Ron DeSantis Has Come Out Swinging

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis kicked off his 2024 campaign in a fiery mood, appearing finally ready to retaliate to the insults aimed at him by Donald Trump while also attacking President Joe Biden and his family.

DeSantis, who confirmed his White House bid with a May 24 Twitter Space announcement plagued with technical difficulties, gave his first official campaign speech at the Eternity Church in Clive, just outside of Des Moines, on Tuesday where he outlined his vision for the county if elected president.

During his Great American Comeback campaign speech, DeSantis also fought back against Trump—his biggest challenge in the Republican primary—by lobbing a series of veiled insults at the former president without ever mentioning him by name.

"At the end of the day, leadership is not about entertainment," DeSantis told the crowd. "It's not about building a brand, it's not about virtue signaling."

Elsewhere in his speech, DeSantis suggested that he is the only candidate that can end the GOP's recent "culture of losing" by defeating Biden in 2024.

DeSantis also appeared to take jabs at Trump and other politicians who talked about "securing the border for years and years and years," while suggesting that he will be the one who can "bring this issue to a conclusion" if elected president.

He also referenced how Trump will only be able to serve one term if he re-enters the White House while stating that the country needs a "disciplined, energetic president who will spit nails and fight the needed battles every single day over an eight-year period."

Responding to DeSantis' speech, Trump spokesperson Steve Cheung said the Florida governor is "not a serious person who can take on Joe Biden and bring about the Great American Comeback."

"His poorly conceived speech was light on substance and was crafted to appease establishment Never Trumpers who are looking for a swamp puppet that will do their bidding," Cheung told Newsweek.

For months, Trump has handled DeSantis as he did with the Republicans he was up against in the 2016 GOP primary, by launching wave after wave of attacks aiming to shake potential voters' confidence in him as a candidate.

The most recent attack line from Trump focuses on DeSantis' handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, including mentioning how the Florida governor did not completely fight against lockdown restrictions and closed beaches to the public relatively early.

"Under Ron DeSanctimonious as Governor, Florida was the third WORST State in Deaths by Covid. So why do they say that DeSanctus did a good job? New York had fewer deaths! Also, he shut down the State, and even its beaches (unlike other Republican Governors)," Trump posted on Truth Social on Tuesday.

Until now, DeSantis has held off from reacting to attacks from Trump. However, he appears to have changed gears now that he is officially going up against the former president in 2024.

"The former president is now attacking me saying that [former New York governor Andrew] Cuomo did better handling Covid than Florida did," DeSantis told reporters after his Iowa speech. "I can tell you this. I could count the number of Republicans in this country on my hands that would rather have lived in New York under Cuomo than lived in Florida in our freedom zone.

"Hell, his whole family moved to Florida under my governorship, are you kidding me?"

DeSantis, who was formerly a close ally to Trump prior to reports he was going to challenge him for the presidency, addressed the feud and noted why he never criticized Trump while he was in the White House.

"When we disagreed, I never bashed him publicly because he was taking all this incoming from the media, the left, and even some Republicans. And the whole collusion was a total farce. And he was treated very, very poorly. And that bothered me, and it still bothers me to be honest," DeSantis said.

"So, I never really would air those disagreements. Well, now he's attacking me over some of these disagreements, but I think he's doing it in a way that the voters are going to side with me.

It wasn't just Trump that DeSantis went after during his speech in Clive, the first of a four-day tour across 12 cities in the early primary caucus states of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina.

DeSantis also described Biden's recent debt ceiling deal as a bill that will see the country "careening towards bankruptcy," as well as promising that if elected president he will send "Biden back to his basement in Delaware."

"I mean, he's spent so much of his time as president on vacation, we might as well make it permanent," DeSantis said.

The line that Biden only campaigns "from his basement" rather than in front of voters was previously used by Trump and other GOP figures during the 2020 election.

DeSantis took the time to knock the so-called "elites" and those who push the "woke ideology" he fights so hard against. DeSantis also criticized what he called "an unaccountable, weaponized administrative state that unevenly wields authority, depending on its targets" while referencing Biden's son.

"Two different sets of rules, depending on whether you're a member in good standing of elite society or not," DeSantis told the Iowa crowd. "If Hunter [Biden] were Republican, he would have been in jail years ago."

Hunter Biden's taxes and foreign business work are currently under federal investigation. He has not been charged in connection to any probe and denies all wrongdoing.

It remains to be seen if a more combative DeSantis will help his 2024 chances, with polls frequently suggesting Trump is the overwhelming favorite to clinch the Republican presidential nomination in 2024.

Trump is ahead in the GOP primary with 54.3 percent, with DeSantis a distant second with 20.7 percent, according to FiveThirtyEight's national average tracker.