Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis launched his first full-day presidential campaign on Thursday. Sputtering Twitter Rollout The night before, it held a series of interviews with friendly conservative pundits and announced in-person events in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina next week.
For DeSantis, the immediate challenge appeared to be to get past a rough kickoff and appeal to mainstream Republican audiences, after a frequent Twitter debate with billionaire Elon Musk. rice field. Lost in online right-wing frustration And voters stay away from the issue To tell They care most about the economy and so on.
DeSantis defended his decision to announce his campaign on social media platforms, acknowledging that a “small fraction” of Republican primary voters use Twitter.
“I had a feeling there was going to be a lot of talk about this,” he told conservative radio host Eric Erickson on Thursday afternoon. “And I think that was probably the biggest news in the world yesterday.
DeSantis also tried to turn attention back to his escalating rivalry with former President Donald J. Trump, whose ardent supporters have become one of the biggest obstacles to the gubernatorial race. DeSantis launched a series of jabs at Trump as he launched his media assault, noting how often the former president attacked him.
“I think a lot of what he’s doing is showing people that he understands that I have a chance to beat him,” DeSantis said on a New Hampshire radio station. because no one is criticizing it now,” he said. “It’s just me.”
Trump’s team “if they don’t think I have a chance, they won’t do it,” DeSantis added, arguing he had a better chance of winning independent voters.
At the same time, DeSantis pardons Trump on “The Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Show,” along with many others including defendants indicted under federal law if he wins. suggested that it might be possible to consider On January 6, 2021, the Houses of Parliament will be attacked.
“On day one, we will bring people together to investigate all these incidents, look at who are the victims of weaponization and political targeting, and be proactive about issuing amnesties,” he said on Jan. 2. He answered the question of the day. He granted six pardons, but cited other cases that he claimed represented federal law enforcement “use of weapons.”
“Some of these cases may have technical violations of the law, but there are three others who have done the same thing in contexts like BLM and they are not prosecuted at all. If so, it is an unequal application of “justice,” he added, referring to the Black Lives Matter movement. “So we’re going to find a way to keep that from happening and then exercise our powers of clemency.”
Asked directly whether Trump himself might be included in his review, DeSantis said: “There are many instances of detrimental treatment based on politics and weaponization, both large and small. I think it will be included in the review,” he said.
The governor avoided mentioning Trump during Wednesday’s unfolding at a delayed livestream Twitter Spaces event with the platform’s owner, Musk, but the event was plagued by problems such as: Technical glitch causes dead air and intermittent mic heat.
One person listening to the Twitter announcement was Trump himself, at least for a while.
“I did my best for the first 30 minutes,” Trump said in an interview as he headed to the seventh tee at a golf course outside Washington. “Then everyone turned off.”
Mr Trump has yelled at the development, calling it a “disaster” and saying he “doesn’t know if it’s recoverable”.
“He’s very dishonest, but he has no personality,” Trump said of DeSantis. “And without character, politics is a very difficult task.”
DeSantis’ next goal is to return to a more traditional campaign, running from May 30 to June 2 in the first three states of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. is planned. The campaign will visit 12 cities over the next four days. He visited the city as the first leg of his Great American Comeback Tour.
DeSantis will kick off Tuesday with his campaign’s first in-person event in Des Moines. He will be in Iowa on Wednesday before heading to New Hampshire on Thursday and South Carolina on Friday.
“Our campaign is committed to spending time winning these early candidate states,” DeSantis’ campaign manager Genera Peck said in a statement.
Election campaigns for presidential primaries are often tense and grinning, especially in the early stages.
It will be interesting to see how Mr. DeSantis interacts with people on his travels. He was also awkward when meeting voters on the boardwalk, leading to ridicule from Trump and other detractors.
DeSantis is expected to need a victory in Iowa and at least a close second-place finish in New Hampshire to show he can effectively challenge the former president, especially if other candidates are facing political challenges. Race because you could sense the possibility and jump into the election.
On Thursday night, DeSantis will attend a reception with major donors at a Miami hotel as the team ramps up its fundraising efforts. Despite the Twitter mishap, his campaign said it had raised more than $1 million online in the first hour of Wednesday night.
DeSantis’ team gathered donors in the Four Seasons Miami conference room in the city’s financial district to hear the Twitter space.
Two participants said it didn’t work at first. The hotel’s audio-visual system was also glitched, as was the live stream, forcing donors to try to listen on their mobile phones while having drinks at the bar and chatting among donors. But the general atmosphere was one of excitement, insiders said.
On Thursday, senior DeSantis campaign officials told donors they believed the night was a success, even if it didn’t live up to the original script. The faction wants to move fast, take risks, and confuse skeptics.
Still, DeSantis’ decision Thursday to say he wasn’t on the platform Twitter and talk more about things like diversity programs at public universities than about inflation left many Republicans baffled.
“With such an announcement, he appealed to the 0.2% of voters likely to vote Republican,” said veteran Republican pollster Whit Ayers. “His strategy is on another level than anything I’ve ever understood.”
