DES MOINES, Iowa — Ahead of the Iowa caucuses, Ron DeSantis’ campaign and allies are pushing back against predictions that the Florida governor will get crushed Monday night.
They insist the polls are wrong and argue the media has prematurely written DeSantis’ political obituary. The Florida governor himself brushed off questions about money and fundraising issues.
But with just days before Iowans hold the caucus, some DeSantis supporters concede it’ll be incredibly difficult to stage a startling upset and outright win Iowa.
Hal Lambert, who serves on DeSantis’ national finance committee and is bullish about the governor’s overall chances, said “a close second would be a successful outcome” and suggested anything less than that would be grim.
“I’ll be frank: I would say third place is not good,” he said.
One DeSantis fundraiser, who was granted anonymity to relay private conversations, said they didn’t see how DeSantis could “pull it together.”
“It went wrong early and they’ve corrected a lot late … By the time he had his footing, [Donald Trump] had his foot on his throat,” the donor said.
A poor showing in the Hawkeye State is widely viewed as a mortal wound for DeSantis’ campaign, though the governor said he would stay in the race no matter what happened Monday and will be traveling to South Carolina after Iowa. He invested more resources and time in the state than New Hampshire or South Carolina, including visiting all 99 counties, yet the respected final Des Moines Register/NBC News/Mediacom poll shows him 32 points behind Trump and trailing former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley by four points.
Never Back Down, the political action committee backing his candidacy, said it recruited more than 1,600 precinct captains in Iowa and created an aggressive ground game over the course of nine months that’ll be especially crucial as temperatures dip dangerously low. DeSantis received coveted endorsements from Iowa's popular Gov. Kim Reynolds and evangelical leader Bob Vander Plaats, and he has a slight edge on Trump when it comes to voter intensity, according to the Des Moines Register poll.
“Gov. DeSantis over the past month has been exceptional on everything he has been doing: the debate stage, the town halls, working Iowa, working New Hampshire,” Lambert said. “I don’t have any complaints about any of what he has done. Now we are going to see if it worked.”
There was a time when DeSantis’ prospects would not have appeared so dim in Iowa. He entered last year with high expectations after coming off a historic, nearly 20-point reelection victory in Florida. Some polls even showed him besting Trump in a hypothetical matchup. But when he officially entered the Republican presidential primary, he faced a string of negative headlines, from a glitchy social media launch to news about layoffs and poor financial planning.
Through the summer and into fall, DeSantis struggled to gain traction. His standing in most polls has gone down while top rival Trump has dominated, showing a nearly 35-point lead in Iowa as of Friday. Haley is capitalizing on her momentum and attracted big name donors, including the Koch family and some who routinely contribute to Democrats, including LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman.
Making matters more difficult is that Trump’s indictments increased his favorability among GOP voters and the PAC supporting Trump’s political operation attacked DeSantis with $23 million in negative ad spending, more than against any rival including President Joe Biden.
The DeSantis donor questioned the campaign’s assertion that the polls are wrong, saying, “There has to be some accuracy in the polls because they all say the same thing.” But the donor added that anything is possible.
“Could he catch lightning in a bottle? Everybody is kind of frozen right now,” the donor said.
The governor’s campaign hasn’t specified what percentage of the vote would constitute success. Campaign spokesperson Andrew Romeo said the pressure was on Trump and Haley to out-perform given their “chest-thumping” in the final days ahead of the caucuses.
"Trump has already declared victory by a 40-point margin, and Haley and her establishment funders are publicly guaranteeing a bought-and-paid-for strong second-place finish given they are the leading spenders in the state,” he said. “In sharp contrast, Ron DeSantis is only focused on out-working and out-organizing the competition. We believe that Iowans will reward our approach on the night of January 15.”
Dave Vazquez, the spokesperson for Never Back Down, said the PAC was “playing to win and have the best possible outcome in Iowa.” He added it already has built out a ground game in New Hampshire and South Carolina.
But how much DeSantis has in his campaign coffers is likely the biggest factor for how long he’ll stay in the contest. Asked by a reporter on Thursday night whether he had the cash to continue campaigning, DeSantis said only, “We’ll be fine” and, when pressed, wouldn’t answer whether his campaign was broke. In a sign of the governor’s frustration, though, he criticized Fox News and other conservative media last week.
“The governor is not a quitter,” said one campaign ally, granted anonymity to speak freely. “I think even if he is trailing he’s not going to drop out. He’s going to keep going.”
DeSantis continues to draw crowds in Iowa and appeared at ease onstage as he took policy-heavy questions from voters. One DeSantis supporter, Mitch McDonough, who attended a conference featuring the governor, said he voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020 but was ready to move on. He said the former president appeared to be running to prove that he could win rather than to lead the country.
“It’s the wrong point,” he said.
But at DeSantis’ stops, it was not uncommon to find potential voters who planned to vote for Trump, even if they said they liked the Florida governor. Perhaps, some said, they could support him for president in 2028.
“We can have one more term for Trump, then DeSantis can follow in his footsteps,” Krista Taylor, vice president of a construction company in rural Dubuque, said after the governor spoke at an event.
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