Without mentioning Donald Trump by name, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis urged Republicans to ignore the “static” and focus on conservative issues — or risk fueling President Joe Biden’s reelection victory.
“I hope we’ll be focused on the future of the country, rather than the other static that’s out there right now,” DeSantis said. “A lot of the static, a lot of the things about looking backward, is not going to help us secure this border. That is not going to help these middle-class families who are struggling.”
The second-term Florida governor is Trump’s top rival, but he’s long trailed the former president by double digits in the polls. He also has been pilloried by critics who mock his buttoned-down approach.
DeSantis seemed determined to show a different side of his personality on Friday at the Gathering — the two-day conservative conference in Atlanta — as he cracked jokes about college football, quipped about slow drivers and shared a sentimental story about his son playing baseball in Iowa.
Like other Republican contenders, he has either sidestepped Trump’s criminal charges or echoed a GOP narrative that they amount to a politicized prosecution.
He’s taken a slightly different approach to the 98-page Fulton County indictment, which alleges a vast pro-Trump conspiracy from the halls of the state Capitol to the election office in rural Coffee County.
Ahead of his arrival in Georgia, DeSantis told reporters in New Hampshire that he hadn’t yet read the charges but suggested that District Attorney Fani Willis is misusing her office by focusing on Trump.
“Atlanta has huge problems with crime right now,” he said, “and there has been an approach to crime which has been less than exacting.”
Many of DeSantis’ remarks focused on the conservative policies he adopted in Florida, his ongoing legal battle with the Walt Disney Co., and his pledge to bolster national security.
The Grand Hyatt Buckhead ballroom filled with cheers as he outlined plans to crack down on drug trafficking and leave smugglers “stone cold dead” if they’re caught illegally entering the U.S.
“We are going to authorize the use of deadly force against cartels,” DeSantis said. “If you have somebody coming in with the fentanyl in their backpack, if they even break through the border wall ... that’s the last thing they’re going to be able to do.”
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