The most depressing thing we learned about the 2024 Republican presidential candidates last week, when they first met onstage in Milwaukee, is that most of them would vote for former President Trump, even though he is on Election Day a convicted criminal.

Most would probably follow him to hell too.

This would be the governor of Florida. Ron DeSanti’s Escape Night. After all, he is the front runner among candidates not named Trump. But he didn’t make much of an impression

to most commentators.

To use one of his favorite insults, he was more of a listless vessel than a breakout star.

As it turns out, DeSantis isn’t very good at debating

at least not the kind that precede a presidential election.

He managed to repeat it

other

contradicts himself, promising twice to send Joe Biden back to his basement and once not to let Biden hang out in his basement this time. We’re going to run him across this country. Make up your mind, Governor!

DeSantis stormed the national scene during the pandemic, demonizing public health officials like Anthony Fauci; engaging in pointless battles with Disney, his state’s main economic engine; and lash out at anything he deems

edit

awake, which his own general counsel defined as the belief that systemic injustices exist in American society and the need to address them.

How radical!

DeSantis has repeatedly touted his state on the campaign trail as the place where Awake is going to die, but didn’t utter that word once Wednesday night, telling us that he finally understands that this is a stupid rationale for a presidential campaign.

Nor did he mention Disney, which has become such an thorn in his side that the man whose campaign bus exclaims “Never Back Down” has become shaky. He now claims he moved on when the feud came up, urging Disney to drop its federal lawsuit alleging that DeSantis violated the company’s First Amendment rights by retaliating against the company’s objections to Florida’s infamous Don’t Say Gay law.

DeSantis has fallen in the polls and is rising along with 38-year-old tech brother Vivek Ramaswamy. I think DeSanti’s debate performance helps explain why he’s waving.

First, as has been extensively noted, the man has exactly zero charisma. As we’ve seen in recent months, he walks between voters with a grin-and-wear-it grimace. He wipes his nose and then shakes hands. He swears and harasses children.

Prior to the debate, according to a report in the New York Times, Mr. DeSantis’s aides had predicted that he would be the center of the attacks. So much for that. Rivals mostly ignored him. In politics, that is a worse fate than forgetting which federal departments you want to abolish.

His first substantial moment, after questioning why the populist anthem Rich Men North of Richmond has become an unexpected hit, turned into a rehearsed attack on Hunter Biden’s overpriced artwork.

We can’t succeed as a country if you work hard and can’t afford groceries, a car, or a new house, while Hunter Biden can make hundreds of thousands of dollars from worthless paintings. (Or, ahem, while the son-in-law of a former president, with no background in private equity, receives $2 billion from the Saudi Public Investment Fund?)

During a lively back-and-forth conversation about Ukraine, DeSantis barely spoke and promised not to send US ground troops, which has never been on the table. Oddly enough, on Day he promised to invade Mexico

1 one

to take out fentanyl laboratories controlled by drug cartels.

As for the other candidates, Callow newcomer Ramaswamy turned out to be clueless about foreign policy.

Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie was unusually demure. Former Vice President Mike Pence, so often robotic and rehearsed,

at least

came alive to insult Ramaswamy.

Former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, the only woman on stage and the only candidate willing to be candid about Trump’s unpopularity, the political impossibility of a national abortion ban and Republican contributions to the national debt, is unlikely to be rewarded for her honesty in the case of a Trump candidacy.

other

Like Haley,

former governor of Arkansas Asa Hutchinson and current governor of North Dakota.

Ron Doug

burgum

whose presence

hardly registered.

who was smart and reasonable and therefore has no chance in the Republican race for the nomination.

DeSantis

‘s

showed last week that there really is no way to outsmart Trump. But he certainly tried.

Echoing the man he wants to beat, he said there’s only one way to deal with a prudent public health official like Fauci: “You bring Fauci in. You put him down. And you say, ‘Anthony, you’re fired .'”

If anything, DeSantis sounded like a Queens mobster when asked if Pence had done the right thing by certifying the Electoral College results on January 6, 2021, eventually saying, “Mike has done his duty. I have no problem with him.’

And just as Trump tells imaginative, unbeatable stories, DeSantis told an absolutely bizarre story that was meant to illustrate the callousness of abortion. “I know a lady in Florida named Penny who survived multiple abortion attempts. She was left in a pan. Fortunately, her grandmother rescued her and took her to another hospital.” (According to the Poynter Institute’s PolitiFact, the Penny in question was born in 1955, long before the U.S. Supreme Court legalized abortion. Her claim has not been corroborated.)

It’s way too early to write the story of Ron DeSantis

S

a political obituary, of course, and his campaign soon announced that he had raised $1 million in the 24 hours following the debate. A quick poll saw him win the night, while Ramaswamy came in second. But most people thought the real winner was still Trump.

It looks like DeSantis will take center stage again when the candidates, likely without Trump, meet at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley on Sept. 27. He will appeal to Reagan, they all will. If they promise again to vote for the Republican nominee, convicted felon or not, Reagan, who is buried on the library grounds, will turn in his grave.

@robinkabcarian