Trump, DeSantis, and Florida as the New GOP Olympus

Will the Sunshine State ever yield a Republican president?

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Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks at the Orange County Choppers Road House and Museum on March 8, 2023, in Pinellas Park, Florida.(Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

Part of the premise in the Percy Jackson children’s books is that Olympus, home of the Greek gods, materializes wherever the heart of Western civilization resides. What began near Athens moved to Rome and then Constantinople and then, maybe, Aachen, Madrid, Paris, and London before coming to New York.  

We could do the same for America’s political parties and their spiritual homes. We could see Democrats going from Richmond to Atlanta before turning north to New York and west to Chicago, and now San Francisco (if it’s not already Los Angeles). Up next, Las Vegas? 

Republicans, though their party was founded in Wisconsin, started their life centered on the New York of William Seward and Horace Greeley. Then a long stay in Ohio before zooming out to the California coast. After that, and for a few decades, Texas. Now, of course, it’s Florida.

Florida looks like the new Republican Party in many ways. It has lots of culturally conservative white folks (the southerners who live in the northern part of the state), older voters (the oldest median age of any of the 39 largest states), and a fast-growing population of Hispanic residents from the Caribbean and South America, whom Republicans see as a key way to offset the party’s deficiencies with other minority and immigrant groups.

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  1. Avatar photo
    Ben Connelly

    I want a Western conservatism (Goldwater) or a New England conservatism (Coolidge). Individualism, American patriotism, and the free market!

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  2. Guycatelli1

    "Donald Trump won the general in 2016 as a New Yorker, though he lost the state by more than 20 points in both of his [subsequent] campaigns."

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  3. Betsybowditch

    Can a small government, low tax GOP Governor sell the Florida model nationally?

    The Sunshine State benefits from large numbers of retiree transplants who receive and spend their Social Security checks locally. That is not a viable model for the rest of the country.

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  4. Avatar photo
    DougAz

    I'm team Chris Christie. He will be the last person standing vs Donald.

    Although I'll vote Democrat period, I could live philosophically well under a President Christie.

    Who, I predict, will shock conservatives. He would likely pick a moderate left leaning Supreme Court and also other Federal bench appointees.

    He won't ever support any national legislation on abortion either way.

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    Lucas

    Man the absolute whiplash I got seeing Percy Jackson of all things get name dropped in a Christ Stirewalt article. That's middle-school Lucas' "I know more about Greek stuff than you lame Harry Potter readers do" series, other people aren't allowed to read that!

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  6. Dnels

    Florida is GOP version of CA. The lack of competition or challenges to their policy is distorting the politics of the state and making them unelectable to anyone outside their far right bubble. Just as no lefty can believe that Newsome would be unelectable to the other 49 states, team Desantis can't see how going far right is depressing his national numbers against Biden.

    It also remains to be seen how strong the backlash to this wave of far right lunacy will be in the next election. All of his spring policies passed to challenge Trump are very unpopular in FL and there can be a correction in '24. Chris may have to anoint a new GOP Olympus next year.

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    1. Avatar photo
      Mudskipper

      I'm not sure what you mean by "lefty," but many of us Democrats in California are well aware that any Democrat from California is likely to be poison in a large number of states. If I could wave my wand and choose a Democrat to run for President, I'd chose a governor from a midwestern state.

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    2. Very Old Grumpy Guy

      Another example of the cancer caused by a lack of political competition. Be careful when you wish weakness on the other party. Your party is likely to follow them into the abyss. If your party must compete against good ideas, its ideas get better.

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      1. Pbeaupre3141

        Spot on. This is why gerrymandering is so harmful - it encourages radicalization among the party that gerrymandered.

        But gerrymandering has another component: it protects or delays the gerrymandering party from facing competition. And that party can cause a lot of damage when given that much leash.

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        1. Very Old Grumpy Guy

          I THINK most people would agree that competition is the life blood of economic, technological and biological systems. Where they get tripped up is they think that somehow think that the benefits of competition DO NOT extend to political and social systems. Non-competitive systems AT BEST are stagnant, but usually they eventual simply collapse as they are unable to adapt if the environment changes around them. This is one of the weaknesses of the reductive description of "Conservatism" as standing athwart history yelling stop. Time does not stop. Circumstances change. Technology changes. Unless you can somehow stop the passage of time, you cannot stop history.

          Would any business school teach its students that they should stand athwart and yell stop to be successful?

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  7. Dustin M

    "None of that means the 2024 story will necessarily play out in the same catastrophic way for DeSantis and Trump as it did for Bush and Rubio."

    Aw man, I was all geared up for a prediction that the similarities could continue all the way to where an aggressive, brash late-entry from the Northeast unexpectedly steamrolls everyone on his way to the nomination. Chris Christie, the 2024 GOP nominee from the parallel universe

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    1. Very Old Grumpy Guy

      Chris Christie won't win anything, but his truth telling is certainly refreshing!

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  8. Avatar photo
    Azlefty

    Also, what about the rudeness?

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  9. Avatar photo
    O.W.L.

    GOP becomes party of Florida Man.
    The faster all of the old Republicans move to Florida, the better for the rest of the country. Go..have fun..I hear the Villages is nice. They can have Florida, at least until it's all underwater, and the rest of the US will be better off.

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    1. Roni

      Ah, damn. I was hoping they would all move to Idaho or Montana or Wyoming or even the Dakotas.

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  10. Avatar photo
    CJ

    Florida's GOP is a cesspool, so it's a perfect home for today's dumpster fire national GOP.

    I've shared a story in these comments a few times and won't bother writing it up in detail again. Google "2020 ghost candidates Florida". Massive, well-documented criminal electoral fraud that enabled the GOP to maintain control of the state Senate. DeSantis would be no where if he hadn't had a rubber-stamp legislature to boost him.

    Conservatives ignore the wild criminality, hedonism, and greed inherent in the Florida GOP at their own peril. It's why the wife and I left and will never return except to visit family. Ya'll can keep it. I like Colorado's saner politics and mountains much better, and will enjoy watching the far-right choke on its Florida mistake for decades to come.

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    1. J. Everett Schubert

      Agreed. I don't understand the big draw, the obsession with Florida. Maybe it's just because I happen to enjoy four seasons (yes, even winter!), and the thought of living where the landscape in December basically looks just like it does in July, is depressing. The beach is okay, but if you've seen 100 yards of it, you've seen 500 miles of it. The rest of the state is mostly just flat with endless planted pines. And then there's the alligators, snakes, bugs, and every other pestilence known to man. Plus, because even in the inland part, you're never very far from the ocean, it's basically only a matter of time before a hurricane gets you and all you've worked for.

      Nope. Hard pass.

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      1. Avatar photo
        Mudskipper

        Those of us who live out west find it terribly amusing that the highest spot in Florida is 345 feet. I mean, it's hard to wrap our minds around that. Where I come from, that would be considered part of the flat lands and virtual sea level. Heck, I go on short hikes on near daily basis that gain more altitude than that.

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      2. Avatar photo
        CJ

        I didn't mind living there pre-Trump, pre-DeSantis. Yeah summer is hot as hell, but you make good use of beaches and pools and springs. I definitely prefer Colorado's seasons, and it's easier to be outdoor and active when your environment is not just flat scrub. But we left because of politics.

        My elderly parents were getting harassed (and even threatened) by their Trump-supporting neighbors in Ron DeSantis's old district, getting laughed at by elected officials when they tried to get help - they left in 2021 and moved back to Minnesota. My old church tried to expel me because I donated a painting depicting Jesus as a migrant. My state senator wasn't legitimately elected and was openly boasting about having benefited from GOP criminal electoral fraud. DeSantis was rapidly ramping up his "Trump but not Trump" campaign.

        We didn't feel safe, it didn't feel like home anymore, our family was leaving, our friends were leaving, home prices were at the peak (the value of our old home dropped by 10% in the 3 months after we sold, hit right at peak!), the economy was recovered from COVID so there were opportunities everywhere. We left and having had a year to watch it descend further we are glad we did so.

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