’s allies also argue that he has been unfairly covered by the news media, which Sayfie said could be used to his benefit.
“The expectations have been set so low for Gov. DeSantis,” Sayfie said. “To me, the reset is the reset that’s taken place amongst the pundits and mainstream news media and that reset is resetting expectations for DeSantis low, which are now going to make it very easy for him to exceed.”
But critics say DeSantis has already been defined in the campaign, chiefly by Trump, who continues to dominate the crowded field.
“This is the time that the Trump folks want to drive a nail in the DeSantis campaign coffin,” O’Connell said.