Republican presidential candidate and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis says that former President Donald Trump will claim foul play if he loses the upcoming Iowa caucuses.
“If Trump loses, he will say it’s stolen no matter what, absolutely. He will try to delegitimize the results,” DeSantis said Friday in New Hampshire, according to Fox News.
“He did that against Ted Cruz in 2016,” DeSantis added, referring to Trump’s claim that Texas Sen. Ted Cruz stole the Iowa caucuses that year.
Trump objected “even when ‘The Apprentice’ didn’t get an Emmy,” DeSantis said, a reference to Trump’s former reality TV show.
“I don’t think people are going to buy it,” the Florida governor said.
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The Iowa caucuses will be held on Jan. 15.
According to the Real Clear Politics aggregate of polling in the state, Trump is currently at 50 percent, DeSantis at 19.3 percent and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley at 16.7 percent.
In New Hampshire, where the primary will be held on Jan. 23, DeSantis is in fourth place behind Trump, Haley and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.
On Friday, DeSantis tried to portray the former president as having failed to live up to his campaign promises.
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“He’s promising the same things he did in ’16 that he didn’t deliver. And now he’s just running on the same stuff again,” DeSantis said, according to Fox.
“You know, we didn’t get a wall. We didn’t get the swamp drained. He said he was going to go after Hillary [Clinton] and then let her off the hook two weeks after the election.”
He said Trump won’t participate in the GOP primary debates because “he would not perform the way they remember the Trump from 2015 and ’16. I think that’s the real reason he’s not debating.”
Trump is “a different guy now and I think he owes it to actually show up and answer questions,” DeSantis said.
Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said in a statement that DeSantis was “doing his best impression of a Never Trumper by reciting Democrat talking points peddled by Crooked Joe Biden and his campaign.”
“When Ron’s political career is finished in a few weeks, he can start moonlighting as a Democrat surrogate because he’s showing everyone his true colors,” Cheung said.
