The governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, responded on Friday to an article from the Washington Post that suggested he was preparing a new presidential candidacy for 2028. He harshly dismissed the article on social media, as his name circulates in Washington as a possible successor to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.
In a post on X, DeSantis categorically rejected the report from the American newspaper, which relied on three anonymous sources to claim that the governor had already contacted at least one political consultant in view of 2028.
"The Washington Post is making this up out of nowhere. I haven't contacted anyone to aspire to anything. It's just another pathetic attempt to get clicks. Using anonymous sources, of course!" wrote the governor of Florida.
The refusal, however, does not completely close the door to debate on social media. DeSantis did not explicitly rule out a future candidacy, but rather only that he has not begun concrete steps.
Prediction markets assigned him a 13% chance of winning the Republican nomination in 2028 following the midterm election results, an increase of nearly nine points compared to previous weeks.
The immediate backdrop is the catastrophic defeat of the Republicans on Tuesday. The Democrats secured control of both chambers of Congress. In the House of Representatives, they held 254 seats compared to 162 for the Republicans, with several races still pending.
Florida resisted. Republican Byron Donalds won the governorship and Ashley Moody retained her Senate seat, but by historically narrow margins. DeSantis himself described the national debacle as a “level-extinction event” for the party.
DeSantis at the Pentagon?
In that context of republican crisis, on Wednesday CBS News revealed, also citing anonymous sources, that Trump was consulting advisors about whether to keep Hegseth in charge of the Pentagon.
One of those sources indicated that DeSantis was the name being discussed as a potential replacement, with the advantage that he could be confirmed by the Senate during the transition session and take office when his term as governor expires on January 5, 2027.
Neither the White House nor DeSantis have confirmed that rumor. Trump dismissed the possibility of replacing Hegseth in front of the U.S. press: "No, I think he's doing a very good job," he said.
Spokesperson Anna Kelly issued a statement of "full confidence" in Hegseth and praised the military operations in Iran and Venezuela.
The potential arrival of DeSantis at the Pentagon has a significant implication for the Cuban-American community in South Florida.
Hegseth has played a leading role in the military pressure politics towards the Cuban regime. He warned in June from Guantánamo that Cuba would "quickly find out" the consequences of acquiring weapons capable of reaching the base, and in August he declared from Panama that "all options are on the table, including military ones" regarding the island.
DeSantis has cultivated that same image during his years as a political leader in Tallahassee. He signed law HB 905 at the Bay of Pigs Museum, the proclamation to commemorate Cuba's Independence Day in Florida on May 20; and in October, he declared that he wants to see Raúl Castro in U.S. courts for the downing of aircraft from Brothers to the Rescue.
In the horizon of 2028, DeSantis would compete in the Republican landscape with Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State and also a native of Florida.
The relationship between Trump and DeSantis, which experienced a bitter split during the 2024 primaries, gradually began to mend. The governor suspended his campaign on January 21, 2024, endorsed Trump, and the two met privately near Miami months later.
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