Thirteen might be an unlucky number, but it is likely to be the final count for the GOP 2024 primary presidential field. Florida Senator Rick Scott, after seeing two other Florida men faulter on the campaign trail, looks like he’s itching to take the presidential plunge.
You can see why. Current Florida Governor Ron DeSantis had for months been seen as the de-facto Trump alternative. But with a rocky, glitch filled rollout on Twitter, and awkward moments with voters on the campaign trail, the insurgent still finds himself 30 points below former President Donald Trump in the polls on average.
So then Miami Mayor Francis Suarez jumped in. With DeSantis running to Trump’s right on policy, Suarez thought he’d run to his left. A moderate, successful, level-headed governor who has the charisma and look that just seems presidential, he was initially thought of as a candidate to watch. The problem is, Suarez doesn’t seem very smart. He had an early campaign gaffe on Monday when he was asked about the oppression of muslims in China, a group called the Uyghurs. When asked about his position during an interview, he said, “what’s a Uyghur?,” probably thinking it sounded remarkably similar to a famous racial slur.
So why not Scott? Perhaps as an opening salvo, he released a video in response to the NAACP issuing a travel ban warning for black people wanting to visit Florida. Largely tongue and cheek, he essentially discouraged hard left California residents from moving into his state, for the fear that their viewpoints would encroach upon Florida’s liberty:
“Let me give you a travel warning. If you’re socialist, communist, or big government, I would think twice about moving to or visiting Florida. We like freedom, liberty, capitalism, things like that. ”
Issuing his own, reverse, novel travel warning is certainly a way to get the conversation started. And at this point, even though Trump is perched far atop, this could be anybody’s race for second place. Scott put a lot of policies in place as governor that DeSantis ran with. He can take credit for Florida’s booming economy. But the guy isn’t very likeable or charismatic, he almost seems like a lizard person, a comparison he’s received numerous times from both the left and right comedic media. He has an impressive resume from a massive state, and thus will be taken seriously. But he most likely doesn’t have the campaign trail chops to take the ball and run it to the finish line.
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