State Sen. Jason Pizzo, First Lady Casey DeSantis, U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds, and state Rep. Angie Nixon are potential gubernatorial candidates.
Published on March 2, 2025 at 4:51 pm
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Statewide campaigns are already starting
History could be made next year if Casey DeSantis becomes governor, as the extremely online contingent of Ron DeSantis supporters want.
She’d be the first Florida first lady to be governor – and the only one besides Lurleen Wallace of Alabama that immediately comes to mind.
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The first female governor. The first former host of First Coast Living as well.
Yet as any student of history knows, history does not happen on a smooth trajectory. Real history is borne of conflict. And Casey DeSantis, despite having a closet full of expensive Disney princess dresses, would not simply be coronated.
She would have to go through Donald Trump and his endorsed candidate, U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds.
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Donalds, a New Yorker who came to Florida at 17 for college, is a few years younger than the first lady. But that might as well be a few decades. Whereas the first couple come off as the youngest Boomers in history, Donalds is conversant in hip-hop (he recently weighed in on the Drake vs. Kendrick Lamar beef on the Bill Maher show) and is able to talk about his favorite cognac (Hennessey White, for the record) and cigars, as he did with me when I interviewed him for the New York Post last year.
Conversely, Casey DeSantis is not exactly built for tough questions. My relationship with her hasn’t recovered from the time I asked her about taking Mori Hosseini’s plane on a trip to Jacksonville for a press conference.
Of course, the Republican primary won’t be decided by a reporter’s isolated interactions with the candidates. But my experience is that Donalds is a lot more comfortable with adverse questions and less-than-friendly venues than is Casey DeSantis, who was incubated on local TV news and who has sought out fawning interviewers since her husband became a statewide commodity.
National conservative media ranging from the Clay and Buck Show to Laura Ingraham also reflect the changing times. Both of those hot properties on the right have signaled their expectation that Donalds will get a first term before the DeSantis family gets its third.
Legislators in Tallahassee, many of whom were burned by being strong-armed into backing DeSantis over Trump as the 2023 legislative session ended and the governor evaluated budget requests for local projects, may not all be weighing in. But they do say privately that the governor’s top-down, heavy-handed management style has gotten old. And implicit in that critique is they expect more of the same if Casey becomes governor. The words “Imelda Marcos” may have been used in conversation.
Democrats will run something of an opposition campaign. South Florida Sen. Jason Pizzo will play to moderates, in what young people and activists will call a “Republican lite” campaign. If you wanted Gwen Graham in 2018, you likely will be pushing for Pizzo, even though he’s not exactly a North Florida guy.
Closer to home, Rep. Angie Nixon of Jacksonville hasn’t gotten much done in the Legislature beyond building a mail list and antagonizing people on both sides of the aisle. But she’s increasingly prominent nationally and isn’t shooting down persistent rumors that she will run for governor as she fundraises around the theme of “building for the next fight.”
Given the deep GOP entrenchment in Florida, a Democrat has as much chance of winning here in November as a Republican does in California. But partisan primaries aren’t about winning the general election so much as they are ideological litmus tests.
No one expected Andrew Gillum to win 17 months before the Democratic primary in 2018. And Nixon could have the same path, if she is able to assemble a coalition of women, Black voters, and younger voters of all races as Gillum did. It would help, of course, if more moderates got in the race to crowd Pizzo’s moderate lane. Stranger things have happened though.
Turning back to the Republicans, the downballot action merits mention.
While Gov. DeSantis picked his former Chief of Staff James Uthmeier to be attorney general, he’s not getting elected to a full term without a primary.
Enter Matt Gaetz, whose exit from consideration for U.S. A.G. does not preclude him running in Florida.
While Gaetz has higher intraparty negatives than most, he’s a skilled retail politician, who, like Donalds, knows how to talk to hostile media. His talk show on conservative One America News Network gives him a daily platform also. He’d be the Trump slate candidate.
The chief financial officer position will likely be filled by appointment once incumbent Jimmy Patronis gets elected to Congress in April, and that selection from the governor could be loyalist Sen. Blaise Ingoglia. Trump likes Sen. Joe Gruters for the position though. Gruters is loyal to Trump and loathed by the governor.
That will be a lively primary also.
Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson, an egg farmer in the age of bird flu, likely won’t face a primary. Simpson is massively wealthy, poised to be endorsed by everyone outside the DeSantis orbit in Tallahassee, and probably unbeatable by the caliber of politician who would settle for that job.
It’s hard to imagine Democrats making a serious play for these offices in 2026, meanwhile, given they didn’t in 2022.
