People in Gov. Ron DeSantis home state of Florida do not want him to run for the White House in 2024, according to a Quinnipiac poll.
According to the poll, 59 percent of Floridians say DeSantis should not run for president in 2024, 35 percent say they would like to see their governor run for the White House.
Florida Republicans support a DeSantis presidential bid, 67–24, while Democrats overwhelmingly oppose 96-2. Independents are also not onboard with DeSantis seeking the White House. 61 percent of independents say they would not want DeSantis to run for president while 35 percent say he should.
DeSantis was second behind Donald Trump in the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) straw poll in Orlando earlier this year about potential 2024 Republican Party nominees for president.
Florida voters are split on whether Ron DeSantis deserves to be re-elected as governor. 48 percent say he does and 45 percent say he does not. 6 percent did not offer an opinion, according to the poll.
DeSantis is slightly above water in the poll as 47 percent of Floridians approves of the job he is doing as governor while 45 percent disapprove. That’s an improvement from July 2020, when his approval rating fell to just 41 percent, but it’s still well below his pre-pandemic high of 59 percent in March 2019.
“Do Florida voters want to send DeSantis back to Tallahassee? It’s a tossup. But 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is, for now, just not in the cards,” Quinnipiac University Polling Analyst Tim Malloy said.
Another Republican up for re-election in 2022, Sen. Marco Rubio is also below the 50 percent mark. 49 percent approve of his job, while 38 percent disapprove. The gap narrows significantly when voters were asked if he deserves to be re-elected. 47 percent say he deserves to be re-elected, while 41 percent say he does not. 13 percent did not offer an opinion.
The poll comes as Florida is struggling to contain the pandemic and DeSantis clashing with school boards across the state who defy his order to institute their mask mandate.
51 percent of those surveyed said they disapprove of the way he’s handling the pandemic while 46 percent approves.
The Quinnipiac poll surveyed 889 registered voters in Florida from Aug. 17 to 21. It has a margin of sampling error of 3.3 percentage points.
