On the campaign trail, Florida governor Ron DeSantis (R) is a “dead man walking,” according to Republican pollster Whit Ayres.
“It’s hard to see a path forward for him; he’s hanging on by his fingernails,” Ayres told the Tampa Bay Times.
DeSantis narrowly held off Nikki Haley for a distant second in Iowa. He appears to have given up in New Hampshire where polls show him trailing both Trump and Haley by growing margins.
The Florida governor is focusing his efforts on South Carolina where he hopes to knock Haley out of the running in her home state and set up a two person race with Trump heading into super Tuesday.
But for Ayres, DeSantis has made too many “rookie mistakes” to recover from.
“He misunderstood the electorate, he made a bunch of rookie mistakes,” Ayres said. “It’s almost been a comedy of errors, and it’s hard to see where he goes now.”
