Ron turns to Casey to help his reboot: Florida’s First Lady will hit the campaign trail MORE this summer – as they try and restart his 2024 race after firing dozens of staffers

Ron DeSantis turns to his wife Casey to jump-start his campaign after several staffers were fired and costs cut due to a massive shake-up of his presidential effort.

Casey DeSantis will begin a series of solo campaign events later this summer after making her Iowa debut earlier this month.

Florida’s first lady has been described as DeSantis’ greatest asset and greatest liability. She was by his side at most of his campaign events, including a swing across Iowa this weekend.

She has an ease with voters that he doesn’t and is comfortable with the one-on-one interactions required in the early voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire.

That’s what a source close to the campaign told NBC news That Casey is a major asset to retail politics who is needed to win Iowa, but which DeSantis himself needs to improve on.

“He needs to find that equipment,” the person said. “He needs to find it quickly.”

She also has a reputation for being the power behind the governor and heavily involved in his presidential endeavors.

And that presidential campaign, which is about two months old, is in the middle of the first reset.

DeSantis’ campaign fired about 10 staffers this weekend, NBC news reported, amid a high financial burnout and as his presidential effort has gained little traction in the polls.

The Florida governor is trailing Donald Trump in scrutiny for the Republican presidential nomination. Trump leads by 36 points in the RealClearPolitics Poll Average.

The former president has put DeSantis in his sights and even called on him to drop out in a speech this weekend.

However, DeSantis shows no signs of giving up, even as his campaign adopts new strategies, including broadening his reach and working on his policy agenda.

“The more people hear of Ron DeSantis, the more they will support him and his vision to restore the sanity of our country and lead our Great American Comeback,” DeSantis campaign noted early Monday.

DeSantis will speak about his faith in Washington DC on Monday morning and hold an event in North Carolina on Monday afternoon. He will be in South Carolina Monday night and Tuesday morning.

The governor will also appear on CNN Tuesday in a rare interview not conducted by a conservative-friendly news outlet.

He will also hold a retreat with powerful donors this weekend in Park City, Utah, Bloomberg reported, as he tries to replenish his coffers with much-needed cash and reassure influential Republicans that his campaign will go to extremes.

“Ron DeSantis will be everywhere for the next few weeks and he’s just getting started,” said his spokesman Andrew Romeo.

DeSantis raised $20 million in the second quarter of 2023 but $3 million of that can only be used for the general election under federal law.

And about $14 million of that total proceeds came from donors who gave the maximum legal amount, meaning about two-thirds of his early backers can no longer donate directly to his campaign.

In addition, his campaign spent more than $1 million on payroll, payroll taxes, insurance and processing costs in the second quarter. It had 92 staff on its books.

As DeSantis tightens his money belt, he will also cut back on travel, emphasizing the early voting areas of New Hampshire, South Carolina and Iowa.

Many around him think DeSantis can repeat what Barack Obama did in the 2008 Iowa caucuses. Obama had a surprise victory over front-runner Hillary Clinton that helped him cross the finish line to the party’s nomination.

Trump also lost the Iowa caucuses in the 2016 Republican presidential primary to Texas Senator Ted Cruz.

Casey DeSantis will be an important part of that effort.

The Florida first lady shone in her first solo campaign appearance earlier this month, talking easily to Iowans about their corn crop, their schools, their families and the weather.

She has become a prominent public face and voice for Ron DeSantis’ presidential campaign and was in Johnston to launch “Mamas for DeSantis” – a national version of the group she founded in Florida to help her husband win a second term as governor to win.

“It’s one thing if your policies come out after us – the mamas. It’s another thing when they come after our kids. And then the claws come out,” she said.

In her speech, she reiterated her support for her husband’s policies — including his “war on wake” — and presented why he should be the next president.

In her 35-minute speech, she focused on three topics: her children, her husband, and God.

She vowed to travel the country to help her husband win the Republican presidential nomination and the White House.

“As long as I have breath in my body, I will fight for Ron DeSantis – not just because he is my husband; that’s part of it — but it’s because I believe in him,” she said.

“If you want someone to go to Washington DC to clean the house, to get this country back on the trajectory we’re talking about – our rights come from our creator and our government is set up to protect our rights that come from being us, he’s the man to do it and if I have to cross this country I will,’ she vowed.

But when she talked about schools and parents’ choice, she got the biggest round of applause from the packed house. Education turned out to be a major issue that garnered votes in the 2022 midterm elections.

It is up to the parents to decide which education they think is best for their children. And the government should, again, get out of the way,” she said.

And she echoed her husband’s “war on wake,” praising him for his policies during COVID that kept the state open and supported parents over teachers.

“By the way, they don’t do the Florida Olympics. There’s no discrimination if you use the wrong pronoun,” she said.

“It was COVID that really sparked a lot of this parental empowerment revolution, because for the first time, parents peered into the classroom and they didn’t like what was being taught that they saw – the sexualized curriculum being pushed for five-year-olds ,” DeSantis said.

She credited Ron DeSantis with “enabling parents to go to the schools and say I want to see what kind of curriculum you teach our kids.” And if they didn’t provide that information to the parent in time, they had a right of action to litigate.’

She said it was that policy that led to his re-election as Florida governor in 2022.

Before her speech, Casey DeSantis, dressed in camo pants, a white tank that reads “Mamas for DeSantis” in orange letters, a crucifix necklace, and tan stiletto heels, worked into the crowd.

She moved easily among the voters, bent down to talk to a little girl, and then said to her mother, “She’s wonderful.”

She shook hands and made small talk, showing the ease with the retail politics that many say her husband lacks. She gave hugs, posed for pictures, took selfies.

‘God bless you. Thanks for the support,” she told a volunteer.

‘We come back often. You’re going to get tired of us,” she told voters.