By Dan Murphy
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg are two possible Presidential candidates in 2024 taking different paths to The White House. One has attracted massive interest from republicans looking for a backup plan if Donald Trump doesn’t run again, while the other has quietly served in the Biden administration without making any noise about his future plans.
But what if the choices for Americans in October of 2024 were DeSantis and Buttigieg? Political journalist Mark Halperin gave a surprising analysis of both Mayor Pete and Governor DeSantis on his recent appearance on the Michael Smerconish show on Sirius/XM Radio.
Halperin, who also authors a daily newsletter (markhalperin.substack.com/) believes that Buttigieg’s political stock is on the rise, while DeSantis has yet to receive the national scrutiny that every Presidential candidate deserves before they take the Oath of Office at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
“The official position of almost every democrat is that Joe Biden will be the nominee, or Kamala Harris will be the nominee. But democrats don’t relish either of those options.” Buttigieg “is a super smart guy and a very keen observer of this administration. He is talked about as potentially running for President in 2024 by a lot of the financial backers that he had the last time, and from democrats around the country that are concerned about the political standing of the President, the Vice-President, and of going into the mid-terms on a trajectory of losing to Trump in 2024,” said Halperin.
Buttigieg made history when he became the first openly gay Cabinet member in 2021. At age 40, He is also the youngest cabinet member. He served in the US Military and was deployed to Afghanistan. He married his partner, Chasten Glezman, in 2018, and they have two children.
The contrast between Buttigieg’s politics and personal life choices, and DeSantis’ could not be starker. In March of this year, DeSantis signed the “Parental Rights in Education” bill, aka the “Don’t Say Gay” law which bans the classroom instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity in kindergarten through 3rd grade classrooms in Floriday. DeSantis said that teaching K-3 children that “they can be whatever they want to be is not something that’s appropriate for any place, but especially not in Florida.”
DeSantis is young, 43, and educated at Yale and Harvard Law. But Halperin surprised Smerconish on his Sirius/XM show with his analysis that DeSantis has not yet been tested and vetted, for big time Presidential politics. “He (DeSantis) is Trump with less political skills and less of a proven capacity to play at a national level. I think there is a lot about DeSantis that would not play well on a national stage. I believe that he is the most likely republican candidate other than Trump, he is also, easily, the most overrated general election candidate in the field,” said Halperin.
DeSantis has earned the wrath of the Disney Corporation, which opposed “Don’t Say Gay”. “Our goal as a company is for this law to be repealed by the legislature or struck down in the courts, and we remain committed to supporting the national and state organizations working to achieve that.”
But DeSantis wears his war with Disney and the LGBTQ+ community as a badge of honor. “I don’t care what Hollywood says. I don’t care what big corporations say. Here I stand. I am not backing down.”
DeSantis also received the pseudo endorsement from Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who in a recent Tweet about his vote for Congresswoman elcted Mayra Flores, added that he was leaning towards voting for DeSantis for President, and that the Florida Governor, “has a better chance of winning.”
Halperin said that while “Trump also treats people badly, Trump is a once in a lifetime political talent, as Obama and Clinton were. DeSantis is no Trump.”
