Pollster Frank Luntz believes the GOP primary battle is about to turn into a Ron DeSantis pile-on as everybody targets him instead of each other.
He revealed this belief when questioned on CNN this Friday about presidential candidate Chris Christie slamming DeSantis for allegedly avoiding questions about the Jan. 6th riot.
After playing a clip of Christie attacking DeSantis, CNN host Abby Phillip asked Luntz, “Could this become a DeSantis pile-on at the end of the day?”
Listen to his response below:
“Absolutely. Absolutely. The question now is who’s gonna be the alternative to Donald Trump,” Luntz replied.
“It’s gonna be one or two candidates. Right now, Tim Scott is doing very well in Iowa, Chris Christie’s doing very well in New Hampshire, and whoever emerges from this debate — and there will be somebody who’s crowned the winner — that person automatically raises money, automatically ends up on shows like yours, automatically starts to get the attention that they need,” he added.
He cautioned though that “up until this point, it’s been Trump, Trump, Trump,” with “the indictments, his victimization, his accusations of persecution, and it’s why Trump has been gaining and gaining even though these indictments are happening.”
“But on next Wednesday, the real election begins, and that’s when somebody like a Chris Christie will emerge, and the question’s gonna be who’s got the best line, who’s got the best attack, but you have to deliver that attack without alienating the people that you’re trying to win over,” he continued.
Truth be told, however, the DeSantis pile-on has already started. It started months ago, in fact, when, following DeSantis’ botched presidential announcement, the other candidates all pounced, including former President Donald Trump.
“Ron DeSantis’ botched campaign announcement is another example of why he is just not ready for the job,” Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for Make America Great Again Inc., said in a Twitter statement at the time.
“The stakes are too high, and the fight to save America is too critical to gamble on a first-timer who is clearly not ready for prime time. President Trump is the proven leader that will be ready on day one to turn the country around,” she added.
Ron DeSantis’ botched campaign announcement is another example of why he is just not ready for the job.
The stakes are too high, and the fight to save America is too critical to gamble on a first-timer who is clearly not ready for prime time.
President Trump is the proven…
— Karoline Leavitt (@kleavittnh) May 24, 2023
Even former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a “RINO” who has zero chance of winning the nomination, took a shot.
“Just like my policies, this link works,” he wrote in a tweet that included a link to a campaign fundraising page.
Just like my policies, this link works:https://t.co/wzielsY4xD
Click here to support the consistent conservative candidate whose policies work every time.
— Gov. Asa Hutchinson (@AsaHutchinson) May 24, 2023
According to NBC News, DeSantis is basically “stuck in the middle and getting punched from above and below.”
But instead of hitting back at every opponent, he’s saving his fire for Trump and only Trump. Why? Because his “advisers doesn’t see an upside to getting into entanglements with those competitors who are polling lower,” NBC News notes.
“This is a two-horse race. If there’s a third, it’s Joe Biden,” a source familiar with the Florida governor’s thinking explained to the outlet.
But why is everybody attacking DeSantis instead of Trump, the frontrunner? Because “[c]andidates who are hoping to overtake Trump likely will need to peel off a swath of DeSantis’s voters to build their winning coalition,” according to The Hill.
That said, the Florida governor’s team has made the case that the joint attacks on him from everyone, including Trump, proves that he’s most likely to win the nomination and thus poses the “greatest threat” to everyone, especially Trump.
Indeed, in a recent statement, pro-DeSantis super PAC Never Back Down spokesperson Erin Perrine said Trump “is scared of Ron DeSantis and has every reason to be” given as the Florida governor has never lost an election.
True, though to be fair, DeSantis is nowhere close to catching up to Trump in the polls, with the former president leading him by an average of 40 percentage points.
These are the largest ongoing expenditures against a non-candidate in Republican primary history, and that’s all you need to know to draw the obvious conclusion. @RonDeSantis presents the greatest threat to Donald Trump. https://t.co/sRQT6OH6a3
— Bryan Griffin (@BryanDGriffin) May 22, 2023
Yet despite Trump leading DeSantis by so many points, he does spend an inordinate amount of time on his social media platform, Truth Social, attacking the Florida governor while saying little about his other challengers.
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