The DeSantis Campaign Could Regret Flirting with Vaccine Skepticism

The pro-Ron DeSantis PAC Never Back Down has earned its name. The organization does, indeed, never back down from attacking former President Donald Trump from almost every available angle. The same can be said for DeSantis’s rapid-response operation. After nearly eight years in which Republican lawmakers and GOP-aligned institutions shied away from criticizing Trump, even when it might have benefited their political interests, the DeSantis operation’s kitchen-sink approach is refreshing and necessary. But in exercising little discretion in the formulation of some of these attacks, DeSantis backers are staking claim to ground from which they will eventually have to retreat.

Donald Trump’s sit-down interview with Fox News Channel host Bret Baier provided the DeSantis campaign’s rapid-response operation, the “DeSantis War Room,” with plenty of fodder. The operation landed a variety of solid attacks on the former president over his apparent confusion about whether the federal convicts whose sentences he supported commuting through legislation should, in fact, be killed by the state. But the War Room also inexplicably committed itself to criticizing Trump for being too supportive of Covid vaccines.

About the Author

Noah Rothman

Noah Rothman is a senior writer at National Review. His third book, Blood and Progress: A Century of Left-Wing Violence, was published by Hachette in May 2026.

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The pro-Ron DeSantis PAC Never Back Down has earned its name. The organization does, indeed, never back down from attacking former President Donald Trump from almost every available angle. The same can be said for DeSantis’s rapid-response operation. After nearly eight years in which Republican lawmakers and GOP-aligned institutions shied away from criticizing Trump, even when it might have benefited their political interests, the DeSantis operation’s kitchen-sink approach is refreshing and necessary. But in exercising little discretion in the formulation of some of these attacks, DeSantis backers are staking claim to ground from which they will eventually have to retreat.

Donald Trump’s sit-down interview with Fox News Channel host Bret Baier provided the DeSantis campaign’s rapid-response operation, the “DeSantis War Room,” with plenty of fodder. The operation landed a variety of solid attacks on the former president over his apparent confusion about whether the federal convicts whose sentences he supported commuting through legislation should, in fact, be killed by the state. But the War Room also inexplicably committed itself to criticizing Trump for being too supportive of Covid vaccines.

About the Author

Noah Rothman

Noah Rothman is a senior writer at National Review. His third book, Blood and Progress: A Century of Left-Wing Violence, was published by Hachette in May 2026.