Ron DeSantis

Ronald Dion DeSantis (born September 14, 1978) is an American politician, attorney, and former naval officer serving as the 46th governor of Florida since 2019. A member of the Republican Party, he served from 2013 to 2018 as the U.S. representative from Florida's 6th congressional district. DeSantis was a candidate for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, withdrawing his candidacy in January 2024.

Born in Jacksonville, Florida, DeSantis graduated from Yale University with a Bachelor of Arts and from Harvard Law School with a Juris Doctor. He joined the U.S. Navy in 2004 and was promoted to lieutenant before serving as a legal advisor to SEAL Team One. He was stationed at Joint Task Force Guantanamo in 2006 and was deployed to Iraq in 2007. When DeSantis returned to the U.S. about eight months later, the U.S. attorney general appointed DeSantis to serve as a special assistant U.S. attorney at the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Middle District of Florida, a position he held until his honorable discharge from active military duty in 2010.

DeSantis was first elected to Congress in 2012 and was reelected in 2014 and 2016. During his tenure, he became a founding member of the Freedom Caucus and was an ally of President Donald Trump. He briefly ran for U.S. Senate in 2016 but withdrew when incumbent senator Marco Rubio sought reelection. After winning the Republican nomination in the 2018 gubernatorial election, DeSantis defeated Tallahassee mayor and Democratic nominee Andrew Gillum by 0.4%.

DeSantis was governor during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as during major hurricanes Ian, Helene, and Milton. He encouraged the passage of the Parental Rights in Education Act and the Heartbeat Protection Act. In the 2022 gubernatorial election, he defeated former governor Charlie Crist by 19.4%, the largest margin for either party in a gubernatorial race since 1982. In his second term, DeSantis signed Florida Senate Bill 266 and established the Florida departments of Commerce and Government Efficiency. On May 24, 2023, DeSantis announced his candidacy for the Republican nomination for president of the United States. On January 21, 2024, he withdrew from the presidential race and endorsed Trump.