Ron DeSantis & His Wife Casey's Finances Are A Shady Mystery

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Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and his wife, Casey DeSantis, are doing all right! According to a financial disclosure document filed in June 2023, the former naval officer and attorney turned politician's net worth tripled from a modest $319,000 in 2021 to a whopping $1.17 million in 2022. As evidenced in the disclosure, Ron's income that year came from his $141,400 salary as governor and a hefty advance from HarperCollins for his book, "The Courage to Be Free: Florida's Blueprint for America's Revival," released in February 2023. Ironically, the millionaire governor also listed $18,628.66 in student loan debt. By December 2024, per a financial disclosure filing from July, Ron's net worth had reached $2,087,550.32. During that time, however, he had only whittled down his student loan debt by $3,533.57, still owing $15,095.09. A real head-scratcher, indeed. 

Over the years, the Florida governor, who is openly and unabashedly opposed to student loan forgiveness, has also been very candid and transparent about his own student loan debt. "I still have student loans I pay off. I don't think taxpayers should pay my student loans. I should have to pay it. We still have some," the former presidential hopeful confessed to a room full of people. But why exactly does a millionaire still owe on his student loans in the first place? Welcome to the shady side of Ron DeSantis. Unfortunately, that's just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the Florida governor and first lady's shady financial practices. 

If you thought Ron and Casey DeSantis' personal finances seemed shady, you ain't seen nothing yet! In April 2025, the couple came under scrutiny after $10 million from a $67 million Medicaid settlement was directed to the first lady's initiative, Hope Florida, in 2024. As first reported by the Miami Herald, some of that money later went to nonprofits that donated to political committees linked to DeSantis allies. "Money that should've been returned to taxpayers ended up in a political action committee controlled and designated by the governor to fight a political campaign," CBS News Miami investigative reporter Jim DeFede said plainly about the scandal.

It should be noted that the governor has vehemently denied any wrongdoing on his or his wife's part. Merely one day after state prosecutors announced they were opening an investigation, the governor held a press conference in which he referred to the investigation as a "political agenda to try to smear Hope Florida" and also took a Republican member of the Florida Legislature and the whistleblower behind the investigation, Alex Andrade, to task for trying to soil his wife's reputation. "She has led an initiative to help people, and you have one jackass in the legislature — I'm sorry, it's true — who's trying to smear her, smear good people," he said.

As for Andrade, he later responded to Ron's comments in a statement to the Pensacola News Journal. "I think it's inappropriate of him to be complaining about a criminal investigation," he said. "I discovered evidence of money laundering and wire fraud, turned it over to law enforcement."