Ron DeSantis is killing the residents of his state so he can play to his base...
Opinion: Ron DeSantis probably won’t be hurt by Florida’s covid surge
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opin...robably-wont-be-hurt-by-floridas-covid-surge/
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is again receiving national media scrutiny as his state’s covid-19 cases and hospitalizations soar to record levels. That is as likely to help him politically as it is to hurt him.
How could this be? That Florida is one of the nation’s pandemic hot spots surely raises the expectation that the Republican governor’s standing with voters will take a hit. Combined with his opposition to mask mandates and generally pro-opening stance throughout the year-long crisis, one could also conclude that his positions are to blame for many of the cases and deaths we are witnessing.
But that misreads voter sentiments, especially among Republicans. Attitudes toward measures to control the spread of the coronavirus have differed sharply on partisan lines throughout the pandemic. Indeed, a June poll from Pew Research Center found that political polarization over whether a nation’s covid-19 response was good or bad was higher in the United States than in any other major Western country. Fifty-two percent of Americans on the right said there should have been fewer restrictions to control the virus (far higher than right-wing voters of other countries), compared with only 7 percent of those on the left saying the same thing. That’s a larger divide than anywhere else.
DeSantis’s stances make a lot of political sense when viewed through this framework. A politician should never worry too much about the views of his staunchest opponents. They are likely to disagree with him or her no matter what and are unlikely to change their votes even if they occasionally agree with the leader on issues. Elected officials will always keep the coalition that voted for them at the front of their political calculations, and for DeSantis, that is Republican base voters and Republican-leaning independents. So long as they think he’s governing in accord with their values, the rabid opposition of the other side is usually irrelevant.
Such intense hatred could even help DeSantis in the current political environment. Each side’s base despises the other, which means that incurring opposition hatred can increase support among his own base. That’s especially true of Republicans after enduring four years of the media’s intensely negative coverage of President Donald Trump. When major newspapers and cable television shows take aim at DeSantis, many Republicans take that as proof he’s on the right course.
So far, the evidence shows DeSantis is coming through the surge relatively unscathed. A July Echelon Insights poll showed him leading the field in a hypothetical 2024 GOP primary without Trump. And in terms of reelection, the RealClearPolitics average based on polls conducted in August puts DeSantis slightly ahead of potential Democratic challenger Charlie Crist and well ahead of Democrat Nikki Fried. Florida polls tilt Democratic, overestimating Democratic strength by roughly four points in 2018 and 2020. There is no reason, as of yet, to think the state’s covid-19 outbreak is hurting DeSantis where it counts, among Republicans and Floridians open to voting for him anyway.
There’s also some reason to think Florida’s surge will begin to fall soon. The state’s seven-day average of new cases has been roughly level for nearly two weeks. Past outbreak patterns show cases rise rapidly and then slowly decline. The current outbreak’s chart plot shows the same pattern, with the state likely at the curve’s peak. Perhaps cases will start to rise again, but if not, DeSantis can reasonably argue that he kept the state open while unvaccinated people unfortunately suffered because of their choices. That message will likely resonate with Republicans.
Democrats won’t like hearing this, but DeSantis’s political future looks pretty healthy. It will take a lot more than this surge to derail the man who currently looks likeliest to grab Trump’s mantle as the GOP’s leader.
Opinion: Ron DeSantis probably won’t be hurt by Florida’s covid surge
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opin...robably-wont-be-hurt-by-floridas-covid-surge/
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is again receiving national media scrutiny as his state’s covid-19 cases and hospitalizations soar to record levels. That is as likely to help him politically as it is to hurt him.
How could this be? That Florida is one of the nation’s pandemic hot spots surely raises the expectation that the Republican governor’s standing with voters will take a hit. Combined with his opposition to mask mandates and generally pro-opening stance throughout the year-long crisis, one could also conclude that his positions are to blame for many of the cases and deaths we are witnessing.
But that misreads voter sentiments, especially among Republicans. Attitudes toward measures to control the spread of the coronavirus have differed sharply on partisan lines throughout the pandemic. Indeed, a June poll from Pew Research Center found that political polarization over whether a nation’s covid-19 response was good or bad was higher in the United States than in any other major Western country. Fifty-two percent of Americans on the right said there should have been fewer restrictions to control the virus (far higher than right-wing voters of other countries), compared with only 7 percent of those on the left saying the same thing. That’s a larger divide than anywhere else.
DeSantis’s stances make a lot of political sense when viewed through this framework. A politician should never worry too much about the views of his staunchest opponents. They are likely to disagree with him or her no matter what and are unlikely to change their votes even if they occasionally agree with the leader on issues. Elected officials will always keep the coalition that voted for them at the front of their political calculations, and for DeSantis, that is Republican base voters and Republican-leaning independents. So long as they think he’s governing in accord with their values, the rabid opposition of the other side is usually irrelevant.
Such intense hatred could even help DeSantis in the current political environment. Each side’s base despises the other, which means that incurring opposition hatred can increase support among his own base. That’s especially true of Republicans after enduring four years of the media’s intensely negative coverage of President Donald Trump. When major newspapers and cable television shows take aim at DeSantis, many Republicans take that as proof he’s on the right course.
So far, the evidence shows DeSantis is coming through the surge relatively unscathed. A July Echelon Insights poll showed him leading the field in a hypothetical 2024 GOP primary without Trump. And in terms of reelection, the RealClearPolitics average based on polls conducted in August puts DeSantis slightly ahead of potential Democratic challenger Charlie Crist and well ahead of Democrat Nikki Fried. Florida polls tilt Democratic, overestimating Democratic strength by roughly four points in 2018 and 2020. There is no reason, as of yet, to think the state’s covid-19 outbreak is hurting DeSantis where it counts, among Republicans and Floridians open to voting for him anyway.
There’s also some reason to think Florida’s surge will begin to fall soon. The state’s seven-day average of new cases has been roughly level for nearly two weeks. Past outbreak patterns show cases rise rapidly and then slowly decline. The current outbreak’s chart plot shows the same pattern, with the state likely at the curve’s peak. Perhaps cases will start to rise again, but if not, DeSantis can reasonably argue that he kept the state open while unvaccinated people unfortunately suffered because of their choices. That message will likely resonate with Republicans.
Democrats won’t like hearing this, but DeSantis’s political future looks pretty healthy. It will take a lot more than this surge to derail the man who currently looks likeliest to grab Trump’s mantle as the GOP’s leader.
