Sarasota Republican Christian Ziegler wins race for Florida GOP chair
Florida GOP activists elected Christian Ziegler as the new Republican Party of Florida chair Saturday, elevating a longtime party stalwart from Sarasota who has pledged to remain neutral as two Floridians, former President Donald Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis, appear poised to clash in the 2024 GOP presidential primary.
Ziegler, 39, has been involved in politics at the state and local levels for years. He worked for U.S. Rep. Vern Buchanan, R-Longboat Key, and was highly active with the Sarasota GOP before serving as a Sarasota County commissioner.
Ziegler also has been vice chair of the Florida GOP for the last four years and a GOP state committeeman for a decade. His wife, Sarasota County School Board member Bridget Ziegler, is well known in political circles.
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The likely contest between Trump and DeSantis served as the backdrop for the race between Ziegler and Leon County GOP Chair Evan Power. The growing feud between the two GOP heavyweights could put pressure on Republicans to pick sides, and nowhere is that tension more acute than in Florida.
Ziegler also has been an ardent Trump supporter, even traveling to Washington D.C. on Jan. 6, 2021 and attending the rally that proceeded the riot at the U.S. Capitol, which he says he did not participate in.
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Yet Ziegler said he is equally supportive of DeSantis and was active in his re-election campaign, including kicking off one of the governor’s final rallies this year in Sarasota. And Ziegler's wife has been a DeSantis favorite among local education leaders.
“We’ll let the presidential primary play itself out; from my standpoint I’m focused on the internal party organization," Ziegler said recently.
Sarasota has been a hotbed for ambitious GOP leaders. Ziegler takes over as chair from Sarasota state Sen. Joe Gruters.
Under Gruters, registered Republicans surpassed registered Democrats for the first time, Trump carried Florida in 2020 and DeSantis won his reelection campaign in a blowout.
Ziegler is taking over a party that has been incredibly successful. He is likely to keep pushing the party to deepen it's digital operations, an area he knows well. He owns Microtargeted Media, a digital marketing public relations and public affairs firm that works on GOP campaigns.
This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Florida GOP picks new chair as Trump and DeSantis poised to clash
