Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis laced into former President Donald Trump Saturday without ever mentioning him by name during a caustic speech in ruby-red Utah.

“Politics is not entertainment,” DeSantis declared at the Utah GOP’s state organizing convention in Orem.
“It’s not about building a brand, it’s not about virtue signaling on social media,” he continued to the crowd, which greeted him with a standing ovation. “It’s about delivering results.”

DeSantis also previewed what may become his major line of attack against Trump: what he called the “medical authoritarianism” that he said the former president permitted in response to COVID-19.

Real leaders, he said, “make the decisions for themselves. They don’t subcontract out their leadership to health bureaucrats like Dr. Fauci.”

Under DeSantis, Florida opened schools and businesses long before other states, drawing Trump’s ire.
“A lot of those decisions were very, very lonely,” DeSantis told the crowd. “Now people look back and … act like they supported them all along. But they didn’t.”

DeSantis, 44, has not yet announced his entry into the 2024 presidential race — but is widely seen as Trump’s biggest obstacle to winning his third consecutive GOP nomination.

In November, 86 of Utah’s GOP officials — including some of the state legislature’s most conservative members — urged DeSantis to run for president in a letter that tacitly rebuked Trump for the party’s poor showing in the 2022 midterm elections.

This year, the Florida governor began touring the country to promote his recently published book and tout his record in the Sunshine State, where he won re-election last year by a 19-point margin.

But new polls have shown DeSantis falling behind a surging Trump, who gained sympathy from outraged Republicans after he was indicted on charges of business fraud by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

A Friday poll of likely GOP primary voters by the Wall Street Journal found that 51% supported Trump, while 38% backed DeSantis — a near-complete reversal of the poll’s December findings, which showed DeSantis leading with 52% and Trump with 38%.

Trump and his campaign have lashed out at DeSantis blaming him for a litany of alleged errors that “left a wake of destruction” in Florida.

Other Republican presidential hopefuls flocked to Iowa Saturday to build support ahead of the state’s crucial February caucuses.

South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, who launched a presidential exploratory committee last week, toured a farm in Cumming, Iowa.

“Are we going to be the country that focuses on grievance, or are we going to be the country that allows the seeds of greatness to germinate?” Scott asked. “I’m voting for germination, greatness, and an American future.”

“Headed to John Deere country today!” former Vice President Mike Pence posted to Twitter, over a video of himself driving one of Iowa’s iconic green riding mowers. “See you soon, Iowa!”

Pence sat for a “fireside chat” at the Iowa Federation of Republican Women Spring Conference in Jefferson Saturday, after a meet-and-greet with voters that saw him crouching down to shake hands with a 4-year-old girl whose mother proudly identified her as a “wee-publican.”

“What a cutie,” the former veep said solemnly.

Pence is expected to announce his candidacy in the coming weeks, joining former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, Michigan businessman Perry Johnson, and radio host Larry Elder in the GOP primary race.

All but Haley and DeSantis were set to address the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition, the state’s foremost evangelical activist group, later Saturday, along with former Rep. Will Hurd of Texas and former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii.

Trump will wrap up the event with a phoned-in keynote address.