Florida’s Governor is heading back to the Beehive State Friday as he continues his presidential campaign.
As first reported by the Deseret News, Ron DeSantis will be back in Utah Friday afternoon for a press conference at the state Capitol and for other private events.
DeSantis has enthused about Utah like no other Florida Governor in history, perhaps a function of needing their votes next year in the Republican Presidential Primary.
At the Utah Republican Convention in April, the Florida Governor contended his home state is the “Utah of the Southeast.”
“Utah is one of the best governed, best-performing states in the United States. You have a sound economy, you promote a good business environment, you stress the importance of education, you have fiscal and budgetary stability and you have safe communities,” DeSantis contended.
“And I think underlying the success of Utah has been a commitment to freedom like Florida. Utah proves that freedom works,” DeSantis added. “Now over the last few years since I’ve been Governor, people have looked to Florida for leadership in a variety of different ways.”
DeSantis added that he “was recently visiting with some folks in Iowa and people said, you know, Iowa, they’re really the Florida of the Midwest with all the conservative stuff they’re doing. Well, let me just tell you maybe it’s a little secret, but it might just be that Florida is the Utah of the Southeast.”
Polling shows the Governor connecting with Utah voters in a way that isn’t happening elsewhere.
A June Deseret News/Hinckley Institute of Politics poll of the state’s 2024 race shows the Florida Governor just 1 point behind former President Donald Trump.
Trump leads DeSantis 27% to 26%, with former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney’s 7% good for third place. Former United Nations envoy Nikki Haley and former Vice President Mike Pence are tied for fourth, with 5%. All other names polled are below that threshold, with an additional 21% not yet committed to a specific candidate.
Other polls have split.
In a survey conducted by WPA Intelligence from April 18-20 among 504 Utah Republican Primary voters, DeSantis led Trump, 46% to 39%. The poll had a margin of error of +/- 4 percentage points.
In the March Utah Public Opinion Pulse survey from OH Predictive, Trump held a commanding lead at 41% to 23%.
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