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Listen: Ron DeSantis's presidential launch suffers major technical issues
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Donald Trump Jr has shared a seemingly AI-generated clip of Ron DeSantis edited into the role of Michael Scott in The Office in a clip in which the character is mocked for wearing a woman's suit.
"Imagine when next time it's not an obvious spoof from The Office but an attempt to depict itself as legitimate and much more nefarious," CNN's Jake Tapper tweeted.
Since his 2024 campaign got off to a shaky start on Wednesday evening with its much-derided Twitter Spaces launch, Mr DeSantis has been doing the rounds of right-wing media outlets, reminding voters of his record in Florida and taking the occasional dig at his chief rival, former president Donald Trump.
In one interview, he said that if he's elected president, he would consider pardons for those charged with January 6 Capitol riot offences, and when pressed as to whether that would include Mr Trump, he said the measure would include everyone.
His remark was criticised not just by Democrats, but was also sharply rebuked by former Republican Rep Liz Cheney, who tweeted: "Any candidate who says they will pardon January 6 defendants is not qualified to be president."
1685253600Vocal Maga supporter Kimberly Guilfoyle on Saturday claimed that Ron DeSantis would "get hurt and damaged badly" by the Florida governor's 2024 presidential bid against Donald Trump, the father of her boyfriend.
Ms Guilfoyle, who was previously married to California governor and Democrat Gavin Newsom, made the comments on Newsmax TV's America Right Now.
"You're gonna run against Donald Trump, you are going to get hurt and damaged badly," said Ms Guilfoyle, who lives in Florida with Donald Trump, Jr. "That is the problem. So by the time Trump is done - we saw this before, 16 people, one after the next, fell off the stage - you're gonna end up in the junkyard, and you're not gonna be in good shape for 2028.
"That's just a fact," she said.
She claimed that it was "not time to go into Toys R Us, strap on the training wheels and take a spin around the aisle and see if it works out."
A former prosecutor, Ms Guilfoyle has been a staunch, visible and vocal Trump supporter for years, notably making a roaring speech at the 2020 Republican National Convention.
Sheila Flynn28 May 2023 07:00
1685250000Back in the day, former House Speaker John Boehner called his regular press conferences the "weekly alligator feeding" and said, "The goal is to feed the alligators without being bit." That meant giving the press just enough of what they needed, helping set the narrative, but not giving so much chum that they would wind up tearing him up in their articles and reports.
Mr Boehner, a classic retail politician and dealmaker from Cincinnati who puffed cigarettes and sipped Merlot, enjoyed a good back-and-forth, which endeared him to reporters.
All the while, a group of firebreathing conservatives that became the House Freedom Caucus tormented Mr Boehner to the extent that, eventually, he decided to call it quits and ride off into the sunset in 2015.
Eric Garcia28 May 2023 06:00
1685246400The Trump clone wars have begun. With Florida Governor Ron DeSantis's extremely online campaign announcement, the 2024 GOP primary just kicked into high gear. In an audio-only conversation on Twitter Spaces with Elon Musk and VC David Sacks, DeSantis officially announced he is running for president. But first, much like some of Musk's rockets, there was a failure to launch that overshadowed everything that followed.
For 20 minutes, there was almost no talking, but there were repeated crashes. The app crashed for me at least 16 times while I tried to listen in to Twitter Space. As the Space hit 680k listeners at 6.20 pm, Musk just ended it after remarking about the servers being strained. Minutes later, Musk started another Twitter Space and DeSantis began reading off a statement attacking "woke ideology" and the "woke mob," but he recited this to an audience that was 1/5 the size of the first Twitter Space - at about 150,000 listeners when he read his announcement and around 300,000 at its peak. President Joe Biden responded by simply tweeting out a donation link with the words: "This link works."
Ahmed Baba28 May 2023 05:00
1685244641The Independent28 May 2023 04:30
1685242841As he vies for the Republican presidential nomination, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is touting a series of measures he has pushed that have led to an upswing in banned or restricted books — not just in Florida schools but in an increasing number of other conservative states.
Florida last year became the first in a wave of red states to enact laws making it easier for parents to challenge books in school libraries they deem to be pornographic, deal improperly with racial issues or are in other ways inappropriate for students.
Books ensnared in the Florida regulations include explicit graphic novels about growing up LGBTQ+, a children's book based on a true story of two male penguins raising a chick in a zoo and "The Bluest Eye," a novel by Nobel laureate Toni Morrison that includes descriptions of child sexual abuse. Certain books covering racial themes also have been pulled from library shelves, sometimes temporarily, as school administrators try to assess what material is allowed under the new rules.
At a campaign event ahead of the 2020 election, Trump praised DeSantis and called him a friend but also joked that he would blame the governor if he did not win Florida.
"I'll fire him somehow. I'm going to fire him. I will find a way," he said.
Trump ended up winning Florida in 2020 by 3.4 percentage points — a bigger margin of victory than in 2016.
1685239241In the first weeks of the coronavirus pandemic, Trump applauded DeSantis for how he had handled governing the response to the virus.
"He's done a lot of things right. And he's been truly — I mean, he cares so much about health care. He cares so much about the cost of prescription drugs. He's been a fantastic governor for Florida. They're very happy with him," Trump said at a press conference.
DeSantis initially resisted issuing a statewide stay-at-home order but reversed course and issued it after facing pressure from Trump and White House advisers.
1685237441Florida lobbyists who work with the Sunshine State government have been left aghast by demands that they donate to Governor Ron DeSantis' newly launched presidential campaign, according to a report from NBC News.
The reason for the alarm about the donation requests is that they have come directly from persons employed by the Executive Office of the Governor in Tallahassee, as well as other executive agencies. The involvement of state employees in soliciting funds for the governor's campaign may run afoul of Sunshine State ethics laws and appears to be a breach of traditional norms that aim to separate the work of governing from campaigning for elected office.
A group of 10 lobbyists contacted by the news network all said they could not ever recall being openly solicited for donations by state officials.
Andrew Feinberg28 May 2023 02:30
1685235649In 2019, Trump changed his residency from Trump Tower in New York City to Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, and held a "homecoming rally" with Gov. DeSantis near Miami.
"Welcome home to Florida," DeSantis told him.
Trump quipped that DeSantis "better not be more popular in Florida than me" after extended cheers for the governor. He went on to suggest to the crowd that DeSantis should wear jackets less frequently so people know he's not fat.
1685233800After narrowly winning his 2018 race, DeSantis singled out Trump in his victory speech as he recognized the many people who had supported his campaign.
"I'd like to thank our president for standing by me when it wasn't necessarily the smart thing to do," DeSantis said. "Mr. President, I look forward to working with you to advance Florida's priorities. I think you're going to get tired of me calling you asking you for things for Florida, but I look forward to that, and I think we'll have a great partnership."
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