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When DeSantis is Challenged to Pledge Not to Run in 2024, He Gives a Crushing Response

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OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.


Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis squared off against former Gov. Charlie Crist in a raucous and interesting debate that aired on Sinclair Broadcast Group on Monday.

One of the highlights of the event was when Crist directly challenged DeSantis to pledge to serve all four years as governor if he should win the Florida race and not run for president in 2024.

“Ron, you talk about Joe Biden a lot,” Crist said. “I understand you think you’re going to be running against him. I can see how you might get confused, but you’re running for governor, you’re running for governor, and I have a question for you.”

“You’re running for governor,” he continued. “Why don’t you look in the eyes of the people of State of Florida and say to them, If you’re reelected, you will serve a full four year term as governor. Yes or no? Yes or no.”

“Ron, will you serve a full four year term if your reelected governor of Florida?” Crist added. “It’s not a tough question, it’s a fair question. He won’t tell you.”

“We did not agree on the candidates asking each other questions,” the moderator said. “Governor, It’s your turn.”

“Well, listen,” DeSantis said and paused. “I know that Charlie’s interested in talking about 2024 and Joe Biden, but I just want to make things very, very clear. The only worn out old donkey I’m looking to put out the pasture is Charlie Crist.”

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Ouch.

There were other highlights in the night, such as a quarrel over Gov. DeSantis’ refusal to give in and to close down schools for an extended period of time during the lockdowns.

Crist claimed that DeSantis keeping the schools open was “politically convenient,” when in fact it was the exact opposite: The governor showed guts by sticking to his plan in the face of immense media blowback over his policies.

But the most remarkable moment of the night had to do with DeSantis’ blunt rejection of childhood transgender surgeries and athletic competition in schools.

“You know, I would say when you oppose the parent’s rights and education bill, which prevents 6, 7, 8 year olds from having sexuality, gender ideology injected in their curriculum, you are the one that’s waging the culture war,’ DeSantis remarked.

“I’m simply defending parents and students because it’s inappropriate to have that in elementary school, it’s inappropriate to tell a sixth grader, a six-year-old that they were born in the wrong body,” he went on. “It’s inappropriate to tell an eight-year- old that they may have been born or girl, but maybe they’re really a boy That’s wrong.”

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“We need to do the basics,” DeSantis continued. “We need to teach them to read, write, add, and subtract. And if we do that, we’ll continue to lead in fourth-grade reading, in fourth-grade math like we did in today’s NAP results, which is a great testament to have an open schools and a lot of hardworking folks in our school system.”

“I also signed — I’m the father of a five-year-old daughter and a two-year-old daughter, as well as a four-year-old son, but my daughters are very athletic — and we signed legislation to protect the right of women athletes, that you should not have someone competing on the men’s team for three years and then switch to the women’s team,” he went on.

“Charlie Crist opposed that bill, hesaid he would’ve vetoed it,” he added. I’m going to protect women’s sports in the state of Florida.”

NBC News is already sounding the alarms that Crist is all but toast in the Florida midterms race. But even worse for Democrats, the key demographic of Hispanic voters are breaking for DeSantis bigtime.

“Florida’s Hispanic voters back Gov. Ron DeSantis over Democrat Charlie Crist,” NBC reported, adding, “and they even support the Republican’s decision to fly migrants to Martha’s Vineyard, according to a new Telemundo/LX News poll.”

“Overall, DeSantis leads Crist by 51% to 44% statewide among those voters, and 56% approve of the job the governor is doing, compared with 41% who don’t, the survey conducted by Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy, found,” the report continued.

“DeSantis lost Hispanic voters by 10 percentage points when he was elected in 2018, exit polls showed, and if he wins them Nov. 8, it would all but ensure his victory in a state where Democrats traditionally need to rely on solid support from Hispanic and Black voters to overcome Republican advantages with white voters,” the report added.

It’s no wonder Democrats are afraid that Ron DeSantis will run for President in 2024.

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