Swamp Monsters

Trump vs. DeSantis—the Greatest Show on Earth (or at Least in Florida)

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By Matt Dixon

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$14.99

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$19.99 CAD

“Delivering juicy details with unrelenting speed and force” (Jonathan Allen), Swamp Monsters is the wild inside story of how Donald Trump made a star of Ron DeSantis and then set out to destroy him—a struggle for supremacy that has turned Florida into the crucible of the new GOP and of America's future—by “one of the keenest and best-sourced observers of Florida’s political maelstrom” (Rick Wilson).

Ron DeSantis was struggling through Florida’s political wilderness when, in late 2017, Donald Trump extended his hand. Ambitious but charmless, DeSantis was a relatively obscure figure even within his own state’s Republican party, and an unlikely pick for the GOP’s gubernatorial nomination. But when Trump took to Twitter and praised him as “a brilliant young leader” and “a true FIGHTER,” everything changed—for DeSantis, for Florida, and for the country. Today, as Florida governor and a GOP presidential frontrunner, DeSantis sits within striking distance of the Oval Office, and his onetime benefactor has turned into his most formidable opponent. Florida, meanwhile, has mutated from the country’s biggest swing state into the stronghold of the extremist wing of the Republican party—a place where COVID denialism and culture-war antics have been battle-tested, and where the nation’s political future might just be forged.
 
In Swamp Monsters, veteran Florida journalist and NBC News senior national politics reporter Matt Dixon pulls back the curtain on the titanic clash between a one-time kingmaker and a would-be king, showing how the battle between Trump and DeSantis has escalated, how it might end—and what it will mean for the country.

  • "An enjoyable, if horrifying, soap opera."
    The New York Times Book Review
  • “Dixon… has a deep well of sources to explain [Florida’s] governor… Trump once called DeSantis a ‘brilliant cookie.’ Read within to watch him crumble.”
    Kirkus Reviews
  • “Matt Dixon is one of the keenest and best-sourced observers of Florida’s political maelstrom. In Swamp Monsters, he captures the war between Donald Trump and his former apprentice, Ron DeSantis, with insight, clarity, and deeper analysis than anyone else. Florida is America’s laboratory of crazy ideas, and Matt is your tour guide.”
    Rick Wilson, co-founder of the Lincoln Project and #1 New York Times bestselling author of Everything Trump Touches Dies
  • Swamp Monsters is the right book at the right time by the right author. It drops the reader right into the eye of America’s political hurricane, delivering juicy details with unrelenting speed and force.”
    Jonathan Allen, #1 New York Times bestselling coauthor of Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton's Doomed Campaign and Lucky: How Joe Biden Barely Won the Presidency
  • “As a native Florida man, I know that the politics of my home state are tougher to crack than the Zodiac Killer’s cipher—but fear not, fellow truth-seeker: Matt Dixon is here. Swamp Monsters is an alternately haunting and hilarious first draft of history. We may never fully understand the chaos that it covers, but Dixon documents it all a way that makes me believe that he does, which I find oddly comforting.”
    Billy Corben, director, Cocaine Cowboys and God Forbid
  • “Florida Swamp Thing vs. New York tabloid creature: the ultimate political fight, told masterfully here by Matt Dixon. Who will win—and at what cost?”
    Marc Caputo, national politics reporter, The Messenger

On Sale
Jan 9, 2024
Page Count
320 pages
ISBN-13
9780316397339

Matt Dixon

About the Author

Matt Dixon is a senior national politics reporter for NBC News and the former Florida bureau chief for POLITICO. One of the best-known and sourced political reporters covering Florida politics, he has played a key role in NBC News’ 2024 presidential election coverage and has lived in the Sunshine State since 2008, where he came immediately after graduation to work for The Villages Daily Sun. A Wisconsin native and a graduate of Marquette University, he now lives in Tallahassee with his wife, Ana, dog, Betsy, and cat, Momo.

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