Tucker Carlson interviewed Florida Governor Ron DeSantis Friday at the Family Leadership Summit forum in Iowa, which is showcasing all the top 2024 Republican presidential candidates except front-runner and former president Donald Trump.
Tucker got the ball rolling by asking DeSantis if he would favor legislation banning abortions after the sixth week of pregnancy, similar to the law he recently signed in his own state:
I’m proud to be a pro-life governor, and I will be a pro-life president, and of course, I want to sign pro-life legislation…
We need to develop a culture of life in this country.
He then spoke about his opposition to “barbaric” late-term abortion procedures and noted that he lost some supporters — even donors — over his positions. But “at the end of the day,” DeSantis said, “you get into the office to do what’s right,” adding he would support the ban on abortion after six weeks again “every day of the week and twice on Sunday.”
He also spoke about how hearing his daughter’s heartbeat on an ultrasound profoundly affected him, and although he had been pro-life already, the experience strengthened his convictions.
Tucker then asked the Florida governor about the red tide problem the state is experiencing, and DeSantis described efforts to mitigate the algae and also pointed out that it was a natural phenomenon. But then he talked about the radical environmental policies of the left:
Them forcing you an electrical vehicle is not going to change the climate when China is building a new coal plant every week. I mean, so just give me the break. This is trying to control your behavior. It’s social engineering and it’s not something that’s going to work…
But we’ve done very well on environment, not because I’m doing kooky liberal things, but because I’m focusing on things that actually impact the daily lives of Floridians.
When Tucker brought up the fact that people are moving to Florida in large numbers, DeSantis said it was simply because they saw how well things were going in the Sunshine State. He also noted that folks are getting tired of the woke nonsense:
We’re up against a movement that is parroting woke ideology. That their message to the American people is that men can get pregnant, really, that you should swim on the men’s swim team for three years, switch to the women’s team and you can be the women’s national champion.
Most people don’t buy that, and so I think we have an opportunity to really capture a lot of voters by representing a platform of common sense and sanity and traditional American values. [Applause.]
On Ukraine and military matters, DeSantis opined that leaders need to have “a concrete idea of what you’re trying to achieve.” He advocated for NATO members to pay more of their fair share because the current administration has a “blank check” policy toward Europe and Ukraine and is not explaining the overall objective to the American people.
“I wish the elites cared more about our border than they do about the Ukraine-Russia border,” he added.
He shut down the idea of sending U.S. forces to the war-torn country:
Speaking of our porous southern border, DeSantis said he’d call a national emergency on day one and use all the forces at his command to stop the tsunami.
The two also spoke about the threat from China–“at the end of the day, what the CCP respects is hard power,” DeSantis said, adding that Joe Biden is projecting the opposite.
They also talked at length about COVID, energy, Russia, cocaine in the White House, digital currency, parents’ rights, Hunter’s laptop, the economy, and more.
But DeSantis didn’t leave without taking a shot at his cross-country rival, California Governor Gavin Newsom. Should President Biden somehow step out of the race, DeSantis is prepared:
I’m fully prepared to have a Florida-California showdown and let the people choose what’s the better vision for the United States of America, because I’m very confident that the freedom in Florida is what more people would choose rather than the public defecation on the streets of San Francisco.
That cracked Tucker up.
To me, DeSantis seemed at ease, spoke knowledgeably about the issues, laughed frequently, and didn’t seem awkward at all. That is not an endorsement or an expression of any preference in the GOP presidential primaries, it’s just my opinion about his performance at this event.
Watch the full interview here: