Attacks on Competitors
Trump wants to discredit DeSantis
03/14/2023 02:51 am
Donald Trump wants to go back to the White House and is warming up for the election campaign. With Ron DeSantis, a potentially dangerous internal party competitor is in the starting blocks. Although he has not yet announced his candidacy, he is already the target of Trump’s verbal attacks.
Former US President Donald Trump has attacked his party opponent Ron DeSantis for previous social policy positions. During a campaign appearance in Davenport, Iowa, Trump told his supporters that DeSantis has advocated cuts in Social Security and health insurance benefits in the past and advocated significantly raising the retirement age. A lot of people wouldn’t know that. With him as president, there would be no such steps, Trump promised.
A few months ago, the ex-president was the first Republican to announce his candidacy for the next election. Next to Trump, DeSantis is considered the most promising internal party candidate and thus the greatest competition for the ex-president. DeSantis is also expected to apply for the presidency – but the 44-year-old has not yet declared himself.
Trump said he’s consistently ahead of DeSantis in polls, whom he’s once more mocked as “Ron DeSantus” and “Ron DeSanctimoniuos.” “Sanctimonious” means hypocritical in German. Trump is known for coming up with derogatory nicknames for political opponents, he dubbed today’s US President Joe Biden “Sleepy Joe”.
Next choice as final battle
In view of the upcoming presidential election in 2024, Trump is trying to use apocalyptic rhetoric: “2024 is the last battle,” he said in Iowa. Addressing his potential constituents, he declared: “If you put me back in the White House, the rule of the corrupt Washington establishment will come to an end.” The United States would be a free nation again. “We will fulfill our mission.”
Trump’s choice of words for 2024 has a bitter aftertaste after he failed to admit defeat in the 2020 election and launched a campaign against the outcome that ended in an unprecedented outburst of violence. Trump supporters violently stormed the seat of parliament in Washington on January 6, 2021, five people died in connection with the riots.