Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis got his ticket punched in the Iowa caucuses. Then he took that ticket and rode it straight to a departure from the Republican presidential primaries just five days later. With DeSantis dropping out and quickly endorsing Donald Trump, it might seem like a sullen silence would fall on the Sunshine State.
But that may not be the case. Florida is one of 44 states where the governor has a power not given to presidents: a line-item veto over spending. On Friday, the Florida Legislature ended a contentious session, passing a $117 billion state budget. However, DeSantis has already announced his intention to “trim” that number.
The question now is whether DeSantis will use his authority to punish state legislators who didn’t line up behind his failed presidential bid.
As Politico reports, over a dozen Florida legislators had the MAGA-scented gall to endorse Trump while DeSantis was still in the race. Now those legislators get to wait and see if their pet projects—and their hometowns—suffer as a result of their eagerness to clamp on that red hat.
As he repeatedly demonstrated in his war with Disney, DeSantis is nothing if not vindictive. He’s willing to slap those who oppose him no matter the cost to his state. Whether it’s universities or cruise lines, DeSantis enjoys flexing his power to make people, organizations, and companies fall in line.
“I hope the concern is invalid,” one Trump-supporting legislator told Politico. “I would like to believe that the governor is going to do the best thing for the citizens of our state no matter what.” However, she probably should have reviewed how DeSantis dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic before expressing that belief.
Whether or not DeSantis chooses to indulge his apparently infinite source of petty vindictiveness may boil down to what he thinks is going to happen this November.
Thanks to a 2023 bill passed by the state Legislature especially to benefit DeSantis, the governor was able to run for president while still holding onto his throne in Tallahassee. Now DeSantis can remain in that chair until the end of 2027. That could position him well for a second shot at the White House when the next term rolls around.
On the other hand, should Trump win in 2024, he would be in a position to adjust the taps on things like emergency assistance to a state that is increasingly battered by hurricanes. Trump might not have a line-item veto that would allow him to directly punish DeSantis, but he would have the next best thing. And really, when someone has already declared their desire to be a dictator, it might not make a lot of sense to do something to piss him off … unless you think he’s going to lose.
If DeSantis breaks out the veto pen and starts drawing a line though bridges, roads, and other projects championed by Trump-endorsing Florida legislators, it’s a decent signal that he thinks Trump is doomed to stew at Mar-a-Lago (where DeSantis can always work out some way to torture him). If DeSantis shies away, it may be at least partly out of fear that Trump could bring him to heel.
Now we just need to sit back and wait a few days for DeSantis to signal which way he thinks the wind is blowing.
We're recapping all of Tuesday's primary night action on this week's episode of "The Downballot"! Co-hosts David Nir and David Beard go coast-to-coast, setting the table in Texas' Senate race and picking apart the bloodbath in the state House. Then it's on to North Carolina, where GOP extremists dominated at all levels of the ballot—and where one notorious election fraudster is now on his way to Congress. We wrap with California, whose troublesome top-two primary system made its quirks felt in a whole bunch of races, from Senate on down.
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