Senator Scott is emerging as a potential challenger to Governor DeSantis in the fight to be seen as the main alternative Republican candidate to President Trump.

Mr. Scott, of South Carolina, has been having a moment over the past week, releasing a new ad targeting evangelical voters in Iowa, announcing a healthy fundraising haul for the second quarter, and meeting with donors who have backed Mr. DeSantis up until this point.

The new ad, titled “Foundation,” features Mr. Scott, who is deeply religious, speaking to an audience in a church and holding a bible saying, “If we want a better America, I think it starts with faith in God and faith in each other.”

“Our country is founded upon a Judeo-Christian rock. Our rights don’t come from a government, they’re inalienable, they come from a creator,” Mr. Scott said. “What’s missing in our public life so often are the values embedded in the gospel.”

The ad is aimed at courting evangelical voters in Iowa. In the state, 28 percent of voters consider themselves evangelical Christians, and 77 percent consider themselves Christians generally, according to Pew Research.

In terms of fundraising, Mr. Scott’s campaign announced a $6.1 million haul in the second quarter of 2023. The campaign also touted that he’s received donations from more than 53,000 individual donors, meaning he has surpassed the 40,000-donor threshold needed to appear on the GOP debate stage in August.

At the same time, the candidate’s Trust in the Mission PAC announced it had raised some $19.3 million in the second quarter of the year, ending the quarter with more than $21 million in cash on hand.

“As he prepares to take the debate stage, it is clear he not only is the best messenger and most consistent conservative in the race, but also has the resources to win,” Mr. Scott’s campaign manager, Jennifer DeCasper, said in a memo.

While Mr. Scott’s fundraising is well behind that of Messrs. Trump and DeSantis and Mr. Scott’s fellow South Carolinian, Ambassador Haley, there are other signs that the winds might be blowing in Mr. Scott’s direction.

Billionaire Ronald Lauder, a one-time supporter of Mr. Trump who has been backing Mr. DeSantis’s campaign thus far, recently flew to South Carolina to meet with Mr. Scott, according to reporting by Politico.

The meeting comes as some top GOP donors are seen as losing faith in Mr. DeSantis to present a credible challenge to Mr. Trump for the GOP nomination. 

The billionaire chief executive of Citadel, Ken Griffin, for one, recently said that he “continues to assess the field,” in a statement released by a spokesman after previously saying that he would back Mr. DeSantis.

A billionaire media mogul, Rupert Murdoch, is also turning away from Mr. DeSantis and is attempting to recruit Governor Youngkin of Virginia to run, according to reporting by the New York Times.

In the polls, Mr. DeSantis is struggling to make headway against Mr. Trump, with his numbers essentially stagnant nationally since he entered the race.

When Mr. DeSantis announced his candidacy on May 24, he was polling at 20.6 percent to Mr. Trump’s 54.1 percent. Today, he is polling at 21.2 percent to Mr. Trump’s 49.4 percent, according to FiveThirtyEight’s average of polls.