Ron Desantis, Florida Gov. and likely presidential candidate, rallied Republicans in the Houston area Friday with a speech proclaiming his state as Texas’ new frontline partner in the battle against the political left.
While Austin hums about the unspoken rivalry between the country’s two largest Republican-controlled states, DeSantis pays homage to Texas’ ebullient egos and says Florida has its own “great sense of pride” under his leadership. He said it’s being noticed “down to the guy in the White House,” referring to his potential opponent in 2024: President Joe Biden.
“They know you don’t mess with Texas – and you don’t step on Florida,” DeSantis said. “I really believe that if Texas and Florida didn’t play the role that we played in this country in recent history, our entire country would be one big awakened, neo-Marxist fire in a landfill.”
DeSantis’ speech at the annual Lincoln Reagan Dinner in Harris County was part of a two-day Texas trip that will also include a similar event on Saturday for the Dallas County Republican Party. The events come as DeSantis increasingly travels outside of Florida ahead of a pending bid against former President Donald Trump for the Republican presidential nomination.
Texas’ own governor, Greg Abbott, has not ruled out his own White House proposal, fueling the idea of a budding competition between the two megastates.
DeSantis didn’t mention Abbott much, but his speech was full of praise for Texas and his recent efforts to lead conservative politics at the national level. This was a far cry from the tone adopted by Abbott’s inner-party critics, who see DeSantis as a stronger champion of their cause.
Instead, DeSantis spoke several times about the two states as the new equals in the culture war, referring to the Alamo as he promised to “never, never give up to the awakened crowd.”
“The state of Florida — and the state of Texas — is where they wake up to die,” DeSantis said, changing a line from his January inaugural address to include the Lone Star State.
Still, DeSantis wasn’t afraid to trumpet Florida and himself. He said he turned his state into a “sanctuary of sanity” during the COVID-19 pandemic, rejecting federal pressure to shut down the state, and he may have added, showing “our own form of Texas swagger.” And, referring to recent events, he boasted that Florida was the only state brave enough to publicly oppose the draft curriculum for the new African American Studies Advanced Course.
DeSantis also boasted about his two gubernatorial elections. He said that despite winning with just 50% of the vote in 2018, he “earned 100% of the executive power and I intend to use it to advance our agenda, in order to defend the interests of the people whom I represent and do good.” my campaign promises.
“I’m just not going to be a plant in a pot and let the left shape the debate and the media shape the debate,” DeSantis said. “I’m going on the attack.”
That approach, DeSantis said, led to his landslide reelection victory last year, which resulted in the Florida Democratic Party being declared “dead.”
Dinner in Houston was closed to the media, in keeping with DeSantis’ hostility towards traditional journalists. But at least one participant streamed DeSantis’s speech live on Facebook, and The Texas Tribune separately received his audio recording. The Dallas event will also be closed to the media.
In Dallas, DeSantis will also appear at the annual county party fundraiser, but it will be a different format than the speech he gave in Houston. It was billed as a “fireside chat” between DeSantis and his wife, Casey DeSantis, who is one of his closest political advisers.
The proceeds from fundraising dinners benefit the district’s parties, but they also give DeSantis a large following among activists and donors in two cities that are home to some of the party’s biggest donors nationwide. DeSantis was expected to meet sponsors privately on the sidelines of both events in Texas.
During his speech in Houston, DeSantis mentioned one top Texas Republican donor by name – Dick Weekly – saying that Florida was working to catch up with Texas on Weekley’s longstanding tort reform case.
DeSantis was represented in Houston by State Senator Brandon Creighton, Republican Conroe, chairman of the Senate Education Committee. In December, Creighton traveled to Tallahassee to meet with DeSantis about education.
Creighton praised DeSantis, but also stressed that the Texas Senate is prioritizing this session. He nodded to one of Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick’s priorities, saying that Texas “will oppose the teaching of critical race theory by tenured professors.”
Creighton specifically emphasized Patrick and Abbott’s priority: a “school choice” program that would redirect tax revenue so that parents could withdraw their children from public schools.
“In this Texas legislative session, we will make it clear that Texas parents have the rights they deserve in the public school classroom, as well as alternative education opportunities and tax revenue that belongs to families, not the government,” Creighton said.
Florida already has a suite of school choice programs, and in his speech, DeSantis wished Texas the best of luck in “finishing the big school choice package.”
The lineup for both the Houston and Dallas events also included U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Austin, indicative of his greater standing in the state, as he was a key Conservative negotiator for Kevin McCarthy’s ascension to House Speaker in January.
Abbott was not expected to attend DeSantis’ performances. On Friday he was in San Antonio and on Saturday he was going to speak in Austin to speak to the conservative law group of the University of Texas.
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