Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis slammed Florida GOP officials on Friday for cancelling this election season’s Republican primary gubernatorial debate.
The Republican Party of Florida announced earlier on Friday that there won’t be a GOP gubernatorial debate at the upcoming Sunshine State Showdown, scheduled for June 27 in Hollywood, because Trump-endorsed candidate Rep. Byron Donalds is the only candidate who’s met the debate qualifications.
The required qualifications include scoring at least 10 points in a GOP party poll and raising over $10 million from at least 10,000 donors, according to the Florida Phoenix.
“In a state as large and diverse as Florida, with its multiple media markets and complex political landscape, this remains a reasonable and accessible threshold,” Republican Party of Florida executive director Bill Helmich said in a statement.
The @FloridaGOP has released the debate thresholds.
As I was the 1st to post earlier this week, the thresholds are similar to the National GOP.
It includes a 10% polling threshold, donation threshold, and signature threshold.
All completely STANDARD.
Only Donalds met them. pic.twitter.com/oSsdvEP3Ex
— Robert J Salvador (@RobertJSalvador) June 12, 2026
Asked about this decision while speaking about Medicaid fraud during a press conference in West Palm Beach, DeSantis accused party officials of trying to “engineer an outcome” in the gubernatorial primary race.
“There should be a debate,” he said. “They said they were going to do a debate. They didn’t put out the criteria publicly. I don’t think the RPOF ever voted on any type of criteria. I’ve heard secondhand what the criteria was. I wouldn’t have qualified when I ran in 2018 for what they were trying to do.”
“And so it’s counterproductive when you try to engineer an outcome because you need a coalition of voters to do well. And this may be a tough cycle for Republicans if you look at some of the indicators, the way things are trending. And so having an open process and having people be able to have their say is always better than to try to engineer an outcome,” he added.
DeSantis also critiqued the idea that the party itself should be in charge of debates.
“You don’t need the party to control it — they have no authority to control debates,” he insisted. “We did a debate when I was running 2018. We did one on Fox News and had nothing to do with the [party]. … And so you can do something like that having nothing to do with the party.”
“You know, the party has a very limited role. It’s really – it should be a candidate-driven process and not for people to be making decisions who voters have never voted into those positions to begin with,” he concluded.
FL’s @GovRonDeSantis criticizes the @FloridaGOP‘s debate criteria, saying the party should not “engineer an outcome” in the governor’s primary:
“There should be a debate… having an open process and having people be able to have their say is always better.” https://t.co/8QMoiTDYz0 pic.twitter.com/aEWM3pd3gE
— Forrest Saunders (@FBSaunders) June 12, 2026
Adding to the controversy is the fact that the Florida GOP had earlier offered a Sunshine State Showdown speaking slot to candidate James Fishback, who’s been accused of antisemitism over his fierce criticism of Israel. Then, after complaints began to flood in, including from Jewish Rep. Randy Fine, the party reversed course.
“After conversations with numerous Republican leaders, grassroots activists, and stakeholders from across Florida, it has become clear that entertaining Mr. Fishback’s overtures to participate in official Republican Party activities was a mistake,” party chair Evan Power said in a statement reported by Politico.
Power also cited Fishback’s “antisemitic and racist attacks on members of our party.”
Responding via a statement to Politico, Fishback said that the “same Republican Party of Florida that refuses to host a debate is now mad at me for agreeing to a debate with CBS News in Jacksonville on July 15th. What a joke.”
He added that he intends to hold his own rally on the same night as the GOP state convention.
“I guarantee that we’ll have more people there than them,” he concluded.
BREAKING: James Fishback breaks Florida GOP rules, announcing he’ll join unsanctioned debate hosted by Jacksonville CBS affiliate.
This puts his standing with the Republican Party in jeopardy. We reached to RPOF for comment. pic.twitter.com/R0cm7secvY
— Florida’s Voice (@FLVoiceNews) June 12, 2026
Former Florida House Speaker Paul Renner, another GOP gubernatorial candidate, told the Phoenix that the whole process has “been rigged from the start.”
