DeSantis uses California speech to dunk on Trump as ‘one of my residents’

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis used his platform through the California GOP conference to mock the present GOP presidential frontrunner former President Donald Trump.

“I perceive that certainly one of my residents was right here earlier saying that he turned Florida purple,” DeSantis mentioned in his speech on Friday. “I simply want if he was the one which turned Florida purple, that he wouldn’t have turned Georgia and Arizona blue.”

His remarks got here after Trump, who resides in Palm Seashore, Fla., spoke on the similar occasion on Friday — crediting himself as being “the one which turned Florida purple,” not DeSantis.

The Florida governor was referencing the 2020 presidential election, when the 2 swing states each elected Democratic senators and had been turned blue for President Biden. In elections prior, each Arizona and Georgia had been gained by Republican candidates — together with 2016, when the previous president gained every state by slim margins.

Trump continues to say accountability for DeSantis’s success in Florida, saying he was a “awful candidate” earlier than his endorsement.

“He was to date behind, ’trigger, you realize why? ‘Trigger he was a awful candidate, and I endorsed him and he turned like a rocket ship, and he ended up getting the nomination,” Trump mentioned earlier this yr at a marketing campaign cease in Iowa.

“Then I held just a few rallies for him ’trigger he was not going to beat the person that he was operating in opposition to, who on the time was mentioned to be the most well liked man within the Democrat Social gathering,” he added, referring to Andrew Gillum, who misplaced by lower than half of a proportion level.

DeSantis’s feedback in California can now be added to a protracted record of assaults from every of the GOP rivals from abortion coverage to COVID-19 response as Trump holds regular within the lead for the GOP nomination and DeSantis’s numbers proceed to fall within the polls.

Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy had been additionally scheduled to talk on the occasion.