President Joe Biden’s campaign for reelection mocked Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) on Tuesday, claiming the governor’s attack on “wokeness” is a “contrived political stunt” and saying MAGA Republicans face a huge problem in the 2024 election.
The comments came in response to an interview DeSantis conducted with CNN, where the Republican presidential candidate said, “Not everyone really knows what wokeness is,” in response to host Jake Tapper telling him “wokeness” is not a major reason people are not enlisting in the military. “I mean, I’ve defined it, but a lot of people who rail against wokeness can’t even define it,” DeSantis added.
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Biden’s campaign for reelection took note of the Republican governor’s words, saying DeSantis’s response was him “admitting his hallmark campaign issue is a contrived political stunt” and is “proof of the larger problem MAGA Republicans are facing in this race.”
“They have a deeply unpopular agenda that Americans have rejected time and time again, so instead, they recycle the same divisive culture wars and attacks on bedrock freedoms meant to tear Americans apart,” Biden 2024 campaign member Kevin Munoz said in a statement provided to the Washington Examiner.
“If Ron DeSantis actually cared about the military, he would call on Senator Tuberville to stop the unprecedented damage he’s doing to the armed forces and military families every day by blockading hundreds of military nominations and promotions,” Munoz added.
DeSantis has made his “anti-woke” stance a major part of his campaign for president, saying it affects everything, including the military, and that he’s “the only guy” fighting it. However, while a popular buzzword among some in the Republican Party, other conservatives suggest most voters are less concerned with sociocultural topics and more concerned with issues such as the economy.
Former President Donald Trump, the GOP front-runner in next year’s election, has even cast doubt on the merits of the word “woke,” contrasting himself with his biggest Republican opponent.
“I don’t like the term ‘woke’ because I hear, ‘Woke, woke, woke.’ It’s just a term they use, half the people can’t even define it. They don’t know what it is,” Trump said during a campaign event in June.
Trump’s team ridiculed the governor’s comment on CNN, telling Newsweek it was an example of DeSantis “stealing” Trump’s messaging, a spirit Trump’s supporters have echoed before. “Ron DeSantis doesn’t have an original thought in that minor league brain of his, so that’s why he’s been stealing President Trump’s messaging and policy ideas from Day One,” Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said.
Trump has attacked DeSantis for months, even before DeSantis announced his campaign for president. While DeSantis has been critical of Trump at times, he has largely elected not to go right after the former president in the way GOP candidate Chris Christie has, ostensibly viewing his path to the nomination as better served by branding himself as a sharper alternative to Trump, not a staunch critic.
While for months, DeSantis has been touted as a major threat to Trump’s chances of securing the Republican nomination, his lack of headway against the former president has encouraged critics to reiterate their doubts over his chances.
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Then, of course, there is Biden, who has not spoken at great length about the 2024 election, but whose campaign made sure to underscore what it believes are his and Vice President Kamala Harris’s differences with DeSantis and the 2024 Republican nominees.
“Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are focused on making our economy work from the bottom up and middle out, protecting Americans’ essential freedoms, and strengthening our national security. It’s an agenda that Americans have voted on in 2020, 2022, and will again in 2024,” Munoz said.
