With just over 100 days to go before the Iowa caucuses, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is pumping even more resources and staff into the Hawkeye State.
The DeSantis campaign plans to move about a third of its staff from Tallahassee to Des Moines, underscoring the primary position the top-tier candidate has placed on the first-in-the-nation caucus state.
He faces a tall order on the way to the scheduled January 15 caucus.
Nationally, DeSantis is running second with 13.5 percent support from Republican voters, but he trails former President Donald Trump by 43 percentage points, according to the latest RealClearPolitics average of 2024 GOP presidential nomination polls.
He’s closer in the Hawkeye State, down 33 percentage points, polling at 16 percent support to Trump’s 49 percent.
That’s a lot of ground to make up in a little more than three months, but the DeSantis camp believes they can move a lot of hearts and minds before caucus day. They need to if the candidate has any chance against the former president.
“If we’re able to beat Donald Trump in Iowa, that’s a huge problem for him,” DeSantis campaign spokesman Andrew Romeo told the Associated Press.
DeSantis and friends hauled in $15 million from donors in the third quarter, which wrapped up Saturday, according to the campaign. Presidential candidates are expected to file their latest campaign finance reports by Oct. 15.
If the reported number holds, DeSantis’ latest haul would be $5 million less than the candidate raised in the second quarter.
The governor’s struggles this past summer are well documented.
DeSantis nixed campaign manager Generra Peck, bringing in gubernatorial chief of staff James Uthmeier. He reportedly cut staff amid demands from major donors that he make his campaign leaner and meaner.
“Anyone that knows Ron DeSantis knows that he is a fighter, a winner, and a leader,” Uthmeier said in a statement on Wednesday. “This significant fundraising haul not only provides us with the resources we need in the fight for Iowa and beyond, but it also shuts down the doubters who counted out Ron DeSantis for far too long.”
In late August, DeSantis-backing super PAC Never Back Down dropped more than $12 million on campaign ads, the brunt of those in Iowa. CNN reported that the political action committee laid out $11.4 million of the $12.3 million in ad expenditures to reach Hawkeye State voters through Halloween.
DeSantis is on a mission to visit all of Iowa’s 99 counties by the end of the month.
“That’s something that’s important, we’re going to do it,” DeSantis told the conservative “Ruthless Podcast” in Des Moines in August. At that point he was nearly a third of the way home. By the end of August, DeSantis had visited half of Iowa counties. The number was up to two-thirds as of last week.
He calls it the “full Grassley,” a nod to U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA), who has made it a point to visit all 99 Hawkeye State counties annually to hear from his constituents.
Earlier this week, Never Back Down launched its “Farmers Never Back Down” coalition. The organization is led by 17 farmers, including leaders of major agricultural groups in the state, who have endorsed the Florida governor for the 2024 presidential nomination, the Des Moines Register reported.
“Gov. DeSantis is the leader we need today for Iowa agriculture and understands the challenges facing Iowa farmers,” said Lance Lillibridge, former president of the Iowa Corn Growers Association and chairman of the coalition, told the publication.
But the Iowa-centric focus could prove costly for DeSantis in other early nominating states.
The governor has arguably neglected first primary state New Hampshire and South Carolina to make greater inroads in Iowa. DeSantis last visited the Granite State more than a month ago.
His absence has been noted.
“Gov. DeSantis needs to spend more time in New Hampshire,” Greg Moore, the New Hampshire director for Americans for Prosperity, a conservative grassroots group which has not yet endorsed a candidate for president, told ABC News.
“He has a solid infrastructure here of supporters, but his visits have been too infrequent to keep him from developing the type of traction he could be. Granite Staters have always rewarded the folks who show up and we’re just not seeing a lot of DeSantis in-state,” Moore added.
DeSantis has seen his poll numbers slip in New Hampshire, falling to third place, at 10.4 percent, nearly 4 points behind former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley (14.2%) and nearly 35 points behind Trump, according to RealClearPolitics.
The polling holds the same in the Palmetto State, where DeSantis (11.3%) is polling in third place behind Haley (15.3%) and Trump (47.8%).
DeSantis campaign officials told CNN the governor has time to make up lost ground in New Hampshire and South Carolina. But Iowa remains the focal point.
“We are redeploying many of our assets so we can further take the fight directly to Donald Trump in Iowa,” David Polyansky, DeSantis’ deputy campaign manager, told the New York Times.
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M.D. Kittle is the National Political Editor for The Star News Network.
Photo “Ron DeSantis” by Ron DeSantis.
