Chris Crucial: Why I am very skeptical of Ron DeSantis 2028 👀

PLUS: Lauren Boebert's future!

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1. Ron’s running (again): Marc Caputo is one of the best chroniclers of Florida politics in the business these days. (He’s at The Bulwark now.) So, when he writes something, about Florida, I pay a LOT of attention.

On Wednesday afternoon, Marc hit “send” on a piece headlined: “The DeSantis 2028 Shadow Campaign.”

Here’s the key bit (although you should absolutely sign up for Marc’s newsletter to get all of it):

Ron DeSantis is back to running Florida’s government. But he hasn’t really stopped running for president.

Next month, DeSantis hosts a two-day presidential-donor gathering at the Hard Rock Hotel in South Florida that’s billed as—don’t call it a “fundraiser”—an “Investor Appreciation Retreat.” It’s the latest phase of an image makeover DeSantis started after he officially dropped out of the 2024 race on January 21 and endorsed Donald Trump.

DeSantis, to hear Caputo tell it, is in the midst of a “image makeover” designed to make him a much more appealing candidate in 2028 than he was in 2024.

On one level, I get it. DeSantis is only 45 years old. He will be the governor of Florida until 2026 — at which point he could immediately turn his attention to another presidential race. And, aside from Donald Trump, he is one of the best known Republican politicians in the country

But, on ALL other levels, I think this is a TERRIBLE idea. For two main reasons.

First, what we learned in the 2024 campaign is that DeSantis is simply not comfortable in his own skin. From his forced smiles during debates to his “laugh” to his interactions with normals in diners and the like, he came across as a poorly-programmed political robot.

That’s not the sort of thing you “fix.” Like, the guy is in his 40s. He’s pretty much who he is. There’s no amount of re-positioning or re-formatting or re-anything that you can do to make someone who is wooden and lifeless as a candidate into a great campaigner.

Could DeSantis get better at [waves arms around] all of this? I suppose. But he’s not suddenly going to from what he was during the 2024 campaign into a smooth and charismatic candidate. Not possible.

Second, there’s the whole “Trump hates him” thing. As Marc writes:

He’s eyeing another shot at the presidency while also trying to coexist with his fellow Florida man, Trump, who once praised DeSantis as one of his “warriors” but now seems unable to forgive DeSantis for challenging him. Even Trump’s online MAGA base is routinely at war with the pro-DeSantis Ron Hive on social media.

Gaming out how Trump feels in a few years is, admittedly, a tough thing to do. He tends to like people who like him or do something for him. And DeSantis, I suppose, could become one of those people.

But, I get the sense that Trump’s dislike of DeSantis goes deeper than just that of a political rival. Trump views DeSantis as disloyal — someone who rode his coattails into office and then turned on him. I don’t know if Trump gets over that.

And, if he doesn’t, I don’t see a path for DeSantis. Trump commands the party base. And I believe he will continue to do so even if he loses in November. (He absolutely will if he wins a 2nd term this fall.) Being on the wrong side of Trump means being on the wrong side of the party base. And no candidate can win a presidential nomination if that’s the case.

2. Boebert is a no-go (for now): Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert announced Wednesday that she would not resign her 3rd district seat in order to run in the 4th district special election. That seat is being vacated next week by fellow Republican Rep. Ken Buck.

“I think this is a play by the uniparty, and I’m not resigning and giving up on my constituents in the third,“ Boebert told CNN”s Manu Raju. ”And I will win the primary.”

While I am generally skeptical of Boebert’s conspiracy theories, I actually think she might have a point here. Aside from just being sick of Congress and wanting out, what Buck’s resignation does is force a special election for his seat — on June 25 — and produce an incumbent who will presumably run for a full term. Which might make it harder for Boebert to win the seat.

Buck has been a vocal critic of his party’s performative caucus — of which Boebert is a very prominent member.

“We’ve taken impeachment and we’ve made it a social media issue as opposed to a constitutional concept,” Buck told reporters. “This place just keeps going downhill, and I don’t need to spend my time here.”

Buck was one of just three House Republicans to oppose the impeachment of Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. Boebert, who voted for the impeachment, calling Mayorkas a “liar” and a “rogue bureaucrat.”

Boebert announced for Buck’s 4th district seat late last year when the incumbent said he would not seek another term. In doing so, she abandoned the western Colorado 3rd district. She did so for entirely political reasons. In 2022, Boebert narrowly beat little-known Democratic challenger Adam Frisch by just 546 votes. Frisch is running again in the 3rd.

While Donald Trump won Boebert’s 3rd district by 6 points in 2020, he won Buck’s eastern Colorado seat far more handily — 57% to 41%. That result likely means that whoever wins the GOP primary (also set for June 25) will almost certainly be the next member of Congress from the district.

3. A walk in the woods: My boys are on spring break right now. This afternoon, I stepped away from the computer (and the Internet) and went for a hike with my family in a nearby state park. I highly recommend it. I snapped this pic from our journey.

NOTABLE QUOTABLE

“This is not an attempt to ban TikTok. It’s an attempt to make TikTok better. Tic-Tac-Toe. A winner. A winner.” — Nancy Pelosi, awkwardly

ONE GOOD CHART

Young people think of their sexuality in a radically different way than their parents and their grandparents. Check out this chart from Gallup:

SONG OF THE DAY

I remember when I first heard the music of Mark Kozelek aka Sun Kil Moon. It was 2014 — when he released “Benji,” which is still my favorite of his albums. Kozelek straddles the divide between music and spoken word — in a devastatingly beautiful way. His new song is called “Birthday Girl.”