4 things to watch after DeSantis gets his ‘ticket punched out of Iowa’

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis notched a second-place finish in the Iowa caucuses on Monday night, coming in far behind former President Donald Trump but achieving a much-needed, yet narrow, victory over former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley in the first vote of the 2024 primary season.

“We got our ticket punched out of Iowa,” he said, celebrating the results at a gathering of supporters in West Des Moines.

For months, the governor and his allies had telegraphed that at least a silver medal in Iowa would set him up to be the clear alternative to Trump. Ahead of Monday’s vote, DeSantis’ allies argued that to stay on track he simply needed to outperform the polls, which on average showed him with just under 16% support. (With more than 95% of the vote counted, the governor’s support topped 21%.)

But Monday night’s vote also served as a reminder of Trump’s lasting influence over GOP voters. The former president finished first in the caucuses, with the Associated Press calling the race for him just 30 minutes after voting began. He held just over 50% of the vote after midnight.

DeSantis’ campaign is now confronting an uncertain future. Here’s what lies ahead:

A tough climb in New Hampshire

His prospects in the coming nominating contests are less certain than they were in Iowa, the state where he spent most of his time campaigning over the past eight months.

On Tuesday, he’s set to make a stop in Greenville, S.C. – an unusual move given that the South Carolina primary is still more than a month away – followed by a planned swing through New Hampshire, which holds its presidential primary next week.

The contest in New Hampshire doesn’t look promising for DeSantis. His strategy of going all-in on the Iowa caucuses often came at the expense of building a deeper base of support in the Granite State, a reality that bears out in public polling. Recent surveys out of New Hampshire showed DeSantis running behind both Trump and Haley by double-digit margins.

South Carolina, which holds its primary on Feb. 24, could also pose a challenge for DeSantis; not only is it Haley’s home state, but she served as its governor for six years. In Nevada, a rule change in how the state GOP awards its delegates has widely been seen as a benefit to Trump.

Given the daunting road forward, some Republicans are unsure just how long DeSantis can justifiably continue on in the race.

“You need to put up a win,” said Kevin Madden, a Republican strategist who served as a senior aide to Mitt Romney during his 2012 presidential run. “Campaigns thrive on momentum. And if you don’t have that, you start to develop a negative feedback loop with donors, volunteers, the media.”

An uncertain financial future

There are still lingering questions about the longevity of DeSantis’ presidential bid, notably how much cash remains in his campaign coffers and whether money will continue to flow in fast enough to power a fast-paced, multi-state political operation.

After the last fundraising period ended in September, DeSantis’ campaign had only about $5 million left on hand that could be spent in the primary. Many of the large donors who fueled his early financial windfalls have already given the maximum amount allowed under federal limits, meaning they can’t donate any more to his campaign.

Asked in Iowa last week about whether he has the money to remain on the campaign trail, DeSantis said he would “be fine.” At a Bloomberg News roundtable discussion in Des Moines on Monday, Roy Bailey, a co-chair of DeSantis’ national finance advisory committee, said that the governor’s operation had enough money in the bank to continue into Super Tuesday.

“We have plenty of fuel in the tank to get the job done to get into Super Tuesday,” Bailey said.

DeSantis’ campaign won’t have to file another finance report until Jan. 31.

Still talking ‘long-haul’

At the same time, Jessica Szymanski, a spokesperson for Never Back Down, the main super PACs supporting DeSantis’ presidential bid, said that the group is “fully prepared and ready to help turn out votes for Gov. DeSantis in New Hampshire, South Carolina, and beyond.”

DeSantis and his allies insist that he’s not going anywhere.

Florida state Rep. Chip LaMarca of Broward County — one of a few dozen Republicans from DeSantis’ homestate who traveled to Iowa to help the governor campaign ahead of the caucuses — said that he expects DeSantis to stay in the race for at least another month. DeSantis himself said that his campaign is prepared for a prolonged fight for delegates.

“We’re in this for the long haul. We understand that you got to win a majority of the delegates,” he said during a Sunday appearance on CNN. “We understand that there’s a long process here, but we’re going to do well, because we’ve done it right.”

Former Florida state House Speaker Jose Oliva, who traveled to Iowa to speak at a caucus precinct on the governor’s behalf on Monday, said that DeSantis is intent on staying in the race until at least Super Tuesday, when 16 states will hold their primaries.

“If there’s anything politics has taught us it’s that anything can happen,” Oliva said. “His view of it is he’s going to go to New Hampshire, he’s going to South Carolina and he’s going to Super Tuesday. He believes his message is a strong message and he believes he can get it to resonate.”

It would be helpful, Oliva added, if the Republican “field would narrow.”

Elephant in the Room

There’s still the Trump factor. The former president leads both DeSantis and Haley in virtually every national and state-level poll, and has leveraged his various legal entanglements — including criminal charges related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election — to re-energize his voter base.

Oliva acknowledged that voters he spoke to who liked DeSantis weren’t willing to abandon Trump. Still, he argued, there may be a silver lining.

“So long as Trump is right in or around 50%, that means that half the electorate is still looking for an alternative,” Oliva said. “And so as long as that remains, the possibility is there.”