Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo pressed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis about his flailing 2024 presidential campaign during an interview on “Sunday Morning Futures,” and the politician was quick to pivot and pin the blame on media narratives.
“What’s going on with your campaign?” Bartiromo asked bluntly. “There was a lot of optimism about you running for president earlier in the year.”
Referencing a Politico Playbook article titled “Failure to Launch,” which analyzed DeSantis’ stalled campaign from poor polling to fundraising drop-off, Bartiromo asked, “What happened?”
But according to DeSantis, who burst into laughter during Bartiromo’s questioning, there is nothing to see in those numbers — it’s all just media “narratives.”
“Maria, these are narratives,” DeSantis responded. “The media does not want me to be the nominee. I think that’s very, very clear. Why? Because they know I’ll beat Biden.”
But Bartiromo has more bad news to bring up. The anchor cited a recent Fox News poll that showed Donald Trump ahead of DeSantis by 34 points. Trump handily led the field with 56%, DeSantis claimed 22% and former Vice President Mike Pence snagged just 4%.
DeSantis didn’t address those numbers, but he did confirm he plans to be a part of the Aug. 23 Republican debate, which Trump has hinted he may not attend.
“I look forward to doing it,” DeSantis said. “I think really, Maria, that’s when people are really going to start paying attention to the primary. I think up to this point, a lot of that has been about some of these legal cases. And I think a lot of the voters are concerned about that and understandably so. We’re going to be able to talk about the vision and I look forward to doing it, I’m glad to get started.”
Back in April, Trump took to Truth Social to share his thoughts about the debate. At the time, he wrote:
“I see that everybody is talking about the Republican debates, but nobody got my approval, or the approval of the Trump campaign, before announcing them. When you’re leading by seemingly insurmountable numbers, and you have hostile networks with angry, Trump- and MAGA-hating anchors asking the ‘questions,’ why subject yourself to being libeled and abused? Also, the second debate is being held at the Reagan Library, the chairman of which is, amazingly, Fred Ryan, publisher of The Washington Post. No!”
Fox News will host the first Republican debate, with anchors Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum moderating, next month.
