Ron DeSantis lost a pingpong match in Utah, and maybe the state along with it

In early October, a group of top Republican donors and strategists gathered at Park City’s glitzy Stein Eriksen Lodge. They came to network, enjoy the scenery and beef up on topics ranging from artificial intelligence to foreign policy. Aside from one evening session — featuring Sen. Mitt Romney and his former running-mate, Paul Ryan — the E2 Summit was closed to press and invite-only.

According to several attendees, there was a sense of urgency at the summit, underlying another key reason for the gathering: To find a Republican candidate who can beat Donald Trump.

By the summit’s conclusion, many of the attendees thought they’d found the person. Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and United Nations ambassador, wowed attendees with her foreign policy knowledge and her no-nonsense demeanor. A number of big-money donors vowed to support her campaign on the spot.

“Haley said, ‘We’ve got to get in the game,’” Spencer Zwick, one of the summit’s organizers, said. “And I thought, she’s right.” Within weeks, Zwick volunteered to join her finance team.

This month, Haley may be returning to Utah for a campaign rally, according to members of her local leadership team. This time, she faces a smaller field — the race for the GOP nomination has narrowed to her and Trump.

If a never-Trump candidate were to have success in any red state, it would be here. Trump fared worse in Utah than in other red states in both 2016 and 2020, and his support among Utah Republicans cratered during the early years of the Biden administration. By most measures, Haley seems to be an attractive candidate for Utah Republicans: she preaches fiscal responsibility, she’s moderate and she has staked out a sharp position against Trump.

But now, a month before Utahn Republicans will vote on Super Tuesday, new polls show Trump near 50% in Utah, far ahead of Haley or any other challenger. By last fall, the early momentum surrounding Ron DeSantis’ campaign in Utah dissipated, and no other non-Trump candidate has replicated it. And the state party’s move to hold a caucus in lieu of a primary — calculated to push civic engagement and get candidates to visit Utah — may only make the path steeper for non-Trump candidates.

All signs point to an uphill battle for Haley in Utah. If Haley can’t win in the Beehive State, can she win anywhere?

How DeSantis rose, collapsed in Utah

The never-Trump fervor in Utah reached a boiling point in late 2022, long before the apparent heir had entered the race.

In November 2022, Gov. Ron DeSantis cruised to reelection in Florida, stirring excitement about his potential presidential ambitions. A group of Utah Republicans, spearheaded by state Sen. Todd Weiler, R-Woods Cross, called on DeSantis to enter the presidential race. “One of Trump’s messages was there would be so much winning that people would get tired of winning,” Weiler said at the time. “Quite frankly, I’m tired of losing.”

Utah Republicans rejecting Trump was not a new phenomenon. In early 2016, a host of prominent Utahns spoke out against Trump. Gov. Gary Herbert expressed opposition to Trump’s proposed “Muslim ban.” Mitt Romney called Trump a “phony” and “a fraud” in a speech at the University of Utah. At the state’s caucuses on Super Tuesday, Utah Republicans overwhelmingly rejected Trump, choosing Sen. Ted Cruz with nearly 70% of the vote. Trump netted only 14%, finishing behind Ohio Gov. John Kasich for third place.

After Trump won the Republican nomination, several prominent Utahns, Herbert among them, came around and endorsed Trump. But the leaked “Access Hollywood” tape — in which Trump bragged about sexually assaulting women — led to public disavowals from Herbert, Sen. Mike Lee, Rep. Jason Chaffetz and others. In November, Trump won Utah, though he fared worse in the general election than any Republican since 1992.

Come 2020, even after Herbert, Lee, Chaffetz and others had endorsed him, Trump netted less than 60% of Utah’s vote, and President Joe Biden outperformed any Democrat presidential candidate in the state since 1964.

By late 2022, a host of prominent Utah Republicans were ready to move on. DeSantis hosted a pair of fundraisers in Salt Lake City and Park City in July 2022, raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for his reelection efforts in Florida. In November, shortly after he won reelection, Weiler, alongside state Sens. Dan McCay, R-Riverton, and Mike McKell, R-Spanish Fork, issued a statement calling for a “leader who will strengthen and unify the nation.” Eighty-three other elected officials, including eight state senators and 28 state representatives, signed on to their letter, calling on DeSantis to enter the presidential race.

But by the time DeSantis visited Utah the following July, much of the excitement surrounding his campaign had dissipated. Of the 80-plus elected officials that called on him to enter the race, fewer than 20 endorsed him.

“He tried to be Trump without the scandals,” said Kirk Jowers, former director of the Hinckley Institute of Politics and an adviser or counsel to five previous presidential campaigns. “But people decided that if it’s just Trump 2.0, we’ll keep the original.”

Only three months earlier, DeSantis had visited Utah to speak at the state’s GOP convention, where he declared that Florida is the “Utah of the South” and was given a standing ovation. Then-Republican Party chairman Carson Jorgensen was adamant that DeSantis was selected not as a pseudo-endorsement, but because he was “the biggest name we could get who hadn’t yet declared for president.”

“Plus, he said he’d do it for free,” Jorgensen said. “And I said, ‘that’s the best governor in the country.’”

Within a month, DeSantis announced his candidacy for presidency. Around that time, a majority of Utah’s GOP county chairs told the Deseret News they’d like to see DeSantis over Trump. But by the time DeSantis returned to Utah in July, appearing at the state capitol and hosting fundraisers, his campaign was sinking: DeSantis was sagging in the polls, hemorrhaging campaign cash and laying off staff.

DeSantis’ Utah visit served as something of a campaign “reset,” pulling together big-money donors and strategists from across the country for a retreat at the Eriksen Lodge in Park City and a fundraiser at doTERRA founder Gregory Cook’s home. He tried to sell donors on his candidacy, briefing them on why each of the other Republicans in the field could not win, according to one fundraiser attendee. “Nikki Haley would have been formidable in 2004,” the attendee recalls DeSantis saying. “But this isn’t the same party that she’s trying to appeal to.”

The visit earned DeSantis some Utah support. But it turned off others. Some big-money donors were perturbed that DeSantis planned his visit during the July 24th weekend, when many Utahns are busy celebrating Pioneer Day or traveling. Others, when given the chance to interact with DeSantis, were turned off by DeSantis’ “cold” demeanor. Don Peay, the founder of Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife, knew DeSantis was a former collegiate baseball player, and he secured a signed ball by ex-New York Yankees pitcher David Wells to present to DeSantis as a gift. When Peay offered it to DeSantis, he was met by a blank stare.

“He didn’t even say thank you,” Peay said. “Presidential politics is all about connecting with people. I knew then he couldn’t be president.”

The sentiment amplified previous concerns from DeSantis’ visit a year earlier. When he stopped by billionaire Scott Keller’s condo in downtown Salt Lake City in July 2022, Keller — as is his custom when hosting politicians or celebrities — challenged him to a game of pingpong. DeSantis’ aides and bodyguards said that the governor did not have time and would not play. Keller insisted, and DeSantis finally relented.

“He wasn’t all that happy to play,” Keller said, “especially after I beat him.”

DeSantis’ perceived arrogance perturbed Keller, who later became a top donor to Mike Pence.

Others point to strategic errors for DeSantis’ failure in Utah. One individual close to the DeSantis campaign said that when given the chance to meet with local leaders in July, top DeSantis officials were not interested in “woke Republicans” like Romney and Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, because that could impact DeSantis’ ability to win over more “hardcore Republicans.” During his July visit, DeSantis did not meet with any of Utah’s congressional delegation.

By fall, DeSantis made the strategic decision to effectively run a one-state campaign, pouring his resources and attention into Iowa. “When it became clear he wasn’t going to win Iowa, after putting everything on the line there, that was the final dagger,” said Jowers.

Some of DeSantis’ Utah supporters see their investment as a long-term play. “I have always taken the long view on Gov. DeSantis as I believe he will be a leading presidential candidate in 2028 regardless of the 2024 outcome,” said Cook, a top DeSantis Utah donor, shortly before the Iowa caucuses.

Can Haley win Utah?

Of the three state senators that spearheaded the “Draft DeSantis” letter, only one — Weiler — endorsed DeSantis during the Florida governor’s visit last July. After DeSantis dropped out of the race, the Trump campaign contacted Weiler asking for his endorsement. Weiler said he is still undecided.

But another of the organizers, McKell, is now spearheading Haley’s campaign in Utah. After encouraging DeSantis to run in late 2022, he didn’t attend DeSantis’ July 2023 event at the Utah Capitol. “It’s not clear to me why (DeSantis) lost his luster,” McKell said. “Ultimately, to me, I think (Haley) is the strongest opponent to President Biden.”

Haley is attempting to pick up where DeSantis left off: amassing the anti-Trump conservatives statewide and pushing for a post-Trump GOP. But Haley does not have the luxury of time DeSantis had; Super Tuesday is only a month away, and she trails Trump in every red state with available polling.

Instead of hosting a primary election with options for in-person balloting or vote-by-mail, the Utah Republican Party is hosting a caucus, where voters will need to attend in person and participate in a “presidential preference poll.” Those unable to attend their precinct location may preregister online and either turn in their ballot early or send it with another voter on caucus night, says GOP Chair Rob Axson.

But Axson acknowledges that the caucus system, combined with the lack of a crowded, competitive candidate field, could lead to a decline in turnout. “We’d love to have any Republican come out, show up and be heard,” Axson said. “Our state is better off when everyone participates.” Axson says 150,000 participants is “a goal we could get to”; in 2016, when Utah hosted a caucus, over 175,000 participated. In 2008, the last time Utah held a presidential primary, over 290,000 voted.

When compared to primary elections, moderate voters are much less likely to participate in a caucus than in a primary election, researchers from BYU found in a 2013 study. That often results in more extreme candidates having success in caucuses. In nearby Nevada, the state GOP is hosting a party-run caucus, where Trump will run unopposed, and they are penalizing other candidates (like Haley) who participate in the state-run primary. Critics have accused the state party of trying to rig the election for Trump.

Members of Haley’s leadership team have mixed views as to whether the caucus format will make it more difficult for Haley to surpass Trump. McKell said Haley’s chances “are just as good” in a caucus as in a primary; Sen. Evan Vickers said that “if the turnout is lower, it could hurt her.”

“I’m not going to comment on behalf of the leadership team as to whether we like the caucus,” said Ally Isom. “But I personally feel strongly we should be doing everything we can to encourage access and voter turnout.”

That hasn’t stopped Haley’s Utah surrogates from campaigning for her to win the caucus here. McKell and other members of her Utah leadership team have pushed what they call the “10-10-5-1” initiative: tell 10 friends why you support Haley, donate $10, share five pro-Haley social media posts and order one lawn sign. They’ve hosted two digital meetings to recruit volunteers across the state, and the list of endorsers statewide has surpassed 100.

“I think it’s time for a new generation of leadership in this nation,” said Isom. “I sure like her leadership temperament. She’s solid. She’d deferential without reporting to political attacks. I think Utahns would want that, too.”