Free Republic

President Biden would easily beat former President Donald Trump in a hypothetical 2024 election matchup — but would lose if he faced off against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, according to a recent poll. In a rematch of the 2020 presidential contest, the 80-year-old Biden would prevail over his 76-year-old predecessor by eight percentage points in the popular vote — 49% to 41% — but would fall to the Sunshine State’s Republican governor by 45% to 42% in a head-to-head contest, the WPA Intelligence survey released Jan. 13 found.

TALLAHASSEE — Gov. Ron DeSantis has signaled that he will make a priority of passing a long-debated proposal that would prevent teachers from having union dues deducted from their paychecks. DeSantis supported the proposal Monday during a speech in Orlando, describing it as “paycheck protection legislation.” The Florida Education Association and other teachers unions backed DeSantis’ Democratic challenger, Charlie Crist, in the Nov. 8 election, with Miami-Dade County teachers union leader Karla Hernandez serving as Crist’s running mate. DeSantis also has battled unions in recent years about issues such as reopening schools during the COVID-19 pandemic. During what was described...

The nation's largest annual conference for Millennial and Gen-Z conservatives, AmericaFest, drew tens of thousands of attendees who seem divided on who should win the 2024 nomination—a troubling sign for the former president. As Trump acolytes, like his eldest son Donald Trump Jr. and unsuccessful gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, sang praises for Trump's 2024 campaign, many event speakers avoided endorsing the former president and interviews with attendees revealed that many aren't prepared to commit to another Trump term just yet. The four-day event in Phoenix, Arizona, is a glaring red flag for Trump's campaign. It signals there may not be...

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) leads former President Trump by 14 points in a hypothetical 2024 GOP primary match-up, according to a new poll. The Wall Street Journal survey released on Wednesday found that DeSantis leads Trump among likely Republican voters, 52 percent to 38 percent. DeSantis also has an advantage in his approval rating, with 84 percent of Republicans surveyed having a favorable view of him. By comparison, 71 percent said they have a favorable view of Trump. DeSantis’s name recognition also appears strong, as only about 10 percent of likely GOP primary voters said they did not know...

For months now, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has been aggressively using his executive power to deny transgender medical care for two of society’s most vulnerable groups—children and the poor. In that, he has been far from alone, as Republicans across the country lean into an ugly backlash against the trans community and the science that supports it. Along the way, DeSantis has been employing a power grab some fear will be adopted by other Republican governors—with disastrous results. As part of DeSantis’ ongoing MAGA crusade against progressives, his administration is simultaneously using different state agencies to cut off what is...

The midterm elections have elucidated much. One of the revelations is the real definition of one of the Democrats’ main campaign themes this election cycle; for example, voters must vote Democrat to “save our democracy.” What has been revealed is that the real intention was to save our kleptocracy and that the junior partners of the Uniparty—the GOP establishment—were complicit.Let us explore the premise.Past Wave ElectionsThe first midterm elections of Democrat presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama provide a benchmark for what should logically have transpired in 2022.In 1994, Republicans took control of the U.S. Congress for the first time...

A new Yahoo News/YouGov poll finds that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis now leads former President Donald Trump by 5 percentage points in the race for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination. Trump previously led DeSantis by double-digit margins among registered voters who describe themselves as Republicans or Republican-leaning independents. Meanwhile, DeSantis is ahead by even more — a whopping 11 points — among Americans who say they voted in a 2016 Republican primary or caucus in their state. The poll of 1,635 U.S. adults, which was conducted from Dec. 1 to 5, is one of the first to confirm how far...

After Ron DeSantis’s smashing reelection victory in the Florida governor’s race, political analysts have debated whether he can beat Donald Trump in the 2024 Republican presidential primaries. DeSantis’s hard-edged culture-warrior persona appeals to many core Republicans and could help him secure the nomination. But attaining the presidency itself will depend on winning over Republican moderates and independents, groups increasingly turned off by populist displays. To reach those voters, DeSantis will have to emphasize a very different set of attributes: his wonky competence as an administrator and his ability to rally bipartisan support for his policies. One of DeSantis’s biggest strengths...

In the Sunshine State, the voting is easy and the results are quick.The day after the 2020 general election, Florida governor Ron DeSantis crowed about his state’s performance. While vote-counting in other states was slow going and the results in several key races were still in doubt, Florida’s elections had seemingly gone off without a hitch. Of course, it wasn’t always that way. Two decades earlier, Florida had become the national poster child for mismanaged elections. In the razor-thin race between George W. Bush and Al Gore, images of Florida vote-counters with magnifying glasses eyeing so-called pregnant, dimpled, and hanging...