Ron DeSantis rises out of GOP’s election night rubble

MAGA once rejected Ron DeSantis. Now, after America’s sweeping rebuke of President Trump, that outsider status could work in his favor. 

Claire HeddlesTimes/Herald Tallahassee Bureau 

Liv CaputoTimes/Herald Tallahassee Bureau 

While Donald Trump’s MAGA movement woke up to ruins from Tuesday’s nationwide wave of support for Democratic candidates, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ political star rose dramatically after RepublicanRead more here. s narrowly evaded the same fate in Florida.

Since the election, the governor — who was on the outs with Trump and key figures in his administration after DeSantis’ bruising 2024 presidential run — has been positioning himself as the conservative oracle of the post-MAGA moment.

After Trump, “I think we’re going to move into an ideas-based future because I don’t think there’s anybody that would be able to take up all the oxygen in the room the way the president can,” DeSantis said on CNN this week. DeSantis himself is known to be wonky, frequently waxing poetic about his conservative policy ideas in ways that didn’t appear to resonate in the 2024 cycle. 

For years, DeSantis has been fending off the MAGA machine, a rebellious Legislature and claims that he, the erstwhile “future of the Republican Party,” Read more here.