The biggest donors in Republican politics largely shunned Ron DeSantis after his presidential campaign began to falter last summer. So his allies turned to donors the Florida governor still held sway over because of his day job.
A state coronavirus response contractor, CDR Enterprises, gave $1 million to his aligned super PAC Fight Right in the final weeks of the campaign. The DeSantis administration has issued purchase orders to the company worth $158 million to help distribute vaccines, treat patients and provide other services, sometimes through no-bid contracts, according to state records.
Herzog Railroad Services — a Missouri company the DeSantis’s team hired to build a $35 million Orlando commuter rail extension — gave $250,000 around the same time to Never Back Down, another aligned super PAC.
And a casino magnate, Jeffrey Soffer, gave $1 million in late July — on the same day that the campaign announced massive layoffs. DeSantis came out in support of Soffer’s controversial bid to transfer a casino license to his Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach weeks after leaving the presidential race.
People involved in the DeSantis fundraising effort described the dependence on donors with business before Florida as part of a strategic shift born of necessity.
Lobbyist friends and fundraisers of DeSantis called Florida clients asking them to contribute to the super PACs paying for television ads and field operations — and many of those people gave, according to people familiar with the situation who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private discussions. The pitch, according to one person who received a call, was that DeSantis was likely to remain a powerful governor in the state.
Read more here from The Washington Post.
