Former Florida House Speaker Paul Renner reportedly filed paperwork Wednesday to run for governor, becoming the second major Republican to enter the race to succeed Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is term-limited in 2026.
“Many called it the two most conservative years in Florida history,” Renner said of his speakership from 2022 to 2024. “I led a chamber of great men and women … that made Florida what it is today.”
Renner, 48, an attorney from the Jacksonville area, faces an uphill climb against Rep. Byron Donalds, the Naples congressman who entered the race in March with the endorsement of President Donald Trump and a formidable $25 million war chest.
Donalds, already a fixture on the campaign trail, is widely seen as the early front-runner.
Still, Renner argued that the race is far from settled. “Launching now allows us to raise money, reach voters in all 67 counties, and at the end of the day people will look at endorsements, but it will all be based on who they trust,” he said Tuesday.
A close ally of Gov. DeSantis during his time in the Legislature, Renner is not expected to earn the governor’s backing. DeSantis, according to Republicans familiar with his thinking, is quietly working to recruit another candidate to carry his political brand into the contest.
Renner was first elected to the Florida House in 2015 and rose to the speakership in 2022, leading the chamber through DeSantis’s peak years and the governor’s failed presidential bid.
During Renner’s tenure, the Republican-controlled Legislature delivered on DeSantis’s priorities with remarkable speed and discipline.
Renner points to insurance reform long sought by the state’s business community and the expansion of school choice as proof of his record of accomplishment. “There were those who said, ‘You will never get it done,’” Renner recalled, framing himself as a legislator who made conservative promises reality.
Donalds’s entry into the race months earlier did not freeze the field, and Renner’s candidacy makes clear that the primary is likely to grow more competitive.
Other potential contenders loom. Lt. Gov. Jay Collins, a decorated former Green Beret and longtime DeSantis ally, is viewed as a possible candidate.
Collins has already drawn attention for a high-profile trip to California, where DeSantis dispatched him to “ensure” the return of Harjinder Singh, an Indian immigrant accused of killing three Haitian immigrants in a truck accident in Florida.
Singh had already signed extradition papers, leading critics to label the trip political theater, though it showcased Collins as a law-and-order lieutenant governor in a state that prizes toughness.
DeSantis’s wife, Casey DeSantis, remains another name in circulation. Popular among Florida Republicans and deeply connected to the governor’s political network, she has considered a bid but has made no announcement.
For now, the contest sets up as a test between Donalds, the Trump-backed populist, and Renner, the legislative conservative who boasts of delivering “the two most conservative years in Florida history.” Both men will try to claim the mantle of Florida’s next Republican standard-bearer in a state where the GOP has defined national battles over education, immigration, and cultural policy.
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