Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and first lady Casey DeSantis played golf and had lunch with President Donald Trump on Saturday amid speculation that she is preparing to launch a bid to become the state’s next governor.
The three spent the time together at Trump International Golf Club West Palm Beach, an administration official told Daily Wire White House Correspondent Mary Margaret Olohan.
When asked by reporters on Friday about running for governor, Casey DeSantis said, “To quote the late and great Yogi Berra: ‘When you come to a fork in the road, take it.’”
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and his wife Casey DeSantis had lunch and golfed with President Donald Trump at Trump International Golf Club today, a White House administration official confirms to @realDailyWire.
“Well, I would say one thing,” Florida’s First Lady told…
— Mary Margaret Olohan (@MaryMargOlohan) March 1, 2025
The news comes after Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) announced this week that he was running to become the state’s next governor, a choice he made after Trump encouraged him to run in a social media post where he said that Donalds had his support.
DeSantis touted Casey as his potential replacement, and poured water on electing Donalds, when asked last week about Trump’s endorsement.
“We have such a narrow majority that to be trying to campaign other places and missing these votes, I think, is not something that’s advisable at all,” he said. “And so the reality is we’ve achieved victories in Florida. We need to start achieving those victories up there.”
DeSantis said that Donalds “hasn’t been a part of any of the victories that we’ve had here over the Left, over these last years.”
“He’s just not been a part of it,” he said. “He’s been in other states campaigning, doing that, and that’s fine, but okay, well then deliver results up there. You know, that’s what I want to see. I want to see them delivering results for the people of Florida. We deliver it here all the time for the people of Florida, and that’s what we need to be doing.”
He warned that the state could easily revert back to being a swing state if it was not managed effectively, despite the massive surge in Republican registration there in recent years.
“People ask me all the time about our wonderful first lady, who has done a fantastic job as first lady of Florida,” DeSantis later added.
“I will tell you this — you’re talking about somebody like her — I won by the biggest margin that any Republican’s ever won a governor’s race here in Florida, she would do better than me, like there’s no question about that, that would happen,” he said. “And she’s somebody that has, I think, the intestinal fortitude and the dedication to conservative principles that, you know, anything we’ve accomplished, she’d be able to take to the next level.”
DeSantis said that former conservative icon Rush Limbaugh had once told him that the only other person he would rather see run Florida other than him was Casey.
“His eyes are lighting up because Rush would always say the spouses are more liberal, and it pulls the office holder to the left,” he said. “And on this case, he’s saying, like, that is not true. And so at the end of the dinner, he put his finger in my chest. He’s like, the only person I would rather have as my governor than you is her. And he pointed to her, and I was like, that’s a pretty good endorsement there.”
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) says that First Lady Casey DeSantis would win by even larger margins than he did during his 20-point victory in 2022 and that she would be able to take the state to the “next level.” pic.twitter.com/7DMKcGbSdd
— Ryan Saavedra (@RealSaavedra) February 25, 2025
Mary Margaret Olohan contributed to this report.
