A new survey conducted by Blueprint Polling found Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis over 12 percentage points ahead of Trump when Florida Republicans were asked who they’d select or lean towards in the 2024 GOP presidential primary. The only options were apparently Trump, DeSantis, or selecting unsure.
Blueprint Polling indicated that combining those who supported DeSantis with those who lean towards him left the governor with the support of over half of overall respondents, at 50.9 percent. Over half those who indicated unsure when initially asked stuck by their uncertainty when questioned again, although slightly more of the initially unsure voters went with Trump than DeSantis when they were asked who they’d select if they had to pick a contender between the two today. When excluding those who evidently just lean towards DeSantis, the Florida governor still led Trump by a substantial margin, with 47.6 percent of the support, compared to just 33.2 percent for Trump. It was 19.2 percent of the overall total that initially told pollsters they were unsure.
Blueprint Polling also asked respondents for perspectives on what Florida GOP’ers believe on key election issues. Asking the question in that way might help get respondents to open up to a greater-than-ordinary extent since they wouldn’t feel a sense of automatic personal responsibility for the answer, although an individual’s answer about what they think Florida GOP’ers in general think would no doubt often reveal something about their personal stances as well. One of the poll questions began as such: “In other states election officials who said publicly that there was no election fraud in 2020 have reported threats and harassment against themselves and family members by supporters of former President Trump.” From there, it asked folks to pick from a list of statements the one they felt best described Florida Republicans’ position — and about 36 percent picked: “Those election officials chose this work and should expect this kind of reaction when people feel strongly about an issue.”
Blueprint Polling appears to explicitly go with the idea that someone claiming a belief on the part of Florida Republicans in general means they’re in support of it as well — “More than a third of Florida Republicans condone intimidation of election workers,” the group says. Meanwhile, other recent political news suggests rising levels of support for DeSantis to the point of threatening Trump’s standing, although it’s a boost from Trump that helped DeSantis prevail in the GOP gubernatorial primary ahead of the governor’s 2018 general election victory. DeSantis raised more in the first six months of this year than a key joint fundraising committee associated with the former president, and a New Hampshire poll also put DeSantis ahead of Trump in a possible 2024 GOP primary match-up.
Trump keeps sticking to his angry rhetoric about the election, but even among Republicans, just 3 percent called election integrity the main issue facing the U.S. in a recent survey. They’re not massively onboard with Trump’s lies about what happened. DeSantis and Trump haven’t, at this point, formally confirmed they’ll be running for president in 2024, but Trump seems all-but-certain to do so, and DeSantis is widely seen as a potential contender. If Trump for some reason sat out the race, it seems safe to assume DeSantis would basically be the shoe-in.
