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Ron DeSantis

Also Known As Ronald Dion DeSantis, DeSantis

Education

  • Graduated with a B.A. magna cum laude - Yale University
  • Graduating Juris Doctor cum laude - Harvard Law School

Overview

Ronald Dion DeSantis is an American politician, attorney, and former military officer serving since 2019 as the 46th governor of Florida. A member of the Republican Party, DeSantis represented Florida's 6th congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2013 to 2018.

Born in Jacksonville, DeSantis spent most of his childhood in Dunedin, Florida. He graduated from Yale University and Harvard Law School. DeSantis joined the United States 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 he returned to the U.S. a year later, the U.S. Department of Justice 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 in 2010.

DeSantis was first elected to Congress in 2012, defeating his Democratic opponent Heather Beaven. During his tenure he became a founding member of the Freedom Caucus and was an ally of President Donald Trump. DeSantis frequently criticized Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. He briefly ran for U.S. Senate in 2016, but withdrew when incumbent senator Marco Rubio sought reelection. DeSantis won the Republican nomination for the 2018 gubernatorial election and chose state representative Jeanette Nuñez as his running mate; in the general election, he defeated the Democratic nominee, Tallahassee mayor Andrew Gillum, by 0.4%.

As governor, DeSantis resisted taking measures to slow the spread of COVID-19 that other state governments implemented, such as face mask mandates, stay-at-home orders, and vaccination requirements. In May 2021, he signed into law a bill that prohibited businesses, schools, cruise ships, and government entities from requiring proof of vaccination. DeSantis cut spending in Florida, which, combined with federal stimulus payments and increasing sales tax revenue in 2021-22, led to a record state budget surplus. He engaged in recovery efforts after Hurricane Ian and Hurricane Nicole. He was reelected in a landslide victory over Charlie Crist in the 2022 Florida gubernatorial election; his 19.4% margin of victory was the state's largest in 40 years. 

Early Life

DeSantis was born on September 14, 1978, in Jacksonville, the son of Karen DeSantis (née Rogers; her family name was originally Ruggiero before her father, Philip Ernest Rogers/Ruggiero, the son of Campanian parents who immigrated from Italy to the U.S., changed it and Ronald Daniel DeSantis.He is Italian American. All of his great-grandparents were born in Italy, and they were originally from comuni in the provinces of L'Aquila Caserta (Caserta), Avellino and Campobasso 

DeSantis's paternal grandfather was Daniel DeSantis, born in Beaver, Pennsylvania, to Italian parents who immigrated to the U.S. during the Italian diaspora, Nicola DeSantis and Maria Nolfi, who were born in Cansano, province of L'Aquila, in Abruzzo region, Southern Italy. His maternal great-great-grandfather, Salvatore Storti, immigrated to the U.S. from Italy in 1904, eventually settling in Pennsylvania. His great-great-grandmother Luigia Colucci joined her husband in the U.S. in 1917.

DeSantis's mother was a nurse and his father installed Nielsen TV rating boxes. His parents met while attending Youngstown State University in Youngstown, Ohio, during the 1970s and moved to Florida during that decade. His family moved to Orlando, Florida, before relocating to Dunedin, Florida, when he was six years old. His sister Christina Marie DeSantis was born on May 5, 1985, in Orlando and died in 2015 at age 30.He was a member of the Little League team from Dunedin National that made it to the 1991 Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. DeSantis attended Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic School and Dunedin High School, graduating in 1997.

After high school, DeSantis studied history at Yale University. He was captain of Yale's varsity baseball team and joined the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity. He was an outfielder on the Yale baseball team; as a senior in 2001, he had the team's best batting average at .336. While attending Yale he worked a variety of jobs, including as an electrician's assistant and a coach at a baseball camp. DeSantis graduated from Yale in 2001 with a B.A. magna cum laude.

After Yale, he taught history and coached for a year at Darlington School in Georgia. He subsequently attended Harvard Law School, graduating in 2005 with a Juris Doctor cum laude.

DeSantis is a Roman Catholic. DeSantis met his wife, Casey Black, on a golf course at the University of North Florida. A former television host for the Golf Channel and WJXT, she married DeSantis on September 26, 2009, at Walt Disney World. The couple lived in Ponte Vedra Beach, near St. Augustine, until it was drawn into the neighboring 4th district. They then moved to Palm Coast, north of Daytona Beach. They have three children. He is a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the American Legion.

DeSantis played on the field the day of the 2017 congressional baseball shooting, and while not present at the time it occurred, he and fellow Representative Jeff Duncan reportedly met the perpetrator beforehand and were asked by him whether Republicans or Democrats were playing that day.                                 

Career

  • governor of Florida - American politician , attorney , former military officer

Recognition

Reference

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