Fans of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) revived claims that the Republican leader would have been a better presidential candidate than former President Donald Trump after the latter’s debate performance Tuesday night.
The pro-DeSantis memes that began circulating after the debate show that the inter-party rift between DeSantis stans and Trump fans is still present—nearly eight months after DeSantis dropped out of the presidential race and threw his support behind Trump.
Although DeSantis—once viewed as Republicans’ best alternative to a third Trump candidacy—is fully onboard Team Trump, it seems that some of his supporters haven’t rejoined the fold.
Polls conducted in the immediate aftermath of the first debate between Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris found that viewers believe Harris soundly outperformed Trump.
A YouGov survey found that 43% of respondents said Harris won the debate, compared to 28% who said the same of Trump. Similarly, a CNN flash poll found that 63% of registered voters who watched the debate believed Harris performed better.
The results mark a major shift for Trump, whose debate performance in June against President Joe Biden was widely viewed as superior. The same CNN flash poll showed 67% of respondents crediting Trump with the better performance.
Now, DeSantis’ biggest fans are arguing Harris would have lost the debate—if she had been going toe-to-toe against DeSantis instead.
“Ron DeSantis would have wiped the floor with this woman,” quipped one person.
“Gov. DeSantis would have exposed this vacuous woman in the first 5 minutes,” echoed someone else. “Let’s not be stupid in 2028, Republicans.”
“I’ll say it, if DeSantis was the candidate, this race wouldn’t even be close,” concluded another supporter.
“Ron DeSantis would have absolutely dismantled Kamala Harris at tonight’s debate and ended her political career in the process,” someone else said, while making a reference to DeSantis’ debate against California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D).
Others similarly lamented the fact that DeSantis is not the 2024 Republican nominee.
“Ron DeSantis earned a scholarship to Yale, was a jag officer in Iraq, was a founding member of the freedom caucus and was our loudest voice against the administrative state during covid… It could have been different,” wrote one person.
“Ron DeSantis should be the one debating Kamala Harris tonight, not Donald Trump,” stated another X user.
And one X user joked that “after this bad debate, Trump will drop out and be replaced with Ron DeSantis.”
DeSantis, for his part, defended Trump’s debate performance and accused the ABC moderators of making it easier on Harris.
“It was a 3-1 debate,” DeSantis stated in a post-debate Fox News interview. “It was disappointing that she didn’t have her feet held to the fire by the moderators. They went out of their way to try to do that to Donald Trump.”
“But I think people that take away from this debate, even with all that, Donald Trump is the candidate that’s going to change things,” he continued. “Kamala Harris is the candidate that, as President Trump said in his closing statement, she’s been there three and a half years, why hasn’t she fixed any of these problems during that time? She does not have an answer to that question.”
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