To the delight of most and dismay of the loyalist few, and despite halfheartedly launching his third presidential campaign, a reluctant Donald Trump is (hopefully) riding off into the sunset, besieged by lawsuits and poor mid-term election results. But have no fear: the new sheriff in town, two-term Florida governor Ron DeSantis, is situating himself to take over the fight against Black people, the ‘mainstream media’, gay and trans people, ‘ineligible’ voters, immigrants, criminals and anyone to the left of Genghis Khan. DeSantis is (at least stylistically) everything The Donald is not: handsome, hardworking and with a presentable family and good grasp of policy issues. In short: Trump with brains.
But DeSantis is no return to the traditional Republicanism presided over by golfers and bankers. He has situated himself as leader of angry hordes of rednecks set to make America great again – if they can only figure when it was last great. He is taking up the cudgel in the culture wars by purging education of everything from ‘critical race theory’ to ‘gendered lessons’.
