GOP presidential candidate and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis took aim at former President Trump on Tuesday, claiming that the “swamp got worse’ when he was in the White House.
DeSantis, in an interview with Fox News’s “The Ingraham Angle” on Tuesday, suggested that Trump did not do enough to hold people such as former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and FBI Director Christopher Wray accountable. Like a handful of other GOP presidential candidates, DeSantis has vowed to fire Wray if elected to the White House.
“Well, he had three years to fire Christopher Wray, and he didn’t fire him,” he told host Laura Ingraham. “And, remember, I went to the rallies in 2016, Laura. You remember them, ‘Lock her up, lock her up,’ about holding Hillary accountable.”
“And then, two weeks after the election, he said, ‘Never mind that I said that,’ and let her off the hook,” DeSantis continued. “And so I think, if you look at it — and I give him credit, even though we’re competing, for the great things he did do. But one of the things he did not do was drain the swamp. I mean, the swamp got worse in his four years.”
He added that Trump “had people in power who were not getting the job done.”
DeSantis also claimed that “very swift action” needed to be taken to hold people accountable, noting that, as president, “you have got to make it happen.”
Over the course of several hours, GOP members on the House Judiciary Committee last month grilled Wray with questions about the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and alleged bias in the investigative agency. Many Republicans have accused the Department of Justice (DOJ) and FBI of being politicized under President Biden, as Trump faces two federal indictments handed up by the DOJ.
The Hill has reached out to Trump’s campaign for comment.