RON DESANTIS HAS officially entered the race for the US presidency but things got off to a less than auspicious start for the Florida governor.
Technical difficulties marred the official launch of DeSantis’ presidential campaign, which was hosted on Twitter yesterday. DeSantis joined Twitter owner Elon Musk and Republican donor David Sacks in a Twitter ‘space’ which at one point had over half a million people tuning in.
After about 20 minutes of crashes, lost connections and feedback loops, which Musk put down to the high level of traffic, DeSantis was finally able to make his pitch to the American public.
The 44-year-old Republican had revealed his decision in a Federal Election Commission filing before joining the live online conversation with Musk and Sacks.
His opening speech hit all the expected notes, including repeated references to what he called “the woke mind virus,” touting his handling of the Covid19 pandemic, attacking the fiscal policy of President Joe Biden and a pledge to “shut down” the US Mexico border.
“Biden’s opened the southern border and allowed massive amounts of drugs to pour into the country. We’ll shut down the border, construct a border wall and hold the drug cartels accountable,” he said.
He also accused Biden of embracing “medical authoritarianism,” in the state’s response to the pandemic.
“We will ensure that those violations of liberty can never happen again,” he said.
“Biden’s allowed woke ideology to drive his agenda. We will never surrender to the woke mob and we will leave woke ideology in the dustbin of history.”
“No excuses. I will get the job done,” he said.
After this shaky start to the official campaign, DeSantis’ main task is to eat away at Trump’s support, but the similarities between the two candidates’ messages have already made it hard for the Florida governor to distinguish himself.
The opening speech did not make any specific references to his Republican rival but DeSantis did say he intended to govern rather than entertain.
Trump is roughly twice as popular among Republican voters, according to opinion polls, and DeSantis was surely hoping to get a boost in notoriety from this novel form of campaign launch and his association with Musk.
It may have backfired though as social media was soon awash with mocking responses to the online audio chat, not least of all from Trump and Biden themselves.
Trump’s instagram account posted a parody form of the Twitter ‘space’ that featured The Devil, Adolf Hitler, George Soros and others, while the Biden administration went with a more traditional, albeit humorous, political attack ad.
Trump just posted this on Instagram I’m losing my mind pic.twitter.com/LB8LSs8VIV
— 𝐄𝐮𝐝𝐚𝐢𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐢𝐚 (@EudaimoniaEsq) May 25, 2023
No matter what happens, you can hear Ron DeSantis’ agenda loud and clear. pic.twitter.com/5QmgvfiTgQ
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) May 25, 2023
DeSantis was also full of praise for Musk, who he sees as a champion of free speech, and his purchase of Twitter.
Since taking over the social media site, Musk has attempted to portray himself as a “free speech absolutist,” despite the recent agreement the company made with the Turkish government that has led to journalists and political opponents being silenced on Twitter.
This was not the first time this year that a high-profile conservative figure in American politics has opted for Twitter over a conventional TV platform. Former Fox News talk show host Tucker Carlson, who was fired by the network recently, announced his show would be moving to the social media site.
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