Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), once the darling of the GOP as the party looked for answers following President Donald Trump‘s 2020 election defeat, faces an uncertain future, highlighted by an unexpected battle in his final two years as governor.
DeSantis’s term as governor has largely been marked by cooperation between him and the Florida legislature, setting a model for Republicans in other states. A feud over an immigration bill that began earlier this year, however, has raised questions as to whether DeSantis’s power in Florida has faded.
Smooth sailing for first six years
The Florida governor was narrowly elected in 2018, succeeding two-term Gov. and now-Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), and his first term in office was dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic, which began just over a year into his tenure. His handling of the pandemic gained him national attention, largely positive, especially by conservatives, but he did have one high-profile standoff with the legislature late in his first term.
When the Republican-led legislature passed a redistricting map in 2022 that would have maintained a black-majority district in the northern part of the state, DeSantis vetoed the plan. He argued the district was racially gerrymandered and pushed for a map that did not include that district — increasing the number of GOP seats. The legislature later passed his proposal, and the maps withstood various legal challenges.
The state’s Parental Rights in Education bill was passed in 2022. It outlawed classroom instruction in kindergarten through third grade about sexual orientation and gender identity while also forbidding schools from withholding information from parents about students’ health and well-being. DeSantis championed the legislation, and Disney’s vow to advocate the law be repealed led to a multiyear battle between the governor and the state.
The legislature swiftly approved legislation that authorized a state takeover of Disney’s central Florida district, and after a short battle in court, DeSantis and the state prevailed.
In 2022, led by DeSantis’s landslide victory in the gubernatorial race, Florida was one of the few states that saw Republicans win sweeping victories, even as talks of a national “red wave” proved wishful thinking.
As talks of a presidential run continued to mount, the Republican-dominated state legislature was in sync with the governor for all of his proposals, including his fight with Disney. The 2023 legislative session set up much of the platform DeSantis could run on, and lawmakers changed the state law to allow him to keep his office while running for president.
Trump entered the 2024 presidential contest in November 2022. His campaign gained momentum after his first indictment in Manhattan in the spring of 2023 and never looked back. DeSantis’s subsequent shaky campaign launch and his inability to gather steam led to his dropping out of the GOP primary shortly after a distant second-place finish in the Iowa caucuses in January 2024.
While DeSantis fizzled in the presidential primary, he led the opposition to two ballot measures: One sought to legalize recreational marijuana and the other to enshrine abortion through viability. Both measures were defeated during the 2024 election.
Messy immigration fight
Despite his 2024 setback, DeSantis still appeared to have significant power in Florida. However, last month, cracks began to show.
The Florida governor had looked to set the national standard for working with the incoming Trump administration on immigration enforcement by declaring a special session and proposing various initiatives for Florida law enforcement to support federal authorities better.
While DeSantis’s plans and special sessions had typically been met with approval by GOP leaders in the state legislature, state Senate President Ben Albritton and state House Speaker Daniel Perez, both of whom were elected to leadership after the November elections, called it “premature.”
As the Jan. 27 special session neared, DeSantis proposed legislation while leaders in both chambers stayed quiet on what they would do. When the legislature began the governor-ordered special session, both chambers quickly gaveled out of it and instead started their own special session with their own immigration legislation proposals.
“I believe special sessions should be used sparingly. They should not be stunts designed to generate headlines,” Perez said at the opening of the session in a sharp rebuke to DeSantis.
The legislation took aim at the governor by taking immigration authority and designating it to the state’s commissioner of agriculture. The competing legislation was labeled the Tackling and Reforming Unlawful Migration Policy, or TRUMP, Act.
DeSantis called the legislation “substantially weaker” than his proposals and warned lawmakers that putting state Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson in charge of immigration enforcement would be like putting the “fox in charge of the hen house.”
Perez told the Washington Examiner last week that their proposal was “more in line with the vision of President Trump and making sure that all immigration issues ran through the federal government.” He also said they gave Simpson the immigration enforcement ability because his office was “best positioned to carry out the laws of the state when it came to immigration.”
“The commissioner of agriculture is the only office that has a network of physical offices existing today throughout the state and at the same time as boots on the ground, with regard to law enforcement. So we thought we had a good skeleton there to build upon it and put some meat on the bones in order to eventually carry out President Trump’s agenda against illegal immigration,” Perez said.
DeSantis had threatened to veto the legislation, which passed short of a supermajority in the state Senate. Even as DeSantis and state legislative leaders sparred in the media for several weeks, Perez was confident there was not “any disagreement” over what both wanted.
“At the end of the day, the governor is a partner, and even though we have a disagreement, we all want the same good, which is a good which is an illegal immigration bill that supports the president. Once we have that conversation and go through the bill, I’m sure there will be a push and pull that gets us to a final product that we’re all proud of,” Perez said.
Weeks after the initial special session, the governor and the GOP leaders in the legislature announced a new legislative proposal to help the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement and resolved several key disagreements.
Instead of vesting immigration powers in the commissioner of agriculture, a state Board of Immigration Enforcement will be created under the new legislation. The board will be made up of the governor, state agriculture commissioner, state attorney general, and state chief financial officer, and decisions by the body must be unanimous.
After the new special session and legislation were announced, DeSantis praised the leaders for working with him on the refined bills.
“In working together on this bill, Senate President Ben Albritton and Speaker Danny Perez have been great partners, and we have produced an aggressive bill that we can stand fully behind. I thank the members of the Florida House and Senate for delivering on behalf of the people who sent us here. I also thank Agricultural Commissioner Wilton Simpson for his support of this revised product to help combat illegal immigration,” DeSantis said on Monday.
Both leaders in the state legislature also touted the “important feedback” they had received from DeSantis and Simpson and discussed the goals they all had regarding immigration in announcing the refined proposals.
“We are proud that over the last few weeks conversations and debate within the Legislature on
these issues have been civil and respectful. By working together with the Governor towards a
shared goal, these proposals and appropriations ensure Florida continues to lead by example with
the strongest crackdown on illegal immigration in the nation,” Albritton and Perez said in a joint memo.
What the future holds
DeSantis, who is term-limited, has already been floated as a Republican presidential candidate in 2028, but his final two years as governor could make or break those chances.
The road bump in the immigration bill fight could either be a sign of problems to come or an aberration. Amid the stalemate with the governor, Perez told the Washington Examiner he had no concerns over his ability to work with the governor during the latter’s last two years in office.
“This is a disagreement, and disagreements are healthy for the process, healthy for democracy. At the end of the day, we both have a job to do,” Perez said last week. “We’re both going to try our best to make our constituents as happy as they can, as proud as they can be of our state. Move forward. I’m not worried about the working relationship. I think we still have tremendous respect for each other, even though we aren’t on the same page today with regard to the illegal immigration bill.”
Florida is not one of the top target states for 2026 listed by the Democratic Party’s state legislative campaign wing, but GOP primary races in state legislative seats could make their own impact. DeSantis, who has no race to run in 2026, has said his Florida Freedom Fund will support “conservative” candidates.
“The FL Freedom Fund was instrumental in raising huge sums of $ to defeat Amendments 3 and 4 in 2024. For the 2026 cycle, the FFF will raise even more resources (1) to ensure support for a strong conservative gubernatorial candidate and (2) to support strong conservative candidates in legislative primaries. We need to elect strong leaders who will build off FL’s success and who will deliver on the promises made to voters,” DeSantis said in the middle of the stalemate over the immigration bill.
Primaries could play a role in seeing if DeSantis’s power has faded in Florida or if he could gear up for another high-profile run in the coming years.
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Perez was not concerned with DeSantis possibly targeting incumbents in his chamber, saying he would be against any primary challenges to incumbents.
“He has every entitlement to do so, and his authority, but I disagree with that move. But if he were to do that, I’m sure that the House will respond accordingly,” Perez said last week.
