Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis kicked off a four-nation “trade mission” on Monday meant to bolster his foreign policy credentials ahead of his expected challenge to Donald Trump for the Republican presidential nomination. But the first day of his foreign tour didn’t go well. Instead of looking statesmanlike, DeSantis came off as looking, quite frankly, a bit weird.
Sure, DeSantis met with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and other Japanese leaders. He called Japan “a heck of an ally” for the U.S. And he praised Japan’s efforts to increase defense spending. “We understand it’s a tough neighborhood out here, with North Korea, the rise of the [Chinese Communist Party], and we really believe that a strong Japan is good for America, and a strong America is good for Japan.”
He also planned to meet with airline executives to talk about creating direct flight routes between Japan and Florida. I guess he’ll have to include Orlando even if it’s the home of Disney World.
DeSantis’ trip, which will include stops in South Korea, Israel, and Britain, is being funded by Enterprise Florida, a controversial public-private state agency that aims to attract businesses to the state and promote it for economic development. But things quickly went downhill for DeSantis after his meeting with Fushida when he appeared with his wife, Casey, and answered questions from reporters.
A reporter asked DeSantis: "Governor, polls show you falling behind Trump. Any thoughts on that?"
On paper, DeSantis’ reply looked pretty nondescript: ”I'm not a candidate, so we'll see if and when that changes." But the video, posted by CNN’s Kaitlan Collins, quickly went viral as it showcased DeSantis’ quirky, not ready for prime time, mannerisms. By Tuesday morning, the tweet had been viewed 17.6 million times. And the hashtag #BobbleheadRon was starting to trend.
Democratic strategist Sawyer Hackett summed up DeSantis plight in a tweet: “Media folks get caught up in ideology, or policy, or debate skills—when in reality, a candidate’s weirdness can tank them the fastest. DeSantis is weird. He talks weird, he lacks charisma, and he can’t win.”
Here are some more Twitter responses as compiled by
Raw Story:
- Semafor Washington Bureau chief Benjy Sarlin: "The danger of being relatively undefined and getting branded “weird” by your opponent first is that even fairly straightforward answers start getting scrutinized in those terms."
- Former President & Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund Sherrilyn Ifill: “Billionaires are lined up to support this guy as leader of the most powerful country in the world?"
- Dave Zirin, frequent political commentator and noted sports editor at The Nation: "Not ready for primetime. Wide eyes and a neck wiggle is no way to do it."
- MSNBC legal analyst Joyce Vance: ”Such smarminess. If he can't handle an easy question about poll numbers he certainly can't handle the presidency. At least not well."
- Political science professor Robert E. Kelly summed it up: "Man, Trump is gonna eat him alive…"
And Florida Democrats were piling on Bobblehead Ron.
Remember how Fox News slammed President Joe Biden for making his unannounced visit to Ukraine in February rather than heading to East Palestine, Ohio, where a train derailment released toxic chemicals into the air? DeSantis is now on a foreign trip while back home gas prices shot up by double digits over the past week after flooding in south Florida prevented fuel trucks from accessing the gasoline terminals at Port Everglades. The flooding at one point caused more than half the gas stations in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale area to close.
Florida’s governor has not visited Fort Lauderdale since the flooding began on April 12.
Meanwhile, DeSantis didn’t exactly distinguish himself at a meeting with members of the Japanese Business Federation. Rather than just praise Florida’s benefits, DeSantis felt it necessary to diss Chicago after its recent election of liberal Brandon Johnson as mayor. The Florida Politics website reported:
“Chicago used to be one of the greatest cities in America. It’s had huge problems and there’s really a major need to go a different direction, and they elect someone that’s going to keep going in the same bad direction at an accelerated pace,” DeSantis said.
“People will start moving out of Chicago and they’ll move to places like Naples and other parts of Florida. That will happen.”
Meanwhile, there was one Florida Man who was relishing DeSantis’ misfortune. In Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump wrote this about DeSantis on his Truth Social platform.
"The “Consultants” are sending DeSanctus, and demanding he go immediately, on an emergency Round the World tour of U.S representative population countries, like South Korea, Japan, the United Kingdom, and Israel, in order to up his game and see if he can remove the stain from his failing campaign."
"Bad poll numbers! Perhaps he can, and perhaps he can’t, who really knows, but he’ll have plenty of time to think as he sits alone, on his tax payer funded airplane, riding it out and thinking, WHY???"
In a later Truth Social post, Trump suggested that DeSantis’ wealthy backers were considering sending him to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in D.C. “for an emergency personality transplant.”
A Wall Street Journal poll released on Friday showed that Trump has “gained command of the GOP presidential nomination race” over DeSantis. In December, DeSantis led Trump among likely Republican primary voters by 52% to 38% in the WSJ poll. The latest poll shows Trump with a 51% to 38% lead over the Florida governor. DeSantis also made a humiliating visit to Washington last week during which seven Republican House members from Florida endorsed Trump.
One Twitter wit had this suggestion as to what DeSantis should do while in Japan.
And some folks were ready to give a sign off for DeSantis’ campaign—even though he hasn’t announced he’s running yet.