Ron DeSantis' 2024 Chances Have Unraveled in a Matter of Weeks

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis' chances of winning the 2024 election have fallen dramatically over the past few weeks, according to bookmakers.

In late November, DeSantis, who is anticipated to announce a White House bid, was widely tipped to replace Donald Trump as the de-facto leader of the GOP.

The hype around DeSantis winning the 2024 GOP presidential primary gathered ground as he cruised to a re-election victory in the 2022 midterms; whereas Trump was widely blamed, including by those in the party, for a poor midterm performance as several MAGA candidates he endorsed lost their races.

Some Republican figures also felt that the party should move on from Trump in 2024 as an escape from the media focus, as well as legal issues that engulf the former president.

As a result, many betting sites including Betfair, William Hill, Sky Bet, and Paddy Power, declared that DeSantis had overtaken Trump as the favorite to win the 2024 election.

In November 2022, in the wake of the midterm results, Betfair listed DeSantis as the 13/5 favorite to win the 2024 Election, overtaking Trump at 9/2.

By January 2022, while DeSantis' odds had shortened to 9/5 with Betfair, Trump became the favorite at 6/4.

Sam Rosbottom, a Betfair spokesperson, has since confirmed that DeSantis' odds have lengthened to 6/1 from 9/2 in April.

"Odds on Ron DeSantis winning the 2024 presidential election have drifted to 6/1 from 9/2 in the past month, with recent polls favoring Donald Trump to be the Republican nominee to challenge Joe Biden next year," Rosbottom told Newsweek. "Trump is the 4/7 odds-on favorite to be the Republican nominee, with DeSantis trailing him 10/3."

As noted by Oddschecker, which aggregates betting odds from numerous sources, DeSantis is behind in the betting market to several other leading betting companies, including ones that previously named him as the favorite in 2024 such as Coral, and BetVictor.

Elsewhere, the Election Betting Odds website was giving DeSantis a 35 percent chance of clinching the GOP nomination in 2024 in late March, with Trump ahead at 52 percent.

However, in recent weeks DeSantis' chances have steadily fallen. He is currently at a 23 percent chance of winning the GOP primary, with Trump way ahead, at a 63 percent chance of victory.

A major concern for DeSantis is his failure to win support despite the legal issues plaguing the former president recently.

On April 4, Trump became the first U.S. president in history to be charged with a crime and pleaded not guilty to 34 felony counts of falsifying business records relating to hush money he arranged to be paid to adult film star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 presidential election to silence an alleged affair between the two.

One month later, a New York jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing former Elle columnist E. Jean Carroll and then defaming her character while denying the accusations.

Despite this, recent polls have shown that Trump is gaining more support among GOP voters, with DeSantis' declining.

An Emerson College Survey conducted after the New York jury ruled in favor of Carroll in her sexual battery lawsuit showed Trump commanding a 56-point lead over DeSantis (70-14) when likely GOP voters in Kentucky were asked who they want the party's next presidential candidate to be.

Trump's polling numbers saw an eight-point increase from a previous Emerson College poll in April, with DeSantis dropping nine points from 23 percent to 14 percent.

DeSantis recently downplayed his struggling poll numbers against Trump during a recent trip to Japan. "I'm not a candidate, so we'll see if and when that changes," he said.

Newsweek has contacted DeSantis' office via email for comment.

Update 5/15/2023, 12:31 p.m. ET: This article has been updated with new odds and comment from Betfair.