MANCHESTER, NH – EXCLUSIVE – Florida Governor Ron DeSantis says voters can judge whether President Biden runs for four more years in the White House.
DeSantis, who last week launched a 2024 Republican presidential campaign, spoke to Fox News Digital in an exclusive national interview a couple of hours later on Thursday. President Biden tripped and fell after delivering a speech and handing out diplomas at the Air Force Academy’s graduation ceremony in Colorado.
Biden was immediately helped and appeared to recover quickly. The White House later said the president was fine.
Regardless, many Republicans have questioned whether Biden, 80, the nation’s longest-serving president, is physically and mentally up to the intense demands of the White House for four more years.
Asked if he agreed, DeSantis said “people can judge that.”
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While emphasizing “I hope he didn’t suffer any injuries, and if he did, I hope he recovers quickly from them,” DeSantis added that “I’m running for president because I want America to recover quickly.” the injuries that Joe Biden has inflicted on the country and, at the end of the day, I think his policies have been wrong.”
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“I think he lacks energy and all that, but he’s on a course that hasn’t been good for this country and that’s my main concern,” DeSantis said.
DeSantis repeated those comments minutes later at the top of the rally at Manchester Community College, the Florida governor’s fourth and final event of a day full of New Hampshirethe state that holds the first primary and second general contest on the GOP presidential nominating calendar.
One of DeSantis’ rivals for the Republican presidential nomination, former ambassador and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, made headlines earlier this year by calling for mental competency tests for all politicians age 75 and older.
Asked if he agreed with that suggestion, DeSantis replied, “I think it’s kind of a gimmick. I think ultimately the voters are capable of making those determinations.”
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“Ultimately, voters will be responsible for their choices, and we hope to do better in 2024,” the governor added.
DeSantis, repeating a line he has used in speeches since launching his campaign, told Fox News it will take more than one term in the White House to “kill the deep state, this big incomprehensible bureaucracy.”
The comments seem to be a nod former president Donald Trump, who is the frontrunner in the GOP nomination polls as he makes his third straight run for the White House. After one term, Trump can only serve another four years if elected in 2024.
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“I’ve been seeing DeSanctus come out and say, ‘I’m eight years old.’ It’s going to be eight years,” Trump said Thursday at a campaign event in Iowa.
And Trump promised that: “It’s going to take me six months to have it totally the way it was.”
Asked about the former president’s comments, DeSantis told Fox News: “If the former president says he can kill the deep state in six months, my question to him would be, well, it’s been four years, why didn’t you kill him then?”
Since declaring his candidacy for the presidency last week, DeSantis has stepped up his counterattacks against former President Donald Trump, who has been blasting his main rival for the Republican nomination for months.
The former president, his political team and allies have stepped up their attacks over the past two months.
DeSantis had mostly resisted responding to Trump’s attacks until last week. But as he kicked off his first campaign swing as a 2024 candidate Tuesday in Iowa, DeSantis began throwing aggressive jabs at the former president during a question-and-answer session with reporters.
“So look, I’m going to respond to the attacks,” DeSantis said. “I’m going to fight back and fight this.”
On Wednesday evening, as DeSantis took the stage at his fourth event in Iowa, Trump took aim at him on social media for the governor’s different pronunciations of his name.
“Did you hear ‘Rob’ DeSanctimonious wants to change his name, again. He’s asking people to call him DeeeSantis, instead of DaSantis. I actually like ‘Da’ better, a nicer flow, so “I’m glad he changed it. He gets really upset when people, including reporters, don’t pronounce it correctly. So he shouldn’t care, DeSanctimonious,” Trump said.
Trump took aim after media reports in recent days highlighted how DeSantis has used two different pronunciations of his name in recent weeks, switching between “Deh-Santis” and “Dee-Santis.”
“I think it’s so petty. I think it’s so juvenile,” DeSantis said Thursday morning in a radio interview in New Hampshire while responding to Trump.
Going into a personal party day after day with the former president, who is a master of in-your-face politics, may not be a sustainable strategy.
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Asked if his pushback against Trump was getting personal, DeSantis disagreed, saying, “I’m not personal at all. Some of the stuff is very juvenile. I don’t think the voters want that. I don’t go into the gutter.”
And when asked the correct pronunciation of his last name, DeSantis told Fox News, “It’s ridiculous. This stupid stuff. Listen, the way I pronounce my last name: winner.”
Paul Steinhauser is a political reporter based in New Hampshire.
