Ron DeSantis has suggested that he’s the only Republican who will be able to beat President Joe Biden in 2024, citing data from key swing states.
The Florida governor, who is expected to confirm he’s running for president in the coming days, claimed he’s the biggest challenger to Biden in 2024, instead of Donald Trump, who remains the overwhelming favorite to clinch the GOP nomination.
“You have basically three people at this point that are credible in this whole thing — Biden, Trump and me,” DeSantis said during a phone call to donors at an event hosted by the pro-DeSantis super PAC Never Back Down, according to The New York Times.
“And I think of those three, two have a chance to get elected president — Biden and me — based on all the data in the swing states, which is not great for the former president and probably insurmountable because people aren’t going to change their view of him.”
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Numerous polls suggest Trump is enjoying all-time high leads over DeSantis in hypothetical Republican primary polls, including in a recent Redfield & Wilton Strategies poll conducted for Newsweek giving the former president a 77-point lead over the Florida governor.
However, there have been other recent surveys that suggest DeSantis is the one who could beat Biden in several key swing states in the next general election.
In April, a survey from GOP firm Public Opinion Strategies found that DeSantis would beat Biden in the battleground states of Pennsylvania and Arizona in 2024 by 45 percent to 42 percent and 48 percent to 42 percent, respectively. The same survey also showed Biden would beat Trump again in those two states, just like the president did in 2020.
In North Carolina, a state that had its electoral votes increased by 15 to 16 in 2024, DeSantis would also beat Biden in a presidential face-off, according to a March 30 poll of 605 likely voters.
The Civitas Poll survey conducted for The John Locke Foundation showed that DeSantis would beat Biden in 2024 by 43.6 percent to 41. The results show the current president would also beating Trump by an even narrower margin of 45.4 to 43.4 percent, albeit with poll results falling within the margin of error of nearly 4 percent.
“Yet again, the race to the White House will flow through North Carolina,” John Locke Foundation President Donald Bryson said in a statement.
“These results indicate that the presidential race in North Carolina could be close. While Ron DeSantis was the only Republican candidate, in this poll, to come out over President Biden, all three results were within the margin of error.”
Elsewhere, an April poll of 500 voters by the GOP firm Public Opinion Strategies showed DeSantis with a 46 percent to 41 percent lead over Biden in the swing state of Georgia. In the same poll, Biden beat Trump by 43 percent to 42 percent.
The data also showed that DeSantis performed better in a hypothetical matchup against Biden than Trump did among white voters, independent voters, and those aged 65 and older.
However, before DeSantis can consider if he can beat Biden in 2024, he first must beat Trump in next year’s GOP primary. Despite the early enthusiasm for his potential campaign, DeSantis has been falling further and further behind Trump in the polls.
According to a Redfield & Wilton Strategies poll of 1,500 people taken on May 17, Trump leads a hypothetical Republican primary with 77 percent of the vote, with DeSantis a distant second on 8 percent.
Amid reports DeSantis is expended to file the paperwork to formally declare his presidential candidacy on May 25, Trump posted on Truth Social on Thursday: “After campaigning for five months, and going nowhere but down, it looks like Ron DeSanctimonious will soon be entering the race. He has ZERO chance, and MAGA will never forget!”
Newsweek has contacted DeSantis’ office for comment.