Miami (EFE) Republican in 2024.
Eternity Church, a Christian church in Clive, just outside Des Moines, will host DeSantis’ first official campaign event tonight, followed by eleven other events in as many cities in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, all of them early voting states.
The choice of a temple as the place to start his campaign is seen as a “wink” to the Christian evangelicals, of great influence among the Iowa Republicans, a state that on Wednesday afternoon will also receive the favorite in the primary process of Iowa. this party, former President Donald Trump (2017-2021).
First among Republican hopefuls
The former president, according to polls the first among the Republican candidates, will hold an interview that day with radio presenter Simon Conway and on Thursday will attend an event in a suburb of Des Moines to close the day with an electoral gathering (town hall). moderated by conservative Fox News host Sean Hannity.
Attacked for months by Trump, DeSantis is expected to launch criticism of the former president in Iowa as he has been doing since last Wednesday, when he announced his candidacy in a troubled chat with American businessman Elon Musk on Twitter, which began late due to Technical failures.
After dodging the former president’s jokes and attacks, DeSantis has abandoned the silence of recent months and has stepped forward to criticize Trump for his handling of the covid-19 coronavirus pandemic during his tenure, among other aspects. .
The Florida Governor
Allies in 2018, when an unknown DeSantis who was a Republican candidate for governor of Florida obtained the endorsement of the former president, vital support in a victory that he achieved with just a percentage point difference, today they are enemies in a primary process in the that the Florida governor appears as second in the polls, but very relegated.
In a statement collected this Tuesday by the digital media Florida Politcs, the president of the Iowa Democrats, Rita Hart, said that both DeSantis and the governor of that state, the Republican Kim Reynolds, stand out for their “extremism” and said that this These types of positions are not very popular in Iowa, the state where caucuses or caucuses are held instead of the traditional primaries.
In interviews he has given since Wednesday, DeSantis, re-elected in 2022 with a large majority, has focused on highlighting his legislative initiatives in Florida, which he defends as the remedy against the “woke” (progressive) culture.
Trump Vs. DeSantis
In the first 24 hours after making his candidacy official in the Republican primary, the DeSantis campaign office raised a whopping $8.2 million.
With Trump and DeSantis, separated by about 30 percentage points in favor of the former, according to the average of the polls, there are six Republicans so far who have registered for the primaries in which the rival of the Democrat Joe Biden will be chosen in the elections. 2024 elections.
Also competing are former US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley, former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy and African-American Senator Tim Scott.
Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie will register his candidacy in the coming days, according to media outlets.