Now that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has officially joined the pool of GOP candidates for the 2024 presidential election nomination, former President Donald Trump is ramping up criticism of his one-time ally.
In a video posted to his Truth Social account Thursday – shortly after DeSantis’ Wednesday campaign announcement on Twitter Spaces – Trump seemingly blamed the governor for COVID deaths.
“How about the fact that he had the third most deaths of any state having to do with the China virus, or COVID? Even [former Democratic New York governor Andrew] Cuomo did better,” said Trump, who owns the Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Fla.
According to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Florida did have the third most deaths overall from COVID-19 (34,554), behind Texas and California. However, Florida’s death rate per population ranked 18th overall.
Though Florida did put some COVID-19 mitigation efforts in place, DeSantis had an anti-mandate approach for much of the pandemic. This January, he announced “a common-sense legislative proposal to make permanent COVID-19 freedoms in Florida,” described as a “strong pro-freedom, anti-mandate action will permanently protect Floridians from losing their jobs due to COVID-19 vaccine mandates, protects parents’ rights, and institutes additional protections that prevent discrimination based on COVID-19 vaccine status.”
DeSantis just officially announced his candidacy, but he has been considered Trump’s strongest contender in the GOP for months. As of Thursday, polls still showed him trailing far behind Trump but considerably ahead of the other potential Republican candidates.
Just as polls have kept an eye on DeSantis over the past months, so has Trump. In March, Audacy reported that the one-term president was researching potential nicknames for DeSantis, including “Tiny D” – it appears that Trump has settled on variations of “Ron DeSanctimonious,” so far. Trump also said this month that he thinks DeSantis has “no personality” and that Florida’s six-week abortion ban may have gone too far.
Legislation in Florida focused on LGBTQ issues, including the notorious “Don’t Say Gay” law, has brought nationwide attention to DeSantis over the past year. This legislation sparked an ongoing Feud with Disney.
“And look at Disney and what a mess it is,” Trump added in his Thursday video. “Could have worked out an easy settlement. But no, he wanted to show the fake news what a tough guy he is. He’s not.”
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