I often joke that I could be writing about tea taxes in Thailand, but if someone posts, “Well, that would have never happened under Trump,” somebody else will fire back, “Oh, you mean the guy who never reined in Fauci?”

And the arguments will start.

Hundreds of comments later, the Thailand tea tax long forgotten, the conversation will move on to another story and both Team DeSantis and Team Trump will feel they’ve gotten the better of things and head on to the next battle.

I wrote an article last week about the most recent Republican presidential debate, which most polls show DeSantis won easily over opponents like former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy. I live-tweeted the event from a Ventura County GOP debate watch party literally around the corner from the Reagan Library, and I concluded that, at least to the people in that room, Trump won the day despite not even appearing.

Some folks did not like what I reported from the scene:

Takeaways From a GOP Debate Watch Party in CA, a Stone's Throw From the Reagan Library

To summarize, the devotion in that room to 45 was so powerful that even DeSantis’ strong performance swayed almost none of those in attendance to turn to his side.

I admit, as a political observer, the Sunshine State’s governor’s inability to attract more supporters has taken me by surprise. I am by no means endorsing him (or Trump) here, but I think it’s incontrovertible that DeSantis has delivered strong results for the conservative agenda and was one of the most effective leaders in fighting back against the Orwellian government overreach during the autocracy of the COVID era. As someone whose family was deeply (and extremely negatively) affected by the draconian, lawless clampdown of Governor Gavin Newsom’s California regime, I can tell you that was no mean feat.

But to a majority of conservatives and Republicans, DeSantis is still no Trump. To them, the man the tabloids used to refer to as The Donald was the original, the OG, the one who brought us back from the darkness which looked like it was going to descend permanently upon us with eight years of Hillary Clinton. (Back then, we didn’t know that an octogenarian train-obsessed hair-sniffer with a limited IQ would actually turn out to be far more dangerous to our republic than Hillary probably could ever have been.)

These passionate devotees don’t care about Trump’s flaws, they don’t care about his endless legal woes (in fact they see them as proof that the Deep State is out of control and needs to be neutered), and they don’t care that DeSantis has been killing it in ads, legislation, and results.

They just can’t quit Donald J. Trump.

A relative of mine who’s on Team R just isn't moved by what DeSantis does – she simply will never turn her back on Trump. It’s not that she doesn’t like Ron and his achievements—she does—it’s just that she feels an almost familial loyalty to the former president. 

She is far from alone, as virtually every survey shows.

Often people get mad when I report these facts and accuse writers like me who point them out of being Trump bootlickers and sycophants, but what they miss is that I’m not celebrating or decrying the reality—I’m just bringing it to you. And the facts are indeed facts, and here they are:

Poll: Trump Maintains Commanding Lead After Second GOP Debate

This is shown in poll after poll after poll after poll. In the one cited above, Trump holds an almost unheard-of 56 percent edge, while DeSantis came in at 11 and everyone else in single digits. Find your favorite study, it will assuredly show similar results. Even if you don’t believe in the accuracy of polls, when the spread is this wide, it’s impossible to ignore.

Nothing seems to dent Trump’s armor among the GOP base, and nothing DeSantis has done or said seems to have gained him any significant progress in turning these numbers around.

Now I’m not saying that it’s a done deal, or that Donald Trump is 100 percent guaranteed to be the GOP nominee, or that it’s game over. There’s still a long way to go, and if the Democrats get their way, Trump could very well end up in prison—and that would certainly change the dynamic. Trump could have a health scare or say something so outlandish that even his most ardent supporters could balk, or a meteor could hit, or who knows what.

But as it stands now, he holds a massive lead and therefore is effectively the leader of the GOP. Many on the Republican side are thrilled by this fact—but some are not. Whichever side you’re on, the truth is the truth. One could think DeSantis would be the best conservative president the country has ever seen, but they’d be misguided if they were unable to admit that his odds are long at best at this point in the contest. I don’t like the fact that flash mobs recently attacked my local mall recently, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.

People can attack the messengers all they want, but the facts remain: at this point in time, Donald Trump is in an exceptionably favorable position to capture the Republican nomination. If I told you otherwise, just to please those out there who wish it weren’t so, I’d simply be another clone of CNN, MSNBC, the NY Times, and others – a journalistic fraud.

If you’re reading this VIP article, you’re presumably already a member. But if you’re considering re-upping your subscription, or upgrading to VIP Gold (where you get an ad-free experience, exclusive VIP articles and podcasts, and VIP Gold live chats across all of the Townhall Media sites [Townhall, RedState, PJ Media, Twitchy, Bearing Arms, and Hot Air]), use code SAVEAMERICA and get a 50% discount. You’ll be supporting independent journalism and helping us keep on doing what we’re doing despite the ever-present efforts of the censors to silence our voices.