On Sept. 1, 1939, the Second World War began in Europe. Britain and France declared war on Germany after it invaded Poland.
Despite a few probes and side campaigns, the Western allies didn’t act as if it was a real war until the invasion of France in May 1940.
The British branded those eight months “the Phoney War.” But it inevitably ended, and the war became all too real.
The 2024 campaign’s Phoney War is over.
For six months after Donald Trump’s announcement, while Trump has hammered away at Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor has stayed on the sidelines.
He’s been busy doing his job, signing a dizzying array of his conservative proposals that the Florida legislature enacted into law.
But aside from a few thinly veiled jabs at Trump, he hasn’t publicly gone to war for the presidency. That ended Wednesday.
DeSantis has used the time well, building a vast and well-funded campaign operation and collecting endorsements. He touts an unprecedented army of campaign workers on the ground that will knock on doors in the early primary states.
Trump, leading in national polls, acts as if the race is over already, even speculating that he might skip the debates.
But historically, late May isn’t that late to start. Trump in 2016 and George W. Bush in 2000 both entered in mid-June; Joe Biden entered the 2020 race in late April.
Even before announcing, DeSantis was running closer to Trump in the early states and far ahead of any other Republican.
Now DeSantis gets to introduce himself to a national audience that has heard his name a lot, but hasn’t really met him.
Trump is almost 77 and has been famous for more than 40 years. Biden is 80 and ran for president in 1987.
Hillary Clinton had been at the center of our politics for a quarter-century by 2016. American politics hasn’t had a fresh face in some time.
No scion of wealth
DeSantis is, in some ways, a throwback.
Republicans used to nominate men of humble beginnings such as Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon and Dwight Eisenhower, but have lately taken to scions of wealth and privilege such as Trump, the Bushes, Mitt Romney and John McCain. DeSantis is the son of ordinary middle-class Floridians who worked his way through college.
The party used to nominate military veterans; DeSantis served in the Navy in Iraq. Republicans used to run big-state two-term governors such as Reagan and George W. Bush; DeSantis has proven his ability to govern diverse, populous Florida and turn it much redder in his re-election.
At 44, he would also be the first GOP nominee under age 50 since Nixon in 1960, and the first under 60 in two decades.
From COVID to the culture wars to law enforcement, Trump’s instincts have been less important than his inability to impose his will on the government and mobilize public opinion behind him.
DeSantis has excelled at both.
In 2022, Trump pushed the party into nominating a raft of failed candidates; DeSantis picked winners in Florida and has shared the wealth of his fundraising prowess. He will not be outworked or outhustled.
After seven years of Trump’s leadership of the party, Republican voters deserve a real choice. Now they have one.
It’s on.
