Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis ripped California Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom during a speech Sunday in the Golden State, saying Californians are fleeing the state in droves to live in Florida where he said they can live freely.
DeSantis’ remarks on Sunday took aim at policies enacted by California and other liberal states that he claims have led to the hemorrhaging of residents who have migrated to the Sunshine State.
‘I know you’ve got a lot of problems out here, but your governor is very concerned about what we are doing in Florida so I figured I had to come by,’ DeSantis joked at the top of his remarks at the Ronald Reagan Library to a crowd of more than 1,300.
Newsom has specifically taken aim at Florida in recent years with the rise of DeSantis in the national limelight.
The Dem governor came under fire this week for leaving California for ‘personal travel’ on Friday – two days after declaring a state of emergency in the wake of a huge snowstorm which dumped 17 feet of snow. His press office did not disclose where exactly he had traveled to and he was expected to return to California on Sunday.
DeSantis’ tour around the country promoting his new book, including the stop in California, is only fueling speculation that he is moving closer toward announcing a candidacy for president. The Florida governor is making a trip to the first-in-the-nation primary contest state of Iowa on Friday.
A big focus of the tour is DeSantis getting the chance to lay out his ‘blueprint for America’ – a perfect tee-up for a presidential run announcement.
‘When I tell you I’m going to do something, I do it,’ DeSantis insisted to a sold-out crowd. ‘I don’t waffle.’
The Florida governor was in Simi Valley at the Ronald Reagan library to promote his new book The Courage to Be Free: Florida’s Blueprint for America’s Revival. He arrived Sunday afternoon with his wife and Florida first lady Casey DeSantis and their two eldest children Madison, 6, and Mason, 4. Their youngest, Mamie, was not in tow.
DeSantis spent his speech on issues that are likely to be the cornerstone of a presidential platform – education and parental rights, not bowing to ‘woke’ institutions and taking on spiking crime.
‘I’m going on offense on all of these issues,’ DeSantis said, claiming that when he first became governor in 2018 he made a pledge to ‘not leave any meat on that bone.’
He specifically called out policies in California several times, even mentioning his war with Disney and mentioning how the Golden State handled the ‘woke’ corporation differently than he did in Florida.
‘I’m looking at them through the lens not just a governor – but I’m looking at them through the lens of a dad and I believe parents in the state of Florida should be able to send their kids to elementary school without having an agenda jammed down their throats,’ he said, referencing his Parental Rights in Education law, which he signed last year.
‘They should not be teaching a second grader that they can choose their gender that is wrong. And that is not going to happen in the state of Florida,’ he said to loud cheers.
‘And I know you have a company down the road in Burbank that had different ideas about that,’ he said, referencing the Disney offices in southern California. ‘But I can tell you this – they may have gotten everything they want in Florida for the last 60 years, but there’s a new sheriff in town now, and we are not backing down to that.’
