Is Ron DeSantis losing his grip on the Florida GOP? ‘People are frustrated’

Florida’s congressional delegation is endorsing his rival en masse, state lawmakers are quietly grumbling about his policy agenda, and even Miami’s normally reticent mayor went on TV to criticize his personality.

It’s enough to start wondering: Is Ron DeSantis’ grip on the Florida GOP beginning to loosen?

A politically taxing month for the Republican governor began hitting closer to home this week, just a half-year after the governor won a landslide reelection victory that appeared to make him the most powerful and influential leader in a state that Donald Trump also calls home. The resulting fallout has raised doubts about the potential presidential candidate’s strength in his own backyard, even as he tours the country touting the “Florida Blueprint.”

Ahead of his likely entrance to the 2024 presidential race, it’s been an unexpected and unwelcome development for DeSantis — one that has apparently instilled confidence in some in-state rivals who only a short time ago were loath to publicly cross the governor.

“Well, he seems to struggle with relationships, generally,” Miami Mayor Francis Suarez told Fox News in an interview Thursday. “I look people in the eye when I shake their hands.”

Suarez, who is considering his own longshot bid for the presidency, has had a publicly rocky relationship with the governor since voting for his Democratic opponent in 2018 but has previously been reluctant to criticize DeSantis, much less attack his personality.

The interview came out a day after TIME reported that two more members of Florida’s GOP congressional delegation, Reps. Gus Bilirakis and Carlos Gimenez, would endorse Trump.

Earlier this week, DeSantis made a rare visit to Washington, meeting with as many as two-dozen lawmakers. But the move has come too late for some congressmen, including Reps. Greg Steube and John Rutherford of Florida, who both endorsed the former president.

Only one member of the state delegation, Rep. Laurel Lee, a former member of DeSantis’ administration, has backed the governor.

Some Republican strategists said the endorsements of Trump would go only so far, however.

“Clearly, Trump’s pride is wounded so he’s making these calls and trying to strong-arm people,” said Stephen Lawson, who worked for DeSantis’ 2018 campaign. “I think it’s a lot of theatrics. If we’re talking about him six months from now, does this matter in Des Moines? I think the answer is probably no. So I think it’s important to take a step back and take a look at the big picture.”

But DeSantis, who on Thursday announced that he is about to embark on an international trade mission to Japan, South Korea, Israel and the United Kingdom, has faced at least minor setbacks in his home state while politicking elsewhere, including the nation’s capital.

On Thursday, Steven Cheung, a spokesman for the Trump campaign, said DeSantis has “abandoned Florida during a gas crisis in order to campaign in Washington, D.C.,” referring to an ongoing shortage of gasoline caused by sudden and severe flash-flooding last week in Fort Lauderdale.

Representatives for DeSantis did not respond to a request for comment for this article. A spokesman for the governor has previously accused his critics of playing politics with the response to the storm.

RELATED: ‘What are you waiting for?’: DeSantis’ 2024 supporters worry he’s launching too late

Tallahassee Agenda

Meanwhile, in Tallahassee, House Speaker Paul Renner acknowledged Wednesday that some Republican legislators are quietly complaining that the DeSantis agenda has consumed the session with tense and contentious debate at the expense of their priorities.

“People are frustrated because we have a ton of bills that the governor has put forward and House leadership has put forward,’’ Renner, a Palm Bay Republican, told reporters. “…There’s kind of a choke point but now that we are getting into the last weeks, we will have dozens and dozens of bills that members have.”

Not all of DeSantis’ top priorities are still alive. A proposal to strip in-state tuition rates for undocumented college students who went to a Florida high school has yet to be introduced by lawmakers and another bill to lower standards for defamation lawsuits and set up a court challenge to the landmark 1964 Supreme Court ruling in New York Times v. Sullivan appears to have been stalled.

Few legislators have also come forward to endorse DeSantis. Renner and Senate President Kathleen Passidomo said on Wednesday they will wait until session ends and DeSantis announces before making a decision but both also said he hasn’t asked for it.

“We never talked about it,’’ Passidomo told reporters. “...I’m not going to say anything until after session. I like the guy. He’s a good guy.”

The recent developments are in contrast to the firm control that DeSantis has exerted over GOP politics in the state since the early months of the pandemic, when he emerged as a conservative darling.

The governor, of course, has still managed an extraordinarily successful legislative session. With the help of a supermajority in both chambers of the Florida Legislature, the governor has enjoyed unparalleled success in getting his agenda through with several major bills already signed into law.

Lawmakers passed one of the most ambitious expansions of school vouchers in the nation, allowing all Florida K-12 students to use taxpayer money to attend private schools. They have banned most abortions after six weeks and changed state law to no longer require a unanimous jury verdict to impose the death penalty.

They passed legislation limiting liability for insurance companies and other businesses accused of injuring people or other business and on Wednesday passed a bill to retroactively exempt from public records all his travel records, with no provision to notify taxpayers for how much is spent on security and travel as he travels the country in an expected campaign for president.

Legislators are pursuing legislation to expand his ban on COVID-19 mask and vaccine mandates, adopt additional restrictions on immigration and, when the governor ran into trouble in his effort to retaliate against Disney for voicing opposition to his ban on gender identity discussions in Florida schools, they swiftly responded by passing legislation that attempts to void the actions of the Disney-backed board that governs the company’s special taxing district.

And Wednesday, the Legislature sent to the governor’s desk a bill that would prevent banks from using environment, social and governance standards in making investment decisions, policies DeSantis calls “woke.”

Financial friends of DeSantis

The governor’s fundraising also indicates that, even were his firm grip on the state’s politics waning a little, his stature is growing beyond Florida.

A Florida political committee established to support DeSantis continues to raise millions of dollars. But as DeSantis criss-crosses the country ahead of a potential presidential bid the majority of the group’s funding is now coming from outside Florida for the first time.

Filings with the state show that nearly two-thirds of the almost $14 million raised so far this year by Friends of Ron DeSantis have come from out-of-state donors. Last year, when the group raised nearly $100 million, more than half of the cash came from Florida donors.

Donations from the presidential battleground state of Pennsylvania accounted for one-quarter of all 2023 funds raised by the group through the end of March, while Texas and Georgia each accounted for more than 10% of the cash haul so far this year.

More than 80% of the funds raised by the group this year have come from big donors who have given more than $1 million.

DeSantis has headlined political events this year in early presidential primary states, such as Iowa and New Hampshire, and wooed donors in Texas, Pennsylvania, Georgia and elsewhere.

James Whitley, co-founder of the Georgia real estate development firm Landmark Properties, cut the DeSantis group a $1.5 million check in March and said his giving was motivated by concern about the future of the country.

“In a world increasingly riddled with chaos, the strong, steady hand of American leadership has never been more essential,” he said. “Gov. DeSantis has the intellectual acumen, leadership ability and fortitude to steer us back in the right direction.”