Florida GOP will require DeSantis, Trump to sign loyalty pledge to make primary ballot

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Gov. Ron DeSantis and former President Donald Trump are finding that the price to make the 2024 Florida primary ballot is going up.

All GOP candidates will have to pledge their loyalty to the eventual Republican nominee to make the March 19 primary, a contest that could tip the balance of the crowded race since Florida’s contest is a winner-take-all primary.

This is a significant change from 2015, when multiple candidates — including two from Florida — were running for president.

The Republican Party of Florida approved the change at its executive board meeting held in mid-May and included the new provisions in an updated version of its bylaws that it filed with state election officials but have not been widely distributed.

The new oath, which includes a promise to "endorse" the GOP nominee and requires a candidate to pledge not to run as an independent or third-party candidate, mirrors language adopted by the Republican National Committee for its first debate.

“We were trying to be consistent with what the debate was requiring,” said Evan Power, vice chair of the Republican Party of Florida, who said that campaigns were notified about the changes. “I don’t think this will come as a surprise.”

The change by Florida Republicans comes amid an ongoing back-and-forth from some Republican presidential candidates about whether they would support the nominee, especially if it’s Trump, who remains mired in legal trouble. Chris Christie called a loyalty pledge a “useless idea” and said it wasn’t needed until Trump came along.

DeSantis last month sidestepped a question about whether he would “support” Trump if he was the nominee, although at a later campaign event he added that candidates should “respect the outcome of the process.” Trump himself has equivocated about supporting the nominee, saying in one radio interview earlier this year it would depend on who it was.

Neither the DeSantis nor Trump campaigns immediately responded to a request for comment on Wednesday.

Besides the governor and former president, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez is also running for the GOP presidential nomination.

Candidates who want to make the primary ballot have until Nov. 22 to turn in a signed, notarized pledge. The party is required to submit the final list of candidates to state election officials by Nov. 30.

Florida Republicans also made other changes to the requirements to be on the primary ballot, including putting in additional requirements designed to entice GOP candidates to attend the party’s “Florida Freedom Summit” planned for early November.

Candidates who agree to attend the summit only have to pay a $25,000 qualifying fee to make the March 19 primary while those who skip the party event will have to pay $100,000. A candidate can avoid paying the fee if they collect signatures from Florida Republicans to make the ballot — but that has been increased from a total of 3,375 signatures in 2015 to a total of 56,000 now.

“The goal is to have people come to the summit,” said Republican Party of Florida Chair Christian Ziegler in an interview by telephone. “We want them to come to our big event for the cycle.”

Ziegler added that the previous signature requirement was too low and easy for someone with an email list to come up with. He said party officials looked at what is required to make the ballot for governor — which is more than 144,000 — and went with an amount that was lower than that.

Power said the executive board passed the changes easily, with the only real debate being over the right number for the petition signature requirement.

“No one was upset about it at the time,” Power said.