During a presidential town hall event in Iowa on Tuesday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis called out former President Donald Trump on the border issue and his absence at primary debates.
DeSantis: ‘I’m Sick Of’ Republicans Using Border Crisis As Political Issue, I’ll Actually Fix It https://t.co/gupxf6Xejc pic.twitter.com/1meGLEhcQw
— Daily Wire News (@DailyWireNews) December 13, 2023
At some point during the event, a member of the audience asked DeSantis what can be done to fix the crisis. In response, the presidential candidate indicated that he knows just what to do.
For one, DeSantis plans to make states like Texas be able to immediately deport illegal immigrants right at the border. This can be done by empowering border states to enforce immigration law.
The second plan includes building a border wall. While highlighting that plan, DeSantis pointed out that former President Donald Trump promised to build the wall but ended up not getting it done.
“And why didn’t it happen? Well, one, I think he got distracted. And he didn’t do it on day one. But two, he didn’t utilize the levers of power that he had. So how do you get Mexico to pay for it? Well, they’re not just going to give us money,” he stated.
Suggesting a better way, he added, “Here’s what you do. You impose fees on the remittances that workers send back to foreign countries, Mexico, Central America, really all over the world, you’d raise billions of dollars, we’ll put it into constructing the border wall.”
DeSantis then went on to blame Biden’s failures at the border on Trump’s failure to build the border wall in the first place.
“We as Republicans, probably 99% blame Biden for 8 million people coming in illegally. It’s been bad for the country. And I do too. But here’s the thing. If Trump had built the border wall, it would have been very difficult for Biden to bring in all those many people. That’s why you want a wall,” he said.
Promising to “get the job done,” he turned to Republicans who he says are “always using this issue every election cycle, to try to get donations and to try to tell the people if you do it, we are going to bring the issue to a conclusion.”
The Florida governor also took Trump to task over his absence at all four GOP primary debates that have taken place since August. Making it clear that “nobody is entitled to this nomination,” he said, “You’ve got to earn this nomination, and part of the way you do it is you show up, you answer people’s questions.”
After going further to criticize Trump’s abortion stance as shaky, DeSantis suggested that he is the only Republican candidate that can “beat” the GOP front runner “one on one.”
“Why? Because the other candidates cannot get enough support from core Republicans and traditional conservatives to be able to go. You can’t just win with a slice of the party. You got to have broad support,” he explained.
Despite his confidence, DeSantis remains way behind the former president in the polls, with the former president leading him by 32% in a recent Iowa poll.
DeSantis, has however, dismissed the consistently wide gap between him and Trump, expressing confidence in his endorsements from Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds and evangelical leader Bob Vander Plaats which he believes will carry him through the caucuses.