Republican Florida Congressmen Matt Gaetz and Byron Donalds defended their state’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, after ABC News released behind-the-scenes footage of his 2018 debate preparation.
In one video, DeSantis and his debate preparation team discussed how he might address his working relationship with Trump.
“Is there any issue upon which you disagree with President Trump?” DeSantis was asked as a hypothetical debate question.
“I have to figure out how to do this,” DeSantis replied, before deliberating with his team.
“Obviously there is [some area of disagreement with Trump] because, I mean, I voted contrary to him in the Congress,” DeSantis said. “I have to frame it in a way that’s not going to piss off all his voters.”
Gaetz, Donalds Defend DeSantis
Gaetz and Donalds both spoke out in defense of the Florida governor after ABC News published the footage.Both congressmen have endorsed Trump’s 2024 Republican presidential campaign. Their defense of DeSantis is notable in light of the possibility that the Florida governor may announce a rival bid for the 2024 Republican nomination.
Don’t ‘Monkey This Up’
In another video clip, DeSantis and Gaetz discussed how to respond to allegations of racism following comments he made about the election cycle.The 2018 debate preparation video that ABC released showed DeSantis and Gaetz debating how to rebut allegations of racism over DeSantis’s “monkey this up” comment. At one point in the video, Gaetz advised that DeSantis was coming in “too hot” on the issue.
“It deserves to be hot,” DeSantis replied. In the 2018 video clip, DeSantis went on to say that he and his campaign had not done enough to push back on “all these stupid stories” targeting his campaign.
While the clip showed Gaetz trying to get DeSantis to tone down his defense against allegations of racism, the lawmaker has since come to see DeSantis’s side of the argument.