Ron DeSantis Doesn’t Understand the Media
The Florida Governor blames the media for his failures, but he mishandled journalists and news executives from the start.
If Donald Trump is the best publicist since P.T. Barnum, Ron DeSantis is the least media literature Ivy League graduate besides Claudine Gay. The Florida governor blames the media for his losses. The mainstream attacked him, the conservative producers stuck with Trump–the list of how journalists allegedly harmed him goes on and on. But DeSantis is wrong. He failed in the media, not because of journalists, but because the governor mishandled journalists, editors, bookers, and media executives from day one.
There are many reasons DeSantis lost. He pushed a six-week-abortion ban, and, as Ryan Girdusky wrote in a fantastic essay, he stacked his campaign with veterans of Ted Cruz’s failed 2016 presidential campaign. Throughout his numerous failures, DeSantis has shown a misunderstanding of how Americans consume news and the purpose of media companies.
The issues began before DeSantis even launched his campaign. His advocates funded several Florida-based conservative outlets, such as the Florida Standard, to promote him. DeSantis went on to vow to only deal with conservative media outlets. Since then, the Florida Standard has shut down, and DeSantis has turned on conservative media, accusing them of promoting Trump over his campaign.
Here, DeSantis operated based on two errors about how Americans receive their news. Americans don’t read outlets branded to a specific city or state outside the New York Times. Nobody was going to be flocking to the Florida Standard. (Florida also isn’t very well known for its standards, so the name made no sense.) Secondly, conservative outlets have tons of viewers, listeners, and readers; however, many Americans just watch the news casually. There’s a reason Trump goes on CNN, and Steve Bannon screams about “flooding the zone with shit”: Americans–yes, even conservative Americans–watch all sorts of content. You need to be everywhere, or at least try to be everywhere. Otherwise, you’re missing voters.
Fundamentally, DeSantis misunderstands the media. He thinks they exist to anoint candidates. He’s angry that conservative outlets didn’t pick him as the nominee, but that’s not the media’s role or business model. If the media had picked the nominee, far-lefty journalists would have anointed Bernie Sanders as the nominee in 2016 and 2020, and conservative outlets wouldn’t have chosen Trump in 2016. Most conservative media didn’t get on board with Trump’s campaign until he won the nomination in 2016.
But the media doesn’t pick a nominee. Quite frankly, media outlets aren’t organized enough to conspire that way.
DeSantis is correct that the media is political. Many journalists are ideologues. Many push their own agendas. More than anything, they act out of fear, worried about offending their tribe of reporters. DeSantis was looking like a loser, so the media ditched him. It’s that simple.
Beyond politics, the media wants to entertain more than anything. CNN boosted Trump in 2016 more than anyone because it exists to sell ads, and Trump delivered viewers. Once they recognized that attacking Trump would bring viewers, CNN anchors criticized Trump. It’s show business.
This worked, of course, because Trump always delivers soundbites and narratives. Trump still dominates coverage because he gives the media a story to tell while seeming natural. Meanwhile, DeSantis looks like the worst media-trained person in history. He would have been better off being his awkward self than delivering weird smiles every five seconds.
Of course, for this to have worked, DeSantis would have needed a better story than “I’m going to ban abortion like I did in Florida.” Americans don’t care that much about Florida (and I say this as someone who lives in Florida!), and COVID-19 was several years ago. People are worried about the border, crime, and inflation. COVID-19 restrictions are so 2020.
So, how should DeSantis have handled the media? He should have gone broad. He should have launched his campaign with as many cameras and reporters in attendance as possible instead of his disastrous Twitter spaces. He should have attacked journalists while also speaking to as many as possible on and off the record. He should have stopped the smiles. And he should have delivered a better message than “Make America Florida.”
He still could have attacked the media. You can attack journalists and then get dinner with them afterward. That’s how the news sausage gets made. Trump knows this. Sure, he launches assaults on journalists as much as MSNBC attacks him, but Trump is always playing ball with as many people as possible.
DeSantis might be smart, but he can’t thread a media needle. No matter the media strategy, he probably still would have failed because DeSantis isn’t a media creature, and he’s an awful campaigner. As we learned from DeSantis’s constant staff turnover, you can change your staff a zillion times, but if the candidate still sucks, there’s nothing any consultant could fix.
Instead of blaming the media or his team, DeSantis should look in the mirror.