DeSantis Has Edge Over Biden With Independent Voters in 2024, Polls Show

Independents may have helped to deliver Joe Biden’s win in the previous presidential election, but some early polling suggests that such voters are starting to see red.

Several polls indicate that independents would prefer to send Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican, to the White House come 2024 in a potential match-up against the Democratic incumbent.

The conservative media company InteractivePolls compared four separate polls in a Wednesday tweet. In each one, independents were asked who they would back for president if the 2024 general election were held today: Biden or DeSantis.

The Republican politician earned 39 percent among independents to Biden’s 32 percent in a Harvard/Harris poll. A Yahoo/YouGov survey, meanwhile, placed DeSantis ahead by a whopping 19 points.

At this very early date, such polls indicate that independents want options, according to Cal Jillson, a professor of political science at Southern Methodist University. Such voters are ready to “think about somebody other than Trump and Biden.”

“Independents have watched Trump and watched Biden, and they hope to do better,” Jillson told Newsweek. “And DeSantis is the person who’s in clearest view as an alternative at this point.”

Some social media users pointed to the recent string of polls as reasoning for why DeSantis should be named the upcoming Republican presidential nominee.

Last month, former President Donald Trump announced during a speech at his Mar-a-Lago resort that he would be seeking another term. However, Trump’s reputation is suffering among certain hardline conservatives.

Meanwhile, DeSantis has begun to emerge as a leading figure in the battle for control of the GOP. He outpaced Trump in a recent poll of registered voters by Suffolk University/USA Today.

Almost two-thirds of conservative independents and Republican voters—a full 65 percent—reported that they’d like to see DeSantis campaign for president in 2024. Of those same voters, some 56 percent stated that they would rather him run than Trump.

“There’s a new Republican sheriff in town,” said David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center, in a statement on Suffolk’s website. “DeSantis outpolls Trump not only among the general electorate, but also among these Republican-leaning voters who have been the former president’s base. Republicans and conservative independents increasingly want Trumpism without Trump.”

Earlier this week, the January 6 committee called for criminal charges against Trump for attempting to subvert the results of the 2020 election. Newsweek reported on Tuesday that DeSantis, once a loyal Trump ally, had stayed conspicuously silent on the criminal referrals 24 hours after their announcement.

Biden’s popularity has also waned in recent months. His job approval rating hovered around 38 percent ahead of this year’s midterms, which is “identical” to Trump’s at a similar point in his own term, according to the Pew Research Center.

Jillson told Newsweek that there’s still a solid group of primary-voting Republicans who are sticking by Trump’s side, but that “more and more Republicans are increasingly nervous, and when they get nervous, they look and see DeSantis and think maybe he would do better.”

However, he said, the Florida governor does have room for improvement.

“The problem DeSantis has is that while he may give a decent speech, when he doesn’t know the camera’s on, he goes flat,” Jillson added. “He is not an energetic, dynamic campaigner and speaker. He can be, but he isn’t always, and so he would have to stay the course through a very long and grinding process, and nobody can be sure he would do that without stumbling.”

Newsweek reached out to the offices of DeSantis and Biden for comment.

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