Gov. Ron DeSantis expects to announce his candidacy for president after Memorial Day and from his hometown of Dunedin — that’s according to several media outlets over the past 24 hours — but how much do people know about Dunedin?
It’s a city of about 36,000 residents, based on U.S. Census data. It’s about 90 percent white. There’s more females than men.
Dunedin sits in Northern Pinellas County, the more conservative part of what has been considered a politically moderate county. It has been considered one of the bellwether counties in the country when it comes to presidential elections. The county has voted for the winning presidential candidate in every single presidential election since 1976, with one exception – when George W. Bush defeated Al Gore in the 2000 recount.
So where would a presidential announcement take place in Dunedin? A couple of potential gathering spots come to mind:
The biggest and perhaps most logical location is TD Ballpark, an 8,500-seat facility that is the spring training home for the Toronto Blue Jays and the Dunedin Blue Jays, the team’s Class A minor league squad. It’s where he also practiced and played games while playing on the baseball team at Dunedin High School.
A drawback to that site of course is that as Memorial Day approaches, so does the humidity in Florida, making any outdoor events a physical challenge.
One possible indoor facility is the Conmy Center at Our Lady of Lourdes Church. It has a special events venue with a main hall that has “theatre style seating” that can accommodate 1,041 people, according to the center’s website. The church is located right next to Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic School, where DeSantis received his primary education before attending his high school in Pinellas.
Doreen Saccardo, who books events at the Conmy Center, told the Phoenix that no one from the DeSantis camp has inquired about renting the facility.
Calls to Dunedin Mayor Julie Ward Bujalski and other members of the Dunedin City Commission did not respond to requests for comment.
DeSantis was actually born in Jacksonville in 1978 but moved to Dunedin in 1985. He lived there until he graduated from high school in 1997 and left the area to attend Yale University.
In his recently published memoir, DeSantis says that though he grew up in the Tampa Bay region, he relates culturally more to the Midwest.
“I was geographically raised in Tampa Bay,” DeSantis writes The Courage to Be Free, according to NBC News, “but culturally my upbringing reflected the working-class communities in western Pennsylvania and northeast Ohio — from weekly church attendance to the expectation that one would earn his keep. This made me God-fearing, hard-working and America-loving.”
This week in Tampa DeSantis signed five more bills into law, including a measure (HB 1438) that prohibits children from attending “adult live performances” such as drag shows.
Former Dunedin Mayor Bob Hackworth, a Democrat, notes how LGBTQ+ community businesses have been prominent in Dunedin going back to when DeSantis was growing up there, and it didn’t appear to negatively affect his upbringing.
“If you’re going to make the argument that drag shows are bad for kids, well how’d you turn out all right?” he told the Phoenix. “Going to Harvard and Yale and becoming governor. That’s just a disingenuous argument, and like I say, he just kind of wants to ignore that as part of the narrative, and to me it just speaks to pure hypocrisy.”
Keep in mind that Joe Biden beat Donald Trump in Pinellas County in 2020 by just 1,241 votes out of 561,161 cast, a margin of .22.
Hackworth says Dunedin “votes red but it doesn’t go to the extreme.” He adds that obviously some people in Dunedin like DeSantis, and some don’t. “It’s not like the whole town is crazy to have him as their hometown boy.”
DeSantis represented Florida’s 6th Congressional District from 2012-2018, which encompassed Daytona Beach and areas around the southern Jacksonville suburbs to New Smyrna Beach. He announced his 2018 campaign for governor while appearing on “Fox & Friends.”
Where have other candidates running in 2024 announced their candidacies?
Donald Trump is a native New Yorker who has made Palm Beach his home since leaving the White House in 2021. He announced his candidacy for president last November in front of a crowd who gathered at Mar-a-Lago, his waterfront estate in Palm Beach.
Nikki Haley announced her candidacy on Valentine’s Day via a video and followed up the next day before a crowd of thousands at the Shed at the Charleston Visitors Center in Charleston, South Carolina, the state capital. She grew up in Bamberg, S.C., approximately 73 miles from Charleston.
Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson launched his campaign last month for president in his hometown of Bentonville, Arkansas.
Ohio entrepreneur and author Vivek Ramaswamy announced his candidacy during a live interview on Fox News and a three-and-a-half-minute video in February.
South Carolina U.S. Senator Tim Scott launched his exploratory committee for president last month, but is scheduled to officially announce his candidacy for president in his hometown of North Charleston, South Carolina on May 22.
Florida was similarly home to two Republicans who were considered to be top contenders for the nomination for president in 2015-2016: Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio, both of whom lived in the Miami area.
Rubio made his campaign announcement at the Freedom Tower in downtown Miami on April 13, 2015.
Bush announced his candidacy at the Kendall campus of Miami-Dade College on June 15, 2015.
CNN reports that DeSantis will file his paperwork declaring his candidacy next Wednesday with the Federal Election Commission, with a formal announcement expected to happen from Dunedin the following week.
–Mitch Perry, Florida Phoenix
richard says
DeSantis is not only BAD for Florida, he is TERRIBLE for America. There is a chasm of difference between him and a traditional Republican, and he has shown himself to be a Trump-clone and not a true GOP politician. As Governor, he has acted like an autocratic bully who has his own interests in getting elected at the center of his platform of performance. He does not communicate well at all with others; he is moody and taciturn, scowling and forever plotting, and sees those who disagree with him as Public Enemies. He is NOT what our country is about– or at least should be about. If his type of politician had been in charge of immigration, he would never have let DeSantis’s Italian immigrant grandmother even step off onto the pier at Ellis Island. Remember all the anti-Italian sentiment from “real” Americans like Reed and Johnson who gave us the 1924 anti-immigration act that bears their notorious names? I say NEVER DeSantis.
TR says
I will comment on one this from your post. I can not understand why all the left think that DeSantis is no good. He has done more for this state than any other Governor that I can remember over the past 35 yrs that I have lived here. I would like to point out the biggest thing that any left member has mentioned about immigration is that I have yet to see one time they mention that they want the immigrants to come here LEGALLY. But they just keep saying let them in because it’s the human thing to do. Yea you can let them in but LEGALLY. Most just want to come here because of the free ride on the American $$$. However richard, I believe you’re wrong by saying that Gov. DeSantis’s grandmother would not have stepped onto the pier at Ellis Isl. Yes she would have because she did it LEGALLY just like a lot of other immigrants did prior to the Obama era. That’s when all hell broke loose at the border because the Left couldn’t get the voted from the American Blacks anymore because they were lied to so many time with empty promises, the left had to get a different group of people to vote for them so they are now allowing all those immigrants to come here and the left also wants to past laws to allow them to vote without being an American citizen. IMO that’s BS. I know you won’t agree with this but it’s the truth and you can keep your head in the sand all you want. The truth is sometimes hard to admit to especially when your wrong about something.
Atwp says
TR what did Desantis do for the state?
Laurel says
TR: You’re right, the truth is hard to admit, especially when you are wrong. and a lot of your statement is wrong. I am not party affiliated, and never have been. I’ve always voted for whom I thought was best, so I can say with confidence that what you claim about the left is skewed. For an example: the Cubans came over here by homemade boats, or flotillas as they were also known, and were allowed to stay if they made it to shore. Cuban Americans tend to vote conservative.
No one wants to allow illegal aliens to vote, that’s nonsense. Now let me refresh your memory about Obama. He was known as the “Deporter in Chief.” Recall?
Change the channel, they are lying to you.
Laurel says
Richard: I agree with you. DeSantis is not a real, traditional Republican. They are a rare species these days, and I wish they would take back their party. We need balance, not division. DeSantis is in the process of a hostile takeover of Florida, with the rest of the country in his site.
To hear DeSantis talk, you’d think he would most like to hang out with Thomas in the Walmart parking lot. He claims he is more inline with areas he didn’t live in, over the state he does live in and so wanted to govern: ours. That’s a stinking pile of…
Barbara Royere says
No to De Santi’s as president, he cant govern Florida. It is all about him. He has banned books, if your not blonde & blue eyed don’t live here. Sounds like someone from Germany, several years ago.
He is wrong & we can do better. Wake up Florida this is not paradise
Stephen says
Desantis is wrecking Florida with his fight with Disney. He is trying to kill tourism. That is Florida’s life blood. Why would we want him to be president? He is also trying to shut down the first amendment. But, don’t worry if times get real tough, he will ban another book.
Justsayin says
Disney is doing a rather decent job destroying itself. Its stock has lost almost half its value in 2022 with a whopping 123-billion-dollar loss. As of now, four thousand Disney employees where let go and another three thousand will lose their jobs soon.
They have bigger problems than Ron Desantis. The BLUE state of California with a Disney theme park is projecting a thirty-two-billion-dollar debt as now. Florida is projecting another surplus. But hey, I am sure Californias DEI standards are second to none. and let’s be honest, isn’t that what is the most important these days?
Ray W. says
I am aware that shortly after the pandemic shutdown went into effect in Florida, notices went out to state agencies to prepare for cuts in their budgeted state funding. When Trump signed into law the initial $2 trillion stimulus package, Florida’s share from that pot of money meant that none of the state agencies had to endure the budget cuts. For the last several years, Florida’s legislature has greatly increased its annual budget, using federal stimulus money to balance the budget. Perhaps, you should be thanking Trump and Biden, and the federal Congress, too, for a large part of Florida’s recent comparative good budget fortune.
The pandemic affected millions of employees and thousands of businesses, each in their own way. Disney, an entertainment giant, suffered in its own way.
I am not arguing that you are completely wrong in your points, only that you are far less than complete in your analyses than you could be. Intellectual rigor requires much, but it can make for better arguments than yours.
Justsayin says
You forget some key facts in your commentary. The state of California received twenty-seven billion dollars in the Biden relief package, the most of any state.https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/politics/story/2021-05-10/california-los-angeles-get-billions-in-federal-relief-money-for-pandemic-costs Floridia meanwhile received 8.8 billion from the same relief package. https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2021/06/02/desantis-signs-100b-florida-budget-flush-with-federal-pandemic-cash-1384839
Disney lost over four hundred million dollars on three movies alone in 2022. Was Ron the reason? https://www.sportskeeda.com/comics/disney-lost-400-million-3-major-box-office-flops-2022#:~:text=Disney's%20animated%20divisions%20also%20suffered,three%20biggest%20flops%20of%202022.
John says
The mini Trump, lets see who he will discriminate next. He may think he is qualified to be the Governor or President but what he has shown since being re elected went to his head and now he thinks he can do whatever he wants. Every news station is reporting how unqualified he is. and I agree.
He is an arrogant unqualified guy that think he can do whatever he wants. He is losing money for the State of Florida and he will do that to our country if elected.
bob says
listen go back to your communist run states where the states
and cities are run by communist politicians where lawless
runs rampant or you would rather have these liars who are
running our country evil is good and good is evil. isaiah5-20
Atwp says
Bob, face the real world. Isn’t Florida a communist state with a lot if crime? Wake up man Florida is not the perfect paradise you think it is. Look at the crime across this state. Desantis is bad for millions of people including himself.
Laurel says
Bob: You want me to go back to my communist state? Okay, happily. I was born in Florida and lived here, so far, 71 years. Where are you from?
Sherry says
@bob. . . I’m also a native Floridian who certainly agrees Laurel! Perhaps it is you who should consider living elsewhere. As Isaiah wrote: Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
OK. . . let’s take a look at good and evil. . . I am thinking that “you”, bob, are a trump/republican/FOX loyalist and that you would call them all “GOOD”. . . Correct?
LIARS= Evil, Right? TWICE impeached trump told over THIRTY THOUSAND lies while in office
SEXUAL ABUSERS/DEFAMERS= Evil Right? trump found GUILTY, and must pay 5 MILLION to victim
THIEVES= Evil Right? trump under investigation for stealing CLASSIFIED documents
LIARS/DEFAMERS = Evil Right? FOX broadcasted LIES about the last election and must pay over 787 MILLION
I could go on and on citing the “EVIL” that “you”, bob, think is good. Obviously it is time for some powerful self reflection, along with hate and anger management counseling, bob. Isaiah and Jesus would be so very disappointed in you!
Ray W. says
Since there isn’t even one “communist run” state in America, I find Bob’s comment that evil has become good and good has become evil particularly ironic.
As I have commented before, in my lifetime, perhaps the closest we have come to communist-style governing was when Nixon signed an executive order freezing prices and wages during a long-term run of stagflation.
The Chicago Tribune’s famous 1930’s era editorial proclaiming the Social Security Act a communist threat to the American way of life doesn’t count.
Laurel says
Ray W.: What stuns me is that some minds have been so pumped up with what the average person (am I being generous?) would consider propaganda, or cultist manipulation, that they cannot see through a clear window in front of their eyes. They only see the painting presented to them, eyes wide shut, by those who would benefit by abusing human nature. For example: I have listened to Trump many times, only to be shocked at his marketing manipulations. However, if I turned off the volume, and just watched his body language, I would see equally, or maybe more so, body actions and facial expressions that confirm that he is bullshitting us.
Body language is supposed to be a very high percentage of communication, hence emojis in textual conversations. Yet it seems to be invisible to those who serve these manipulators. Religion has been successful by manipulating fear such as “A good, God fearing man.” which I would wager is a motivator to the commenter here. Both marketing and fear are being used, very successfully, by the current politicians. DeSantis is using both. Will we need a national intervention and deprogramming, or have to wait for it to defuse over time?
It’s just that it confuses me that body language does not override vocal language, and I don’t understand why our brains see body language, which is suppose to help us determine emotions, truth, fight or flight, doesn’t seem to effect those who are influenced by cultist leaders. The brain becomes hardwired to beliefs.
I’m still waiting for a good article explaining conservatism. So many don’t understand it, and should.
Daniel Rousseau says
DeSantis can announce his candidacy from the top of Mount Everest for all the good it will do him. He is basically nothing but a political bully—younger than Trump and a foot or two shorter—but just as big a bully. Ron is a radical, and radicals are dangerous for our democracy, and the goes for radical Republicans and radical Demcrats. DOWN WITH DESANTIS.
Sherry says
DeSantis= Racism and Fascism !!! Take a Good Read of the FACTS and VOTE Accordingly!!!
May 20, 2023- The NAACP issued a formal travel advisory for Florida on Saturday, saying the state has become “hostile to Black Americans” under Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s (R) leadership.
“On a seeming quest to silence African-American voices, the Governor and the State of Florida have shown that African Americans are not welcome in the State of Florida,” the travel advisory reads.
“Due to this sustained, blatant, relentless and systemic attack on democracy and civil rights, the NAACP hereby issues a travel advisory to African Americans, and other people of color regarding the hostility towards African Americans in Florida,” the group added.
May 18, 2023- LOS ANGELES, (Reuters) – Walt Disney Co (DIS.N) is scrapping plans to build a nearly $1 billion corporate campus in central Florida that would have housed 2,000 employees, according to an e-mail to employees on Thursday, against the backdrop of its ongoing legal battle with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
Disney parks chief Josh D’Amaro said “changing business conditions” prompted Disney to reconsider its 2021 plan to relocate employees, including its Imagineers who design theme park rides, to a new campus in Lake Nona.
The company was expected to spend as much as $864 million on the project, according to the Orlando Sentinel, on a campus that would have served as a base for Walt Disney Imagineering and the Disney Parks, Experiences and Products division.
Disney’s decision to move the California-based Imagineering staffers across the country drew complaints from employees, many of whom said they did not want to move to Florida.
Laurel says
Sherry: There should be a travel advisory for women and girls as well that if they should become sexually assaulted, they would need extensive documentation to get justice. If a woman has an ectopic pregnancy, or an encephalitic fetus, her life would be in danger here as she would not be able to get proper medical help. Women will need to be aware that obstetrics here, will be limited, and few and far in between medical treatment facilities.
Travel advisory for trans kids: Make sure you bring enough meds with you when you come here; you won’t get it here. Proper medical care for your particular condition will not be available. Map out only “family restrooms.”
Travel advisory for LBGTQ+ individuals: Don’t go anywhere, you could end up in jail. Bring a bat.
Best to stay home, or find another place to vacation.
Sherry says
Dear Laurel,
Absolutely! Point By Point!
I sincerely do wish we could create a miracle and wake up millions from their cultist coma. I miss my wonderful neighbors from years past who would live the “Golden Rule” and always “Do the Right Thing” by you because their moral upbringing and respect for all humanity and our shared planet.
Justsayin says
The head of NAACP calling for the boycott lives in……………………………. you guessed it. FLORIDA, the Tampa area to be exact. Do you see him moving out of this terriable state? This has more to do with timing. Desantis will announce his candidacy for President today. The issue with CRT and African studies dust up has been more than the last few weeks.
Disney is also shutting down their one-billion-dollar hotel built in 2019. Yet Florida has been experiencing a record number of visitors. Again, Is that Ron’s fault? Disney made some poor decisions over the last few years and the chickens are coming home to roast. It’s not only them, I see BLM is having some money issues: https://www.newsweek.com/black-lives-matter-risks-going-bankrupt-1802304
Dennis C Rathsam says
De Santis won by a landslide!!!! You all keep crying like little babys… Its all you democrats fault… you keep running 1/2 ass candidates!
Richard says
Dennis: Reality check —
“De Santis won by a landslide!!!!” Yes, 19% I don’t know if that really proves anything, other than that he played on the fears of those who thought they were going to be overwhelmed by immigrants and other non-whites. Does the term You Will Not Replace Us — aka YWNRU — resonate with you? It does with the fear-mongering DeSantis, a man who treads very carefully around the eugenicists’s notion of the mongrelization of races in the Free State of Florida.(Eugenics was something that became current in the West in the mid-later 1800s, as immigration to the US from Southern and Eastern Europe — as well as, gasp–Ireland — swelled into the millions to feed our Second Industrial Revolution. Today, we call it plain old racism. (BTW, Hitler learned from the eugenicists and put their thoughts into practice in killing centers like Hadamar (they euthanized physically and mentally challenged Germans beginning in early 1939.) DeSantis is not there– yet, but his authoritarian ways have limited the abilities of those he considers to be “other” to live in peace and freedom, without fear.
Next: Spelling counts — only if you want to be taken seriously, that is.
“You all keep crying like little babys… Its all you democrats fault… you keep running 1/2 ass candidates!”
Babies, not babys. Not its and you democrats, but use apostrophes to denote possessives. It’s it’s, not its, and Democrats’ not democrats — and a capital D would be called for, as well, since this is a proper noun. Finally, 1/2 ass should read half-assed. Notice the hyphen, please. Again, let me emphasize: Spelling counts, but only if you want to be taken seriously.
I am a very old Liberal Arts college instructor, specializing in English Composition and History.
Laurel says
Richard: Everyone makes mistakes, and I know I’ve made my share, and I am sure I will continue to do so, but you will notice over time that there is a pattern here with particular party supporters. It reminds me of phishing for money online. The phisher looks for people who accept bad grammar and/or bad spelling as those victims are more likely to accept the culprit. That particular party seems to do a similar thing by phishing with misinformation and it’s the people who have trouble with spelling and grammar that take the bait. DeSantis, who went to Yale and Harvard pretended to not know what “sanctimonious” meant after Trump referred to him as “Ron DeSanctimonious.”
Barbara Royere says
No to De Santi’s as president, he cant govern Florida. It is all about him. He has banned books, if your not blonde & blue eyed don’t live here. Sounds like someone from Germany, several years ago.
He is wrong & we can do better. Wake up Florida this is not paradise