DeSantis lashes out at Trump when asked if he’d back him as 2024 nominee

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) lashed out at former President Trump on Thursday after being asked whether he would support Trump if he became the GOP nominee next year. 

“What I would say is this: When you are saying that [former New York Gov. Andrew] Cuomo did better on COVID than Florida did, you are revealing yourself to just be full of it,” DeSantis responded. 

“Nobody believes that,” he added to applause. “And you know why I know that? Because I remember in 2020 and 2021 when he was praising Florida for being open, saying we did it much better than New York and Michigan, and everyone was coming to Florida, and that we were one of the great governors in the United States.”

DeSantis then circled back to the original question and said, “It’s like, I want to beat Biden, OK? I will do that. I will get that done. And I think, more importantly than that, I will actually bring these policies for a landing and get it all done up there.”

“But it’s an important process, and you respect the process and you respect the people’s decisions, how this goes, but I’m very confident that those decisions are going to be positive for us,” he said. 

Trump’s campaign has attack the governor in recent days over his handling of the coronavirus pandemic. On Tuesday, the Trump campaign rolled out a 30-second spot accusing DeSantis of shutting Florida down and referring to him as “lockdown Ron.”

The DeSantis campaign hit back, calling the spot “bizarre.” The campaign rolled out its own video with a compilation of clips of Trump praising Florida for being “open” during the pandemic.

In March 2020, DeSantis declared a state of emergency in Florida in response to the pandemic. He then imposed a stay-at-home order on April 1, 2020, which was considerably later than other states.