Governor DeSantis has just responded to Donald Trump’s interview last night with Megyn Kelly where Trump told several “bold-faced lies” about how DeSantis handled Florida. (The clip is at the bottom)
DeSantis begins by highlighting how Trump used to praise him for the way he handled Florida and has only recently changed his tune because he’s a threat to him:
“He used to praise Florida for having been open. He used to say I was one of the country’s great governors. He said we handled COVID correctly and brilliantly. So he used to say that and he was on record always saying that. Now, because I’m a threat to him, that’s when he’s now changing his tune.
Some of the things he’s saying are just bold-faced lies. We never mandated mRNA COVID shots. In fact, I called a special session of the Florida legislature to prevent any mandates in the state. And not just by the state government or local government, we provided protections for employees at private businesses, which a lot of establishment Republicans basically were saying business should be able to do whatever they want.”
DeSantis pointed out that what’s ironic about this is that the media in Florida tried to use Trump’s White House against him when he was opening things up and preventing mandates in his state:
“A lot of the attacks that I suffered from through the balance of 2020 was the media in Florida leveraging the Trump White House against me and saying, ‘oh, the governor isn’t following the Trump White House directives. He has restaurants open, he has schools open, he has all that stuff.’ So they really used that White House Task Force as a cudgel to try to beat me over the head to try to portray me as being reckless because we had opened the state and we were doing all that. So that’s just the reality.”
He also points out that he was the one opposing Fauci when he was popular, which wasn’t an easy thing to do…
“And then on Fauci, I’m the one that sold ‘Don’t Fauci my Florida’ shirts like two years ago, ‘Don’t Fauci my Florida’ flip-flops. This has been a rallying cry that we stood up to Fauci in Florida. The free state of Florida would not have been what we are were it not for us standing up to Fauci. That’s the bread and butter of what we’ve done to fight against Fauci.
And here’s the thing: I fought against Fauci when he was popular. It’s easy for Republicans to ding him now because he’s unpopular with the broader electorate. Back then, Donald Trump used to cite Fauci’s poll numbers as a reason why Fauci was somebody that should be listened to. He said, ‘Fauci has got these great poll numbers, but we’re listening to Fauci, why don’t we have the same poll numbers?’ And his campaign for reelection, in October of 2020, they were running videos where Fauci is bragging that ‘Donald Trump did everything I told him to do.’ They were putting that out as a positive message for their candidate!
DeSantis responds to Trump lying about the presidential commendation he gave to Fauci:
“And then, of course, he did give Fauci a presidential commendation his last day in office. Megyn asked him about it, and he said, like, ‘what was that?’ Was that the immaculate commendation that just happened to happen? It said, ‘Donald Trump awards Fauci this commendation.’ So I thought it was really pathetic to sit there and listen to that drivel. It is totally false.”
Lastly, DeSantis dings the people interviewing Trump and refusing to call him out on his lies:
“And you know what? People in your business who have their own shows, they know all of that’s false too. We’ll see how many of them are willing to step up to the plate and call a spade a spade.”
Watch the full clip below:
Stop what you’re doing and watch this.
🔥 DESANTIS GOES OFF on Trump’s false attacks over COVID and his many excuses for not firing Anthony Fauci:
Trump “used to praise Florida for having been open. He used to say I was one of the country's great governors. He said we handled… pic.twitter.com/ydphVZmYTg
— DeSantis War Room 🐊 (@DeSantisWarRoom) September 14, 2023