Donald Trump's 2024 political operation has spent a small fortune on ads attacking Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis – who has yet to enter the presidential race, but who consistently performs better than all other non-Trump candidates in the emerging field. They're trying to drive up DeSantis' negatives before he has a campaign with which to fight back. The chief message of these ads, which have played relentlessly on a number of cable news outlets, is that future-minded entitlement reform proposals amount to dangerous "cuts" to senior citizens' benefits. It is, unsurprisingly, a straight-up DNC talking point, as we've analyzed previously.
Team Trump's latest version of the attack prominently features an unsubstantiated and anonymous claim reported in a leftist media outlet (the sort of thing Trump typically rejects as "FAKE NEWS," worthy of revisiting libel and slander laws) that DeSantis...once ate pudding with his fingers. Seriously:
Pudding Fingers pic.twitter.com/PRCVAZlkw9
— MAGA War Room (@MAGAIncWarRoom) April 14, 2023
With DeSantis focused on Florida's active legislative session, there has been very little pushback against these claims. But that is changing. A DeSantis-aligned PAC is now firing back with an ad of its own:
Donald Trump is being attacked by a Democrat prosecutor in New York.
— Never Back Down (@NvrBackDown24) April 16, 2023
So why is he spending millions attacking the Republican Governor of Florida with lies about Social Security from the Biden-Pelosi playbook? pic.twitter.com/xeyi5F4jmj
National Review reports:
Trump’s 2020 budget proposal included cuts to Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare. The proposal outlined an aim to spend $25 billion less on Social Security in the next decade and $845 billion less on Medicare over that same period of time. The proposal also would have allocated $1.2 trillion in a block-grant program to states for Medicaid, in an effort to spend $1.5 trillion less on that program over ten years. Never Back Down, a pro-DeSantis PAC, debuted its own 30-second ad taking Trump to task for fighting fellow Republicans. The ad, “Fight Democrats, Not Republicans,” unearths Trump’s own comments on the issue of entitlements. The ad, which is the group’s first TV spot, depicts DeSantis saying, “We’re not going to mess with Social Security,” while Trump previously told a reporter that “at some point” entitlements will be something to “look at.” The Never Back Down ad came after MAGA Inc. launched a rather unique ad last week: a 30-second video of a man eating chocolate pudding with his fingers. The ad plays on a Daily Beast report from last month that claimed DeSantis once ate a pudding cup with three fingers in lieu of a spoon while traveling on a private plane in 2019. But while the ad grabs viewers with its uncomfortable imagery, the spot ultimately does not concern DeSantis’s eating habits but rather is just the latest example of Trump’s team hitting DeSantis on entitlements.
The headline on that piece is "Trump Forgets His Own Record on Entitlement Reform." Here's the thing, though: Trump isn't forgetting anything. He doesn't care. His record and proposals and statements don't matter to him. Running that counter-spot may be better than nothing, but for that reason, I'm not sure it'll be terribly effective. Trump is attacking DeSantis rather than Democrats because Trump sees DeSantis as the biggest – or only – threat to his path to the GOP nomination. Everyone understands that. Nothing "happened" to Trump; this is who he is. Endless, high-decibel warfare, all the time. Expressing disappointed feigned puzzlement over Trump doing Trump things doesn't strike me as something that will move many votes. And it's totally fair game to point out Trump's glaring hypocrisy on entitlements. There's tons of material to work with. Two problems, though: (1) I repeat, Trump doesn't care about the substance, and he's betting most GOP voters don't either. He doesn't even believe his own policy-related attacks on DeSantis, as he's openly and publicly admitted. This stuff is just a means to an end. I'm not sure "correcting the record" helps much, though I suppose it's worth trying. (2) If the conservative party's nominating contest becomes a battle of who will promise most loudly to never, ever touch insolvency-bound entitlement programs, that will be a profoundly depressing state of affairs. I expect demagoguery from Trump on this front, but isn't DeSantis' brand supposed to be fearless, truth-telling leadership, even on tough issues? I recognize that this is an aligned PAC over which DeSantis wields no control. Perhaps his campaign will pursue a different path once it's underway. Overall, I'd imagine DeSantis and his allies would love to win with this sort of message:
.@NvrBackDown24 launches “Anthem” today as the first full national TV ad pic.twitter.com/60EMUEn3Ky
— Erin Perrine (@ErinMPerrine) April 17, 2023
Perrine, incidentally, worked for Trump's 2020 campaign. That sort of positive material worked very well for the governor in his dominant re-election victory of nearly 20 points last fall. But again, I'm not sure aspirational, high-road, uplifting, Reaganesque messaging will be enough to overcome a frontrunner gleefully yelling about how fat ole puddin' fingers wants to starve your gram, or whatever. It remains unclear what sort of blend of positive vision and strategic pushback might represent a sweet spot against Trump's chaotic, no-holds-barred, "kitchen sink" approach. Maybe we'll see soon enough what DeSantis himself has in mind. But things certainly look like they're moving closer and closer to an announcement:
Scoop: Ron DeSantis’ Presidential PAC To Send First Mailer Out To Four States Touting The ‘DeSantis Playbook’
— Henry Rodgers (@henryrodgersdc) April 20, 2023
Read more here first for @DailyCaller: https://t.co/bWZ5M7iTsx
The PAC supporting Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ potential 2024 presidential bid will send out hundreds of thousands of its first mailers in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada, explaining why he should be the next president, the Daily Caller has learned. The five-page Never Back Down PAC mailer will hit mailboxes Thursday, as DeSantis has been traveling the U.S. speaking at different events. Although the mailer does not mention a possible 2024 presidential bid, it touts all of what the PAC believes are DeSantis’ main accomplishments and details his background.
Meanwhile, the Trump campaign will happily point to polling like this that shows the former president in a strong-to-dominant position atop the still-fluid GOP field – including in states where DeSantis has led in previous polling:
Another strong Trump poll showing — from UGA — in the state whose Republicans are most Trump skeptical.
— Josh Kraushaar (@JoshKraushaar) April 14, 2023
Trump 51
DeSantis 30
Haley 4
Pence 2
“DeSantis was competitive only among…younger Republicans and those with annual incomes that topped $100,000” https://t.co/g93yNGUHB5
DeSantis supporters will hope to see the Florida governor chip away at Trump's lead in the coming weeks, then make more headway as a declared candidate. Their argument will focus more on polling and substance like this:
👇
— Robert Blizzard (@robertblizzard) April 16, 2023
AZ:
DeSantis 48%
Biden 42%
Trump 44%
Biden 45%
PA:
DeSantis 45%
Biden 42%
Trump 42%
Biden 46%https://t.co/PD7jt8NPmg
Why would @GovRonDeSantis do this?!?!? https://t.co/YhbkpQ30up
— Jeremy Redfern (@JeremyRedfernFL) April 16, 2023
