Republican and Democrat to take to the stage in Alpharetta, Georgia, for debate moderated by Sean Hannity
Newsom has called out DeSantis’ lagging poll numbers.
“You’re trying to find migrants to play political games to get some news attention so you can out-Trump Trump, and by the way, how’s that going for you, Ron? You’re down 41 points in your own home state.”
Continue reading...‘Slugfest’ moderated by Sean Hannity saw the Democrat and Republican speaking over each other in heated ‘shadow campaign’
Ron DeSantis, a hard-right contender for the Republican presidential nomination, took the stage in Georgia on Thursday for a debate one eager website dubbed “The Vendetta in Alpharetta.”
But the Florida governor’s opponent was not Donald Trump, the former president and clear primary frontrunner, or any other Republican contender. His opponent was Gavin Newsom, the Democratic governor of California,who is not seeking his party’s nomination next year, given Joe Biden’s grip on the White House.
Continue reading...Peter Antonacci, the chief elections fraud official, died after a heated meeting in the governor’s office and slumped in the hallway
Ron DeSantis’s chief elections fraud official collapsed after abruptly leaving a “contentious” meeting in the Florida governor’s office, then lay dead or dying for almost half an hour in the hallway outside until he was found, an investigation published Monday has revealed.
Previously unreported details of the September 2022 death of Peter Antonacci in the Tallahassee capitol building appeared on the website of the Florida Bulldog, an independent online watchdog of the state’s politics and government.
Continue reading...Florida chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine say order by Republican governor violates their free speech rights
A pro-Palestinian student group in Florida is suing the state’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, and the university system for trying to “deactivate” it in a manner that violates the students’ free speech rights.
The University of Florida chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (UF SJP) filed the suit on Thursday in a federal court in Gainesville. It calls on the court to block what amounts to one of the first attempts in the US to silence a pro-Palestinian student group amid the roiling fallout of the Israel-Hamas war on American campuses.
Continue reading...Candidates clash over Ukraine and immigration and grapple with abortion questions as Donald Trump holds rally nearby
The Israel-Hamas war in Gaza and other foreign policy issues dominated Wednesday’s fiery third debate of Republican presidential hopefuls in Miami. Candidates pledged wholehearted support for Israel’s military response following last month’s Hamas attacks, and clashed over Ukraine, China and immigration.
The debate, minus Donald Trump, the runaway favorite for the party’s 2024 nomination who was hosting his own private rally elsewhere in the area, was a more bitter affair than its predecessors in Wisconsin and California. Lively verbal sparring sometimes regressed into insults, with Nikki Haley at one point calling one of her rivals “scum”.
Continue reading...Candidates showed unequivocal support for Israel on a night when Nikki Haley shot back at Vivek Ramaswamy’s criticism
The third Republican debate was held in Miami on Wednesday, with frontrunner Donald Trump once again foregoing the debate for his own rally nearby.
The pool has dwindled since the last debate, and Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, Vivek Ramaswamy, Tim Scott and Chris Christie seemed to be more serious and focused this time around as they answered questions on the Israel-Hamas war, immigration, abortion and the federal budget. Even so, the debate had moments where it devolved into a shouting match, with petty barbs and personal attacks.
Continue reading...University of North Florida study shows governor trailing Trump by 39 points, 60% to 21%, among Republican voters in his state
A new poll shows Florida’s hard-right governor, Ron DeSantis, falling even further behind Donald Trump in his own state, one day before the embattled candidate for the Republican presidential nomination takes the debate stage in Miami.
The study by the University of North Florida (UNF) published on Tuesday shows DeSantis trailing Trump by 39 points (60-21) among Republican Florida voters, with the former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley a distant third on 6%.
Continue reading...Bad news for Florida governor’s campaign, with favorability falling throughout 2023 and a GOP debate scheduled for Wednesday
Five Republican legislators in Florida have switched their endorsements from rightwing governor Ron DeSantis to former US president Donald Trump before a key party nomination debate in Miami next week.
The move is another boost to Trump – who remains dominant in the 2024 Republican race – and a blow to DeSantis, whose once highly anticipated bid for the White House has recently floundered badly. All recent polling has shown Trump with a strong lead over his rivals and DeSantis being edged out of second place by the former US ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley.
Continue reading...Departure could help Republican candidates but DeSantis and Haley, as well as Ramaswamy and Christie, still hugely trail Trump
Mike Pence’s surprise withdrawal from the Republican presidential nomination race on Saturday is part of natural winnowing of the crowded field, rivals of the former vice-president said Sunday – and one that could help their quest of candidates to wrestle the nomination from overwhelming frontrunner Donald Trump.
“In the end, the race is narrowing, which everyone said it would,” said former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, one of Trump’s fiercest Republican critics and one of four who have qualified for a third TV debate next month in Miami that may not have included Pence, who, he told CNN’s State of the Union, had run “a tough race, a good race”.
Continue reading...At event in Iowa, governor conflates Palestinian civilians with Hamas, the terrorist group that attacked Israel a week ago
Republican presidential candidate and Florida governor Ron DeSantis has rejected accepting Palestinian refugees from Gaza to the US, speaking at a campaign rally in the US midwest on Saturday.
“We cannot accept people from Gaza into this country as refugees,” he said. “If you look how they behave … not all of them are Hamas but they are all antisemitic, none of them believe in Israel’s right to exist.”
Continue reading...Ocasio-Cortez also noted the witnesses were under oath, while the lawmakers on the panel could say what they want – including lies
The House oversight committee is about to hold its first hearing in the impeachment inquiry of Joe Biden, the latest step in a months-long effort investigating the president and his son Hunter Biden’s business dealings that has yet to produce substantial evidence of wrongdoing.
Today’s hearing, titled The Basis for an Impeachment Inquiry of President Joseph R Biden Jr, comes two weeks after House speaker Kevin McCarthy launched the inquiry in response to demands from hard-right members of the House Republican conference.
Continue reading...Seven candidates face off at Ronald Reagan library in Simi Valley, California, with Republican frontrunner again choosing to skip
Seven Republican presidential contenders gathered in California on Wednesday night for the second primary debate of the 2024 election season, but the absence of Donald Trump, the clear frontrunner in the race for the party’s nomination, again loomed large over the event.
Seven candidates qualified for the second debate, held at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation & Institute in Simi Valley, California. Those candidates were Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor, the former vice-president Mike Pence, the former UN ambassador and South Carolina governor Nikki Haley, Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, the entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, the former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, and the North Dakota governor Doug Burgum.
Continue reading...Florida governor aims to rescue flailing presidential campaign that has been further scarred by ‘petty and small’ snub of Biden’s visit
One reality of Florida politics is that a bad hurricane for the state traditionally blows good fortune for its governor. It was true for Rick Scott, elected a senator in November 2018, one month after guiding Florida through Category 5 Hurricane Michael; and again for Ron DeSantis, whose landslide re-election last year followed his much-praised handling of the aftermath of Hurricane Ian.
This year, however, DeSantis is struggling to shake the dark clouds of Hurricane Idalia, as his return to the national stage to try to rescue his flailing presidential campaign after an 11-day break has been further scarred by his “petty and small” snub of Joe Biden’s visit to Florida last weekend to survey the storm’s damage.
Continue reading...If state’s highest court upholds the 15-week ban, a separate, stricter law would take effect prohibiting abortion after six weeks
The Florida supreme court on Friday will hear arguments in a case that could drastically limit abortion access in the south-eastern United States.
Abortion providers in Florida filed a lawsuit to block the state’s ban on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy.
Continue reading...Circuit court judge rules proposal ‘results in the diminishment of Black voters’ ability to elect their candidate of choice’
A judge in Florida has ruled in favor of voting rights groups that filed a lawsuit against a congressional redistricting map approved by Ron DeSantis in 2022. Voting rights groups had criticized the map for diluting political power in Black communities.
In the ruling, Leon county circuit judge J Lee Marsh sent the map back to the Florida legislature to be redrawn in a way that complies with the state’s constitution.
Continue reading...President arrives to survey damage left by Hurricane Idalia but governor Ron DeSantis has no plans to meet Biden
Joe Biden said that no one can deny the impacts of the climate crisis anymore after he visited Florida on Saturday and surveyed the damage left behind by Hurricane Idalia.
Speaking to reporters in front of fallen trees and debris, the US president pointed to this year’s extreme weather events and disasters, saying: “Nobody can deny the impact of climate crisis. There’s no real intelligence to deny the impacts of the climate crisis anymore.”
Continue reading...The eye of Hurricane Idalia made landfall along the coast of the Florida Big Bend near Keaton Beach around 7.45am Eastern time, the National Hurricane Center said.
The storm’s maximum sustained winds were near 125 mph.
Continue reading...Trump’s former attorney ordered to pay attorneys’ fees of $89,172.50 for Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss
Jury selection will begin on 5 September in the contempt of Congress trial of Peter Navarro, a former White House aide to Donald Trump.
Navarro was indicted last year after failing to comply with two subpoenas from the bipartisan congressional committee investigating the January 6 attack. He attempted to argue that executive privilege concerns prevented him from cooperating with the panel, but a federal judge ruled against that defense today.
Continue reading...Democrats criticize governor’s comments after shooting that left three Black people dead and say ‘this type of hatred isn’t random’
The booing that greeted Ron DeSantis as he showed up to a vigil in Jacksonville on Sunday for three Black people murdered by a white supremacist told quite a story. Nobody contradicted the Republican governor and presidential hopeful’s assertion that the killer was “a scumbag”, or that the racist killings were “totally unacceptable”.
Yet his comments raised eyebrows because of DeSantis’s previous attitude – indifference in the minds of many – to Nazis in the state rallying in his name; and his promotion of a succession of legislation designed to disenfranchise Black voters, and recast Florida’s racial history to teach forced labor as beneficial to the enslaved.
Continue reading...Prosecutor Monique Worrell says law enforcement agencies in central Florida were ‘all working against me’
An elected Democratic prosecutor whose removal Ron DeSantis boasted about during the first Republican presidential debate said the hard-right Florida governor and his allies ousted her because she was “prosecuting their cops”.
Law enforcement agencies in central Florida were “all working against me”, Monique Worrell told the Daily Beast, “because I was prosecuting their cops, the ones who used to do things and get away with them”.
Continue reading...