It begins: The unconventional candidacy of the conventional Ron DeSantis
Timothy P. Carney
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Gov. Ron DeSantis’s (R-FL) presidential announcement told us plenty of things about the media, cable news, the internet, and Ron DeSantis. But not all of it was easy to notice at first glance — or, rather, first listen.
Announcing his presidential run on Twitter’s audio-chat function was supposed to show that DeSantis doesn’t need the traditional media. This message has a dual valence: For one thing, DeSantis, like former President Donald Trump, is running against the liberal media as much as he’s running against any opposing candidates. Also, DeSantis, despite being a governor and a former congressman with a typical politician’s resume and fairly traditional conservative view, believes he can and must appear as unconventional. Trump’s win in 2016, his dominance of the party since then, and the direction of many state-level primaries have sent a clear message that the party’s base rejects standard conservative politicians.
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Announcing on alternative media allowed a conventional conservative to give off unconventional vibes. There were obvious risks to this new format, and, sure enough, many things went poorly.
The beginning of the event was marred by connection issues, and when it finally began, DeSantis’s announcement of candidacy, part of an awkward back and forth with the uncompelling host, David Sacks, was stilted and boring.
His boilerplate campaign pitch was just that: boilerplate. He began the session with a flat delivery of standard conservative talking points and criticisms of Biden.
An audio-only interview with a tech investor didn’t allow for any of the slickness or soaring rhetoric we are used to from major presidential candidate announcements. That might be fine because soaring rhetoric isn’t one of DeSantis’s skills.
After the technical difficulties and the flat opening, the format actually showed its upsides. Sacks asked substantive questions on complicated issues. This allowed potential Republican primary voters to know DeSantis’s positions, but it also showcased DeSantis’s strengths: his intelligence and preparedness.
DeSantis is smarter than the average governor and is neither raving nor senile, which gives him a leg up on his most likely opponents in the primary and the general election, respectively.
Compare the Sacks and DeSantis back and forth to the Kaitlan Collins vs. Trump town hall on CNN. CNN’s town hall was simply a dog park in which Collins and Trump each tried to establish dominance. (Trump, of course, won.)
All Republican presidential hopefuls understand that any nonconservative media is apt to be hostile out of a desire to gratify the audience or at best clueless about what sort of questions would be informative to Republican primary voters. DeSantis on Twitter spaces was closer to a job interview, with GOP voters as the hiring managers.
We shouldn’t overanalyze the event, either its hits or misses, as no normal person will remember this a month from now. But we should mark the moment as the first real effort of major politicians to tear down traditional media. The technical failures and uncompelling opening might be enough to dissuade other candidates from taking comparable risks. But on the other hand, it seems inevitable that the current television news edifice sits on a crumbling foundation.
As long as the baby boomers Biden and Trump sit atop our political system, their system, cable news, may stand. But after them, the deluge. Nobody knows what the next generation of news media will look like (or sound like), but it will be more decentralized and more online.
DeSantis could be a central figure in the media reconfiguration because he’s not a candidate for the last 20 years of media. He’s no Barack Obama or Trump — neither soaring nor roaring. He’s stilted but smart.