Stay Free - Russel Brand


Ron DeSantis - Trump, Wokeness & Freedom ”Jan. 6 Was Not an Insurrection”,


Summary

Ron DeSantis, Governor of Florida and Democratic Presidential Candidate for 2024, joins us on the show to talk about his new book, The Courage To Be Free, and why he thinks Joe Biden is a lunatic. He also talks about how he became the governor of Florida, and how he took a stance that was antithetical to the stance taken elsewhere in America. And, of course, he talks about guns and vaccines. Stay free, and remember: everyone has a right to their own opinion, and we should all have a say in what we choose to believe and believe in. And, as always, thank you for tuning into SPOTIFY, and stay free, everyone! Logo by Courtney DeKorte. Theme by Mavus White. Music by PSOVOD, tyops, and tyops. The theme song is Come Alone by Suneaters, courtesy of Lotuspool Records, and the album art is by Nordgroove Records. The album art for this episode was done by and by . is available under a Creative Commons Attribution license. We do not own the rights to any of the music used in this episode. All credit is property of any other works credited to any other artists credited to their respective owners. If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a review, we'd like to receive a small royalty check. Thank you for the use of this episode if you re listening to the music you've listened to this episode on SoundCloud or listening to it on your local radio station or any other streaming platform, we really appreciate it in any other podcast you've been kind of listening to us in the audio you've gotten a chance to help us out. Thank you, we're grateful you're amazing, we appreciate it, it's a big thanks, we've got a good thing, we'll thank you, too much, it really really helps us out, we love you're a good day out here, good day, thanks really good company, good enough, good night, good morning, etc., etc., good night all of your support, etc. etc. -- thank you all really good day. -- thanks, bye, bye. -- RON DAUGHTY, RON AND GABE -- PRAISE ME AND KELLY, JUICY, MURDERER, JAY & KABOLEE, JEAN RYAN MURRAY


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Hello there, you Awakening Wonders.
00:00:01.000 Thanks for joining me today for Stay Free with Russell Brand.
00:00:04.000 It's a very special episode because Ron DeSantis, Governor of Florida and presidential candidate, is joining us.
00:00:11.000 We're going to talk to Ron for 15 minutes on YouTube, if you're watching us there.
00:00:14.000 Then we'll be exclusively on Rumble to talk about Trump, CBDCs, war in Ukraine, anti-riot, stroke anti-protest laws and what that distinction means.
00:00:24.000 In our item, Here's the News, we're going to be talking about Biden's temper.
00:00:28.000 Is he a toddler or is he a lethal lunatic?
00:00:32.000 Let us know in the comments where you stand on that particular issue.
00:00:36.000 And is even this new revelation that Biden behaves extraordinarily in public... This is an allegation, it's not big.
00:00:44.000 It's not been proven.
00:00:45.000 Is that potentially PR to make him sound a little more edgy, a little more priapic than he otherwise may, and a little less docile?
00:00:55.000 But now, the reason that you've joined us, I'm sure, is because we have the great privilege of welcoming the Governor of Florida and Republican presidential candidate for 2024, Ron DeSantis, and I've got a copy of The Courage To Be Free, Ron DeSantis' book, in my hand now, to endorse it by proximity and contact.
00:01:15.000 Ron, thank you so much for joining us on Stay Free with Russell Brand.
00:01:19.000 Well, thanks for having me.
00:01:20.000 And thanks for plugging the book.
00:01:22.000 Not everyone does that.
00:01:23.000 I didn't even ask you to do it.
00:01:24.000 So appreciate it.
00:01:25.000 We are very professional here and we're very grateful to have you on the show.
00:01:29.000 Thanks for joining us.
00:01:30.000 Thanks for supporting and endorsing Rumble, which of course has its home in the state that you are the governor of.
00:01:37.000 Ron, when I was in Florida recently, I was struck by the amount of pride that Floridians have in their state.
00:01:45.000 You appear to be universally endorsed by the population of Florida.
00:01:50.000 I did stand up comedy there.
00:01:52.000 A lot of my stand up was talking about measures taken in the pandemic where I live in the UK and the broad and I would say spookily ubiquitous response to the pandemic in most places in the world, except one might contest in Florida.
00:02:10.000 I'm sure that the sense of state pride that Floridians have is a source of great joy to you.
00:02:15.000 I wonder how you came to the position of confidence in taking a stance that was antithetical to the stance taken elsewhere in America.
00:02:27.000 Well, I'm glad you noticed that.
00:02:28.000 I was born and raised in Florida, and while I've always loved the state, we didn't have the same type of pride growing up that, say, people in Texas have about Texas.
00:02:38.000 And yet, in the last few years, particularly since I've been governor, we've developed that pride, and I think a lot of it's rooted in the fact that we told people like Fauci to take a hike during COVID.
00:02:50.000 We were going to do it our way.
00:02:52.000 We were going to be the free state of Florida, and obviously that meant people had a right to work, right to operate businesses.
00:02:57.000 Kids needed to be in school.
00:02:59.000 We fought back against mandates, both in terms of not letting local governments impose mask mandates, not letting government or business impose COVID vaccine mandates.
00:03:10.000 So in every step of the way, we were really leading.
00:03:13.000 And how did I come to it?
00:03:15.000 I mean, part of it was I just looked at the data that was coming in.
00:03:19.000 The whole premise of lockdown, both in the UK and in the United States, was in the idea that COVID would cause massive amounts of hospitalizations and we wouldn't even have any more hospital beds left over for normal patients.
00:03:33.000 We all got those models, all governors, all heads of state, and I'm looking at this in like March and April, And none of it was accurate.
00:03:41.000 All the predictions were bogus.
00:03:43.000 And so I said, listen, this is something that we're going to have to live with.
00:03:47.000 Sweden is living with it, and they're doing much better than most of these other countries in Europe.
00:03:52.000 Let's have people make their own decisions rather than forcing Fauci-ism on our state.
00:03:58.000 And I think That the goal of Fauci was to have rolling lockdowns so you'd lock down then COVID would go down then you could maybe open back up but when the next wave started you would have to lock down again and I think they would have wanted to repeat that over and over again had Florida
00:04:17.000 Not stood in the way.
00:04:18.000 I think they would have gotten away with it.
00:04:20.000 But what happened was, we said we're standing for freedom.
00:04:24.000 We remember we had a COVID wave summer of 2020.
00:04:26.000 Everyone was telling me, you've got to lock down Florida.
00:04:29.000 Fauci was saying it, the White House, the press, the left, all these people.
00:04:33.000 And I said, no.
00:04:35.000 I said, I'm going to stand.
00:04:36.000 A lot of people said, your political career is over.
00:04:38.000 And you know, at the end of the day, so be it, right?
00:04:40.000 A leader's got to do what he thinks is right.
00:04:42.000 You got to stand up for your folks, protect their jobs, instead of worrying about your own political hide.
00:04:47.000 And so that's what we did.
00:04:49.000 It made the state better, and that did.
00:04:51.000 But I do think it had an impact around the country, because anytime the lockdowners wanted to do more restrictions, people could just point to Florida and say, well, wait a minute.
00:05:00.000 Florida's not doing this.
00:05:01.000 Why don't we have to do it?
00:05:02.000 So we were glad to be able to take that stand.
00:05:05.000 But here's the thing.
00:05:07.000 You still have people today, Fauci and the like, They think that what they did was right.
00:05:13.000 They think that these lockdowns worked.
00:05:15.000 And so my fear is, if this happens in the future, a lot of these people are going to want to do the same thing again.
00:05:21.000 So one of the things I pledged as president, and I think I'm the only one running on the Republican side who will be willing to do this, we're going to bring a reckoning to this health bureaucracy and this medical swamp.
00:05:32.000 Because these agencies like CDC, NIH, FDA, They failed the American people, they become corrupted, and they did a lot of damage with these unscientific anti-freedom policies.
00:05:43.000 Well that's pretty heartening to hear.
00:05:45.000 In retrospect, your stance increasingly seems to have been the correct one, and that's interesting and exciting, in fact, to hear you talk about a reckoning.
00:05:57.000 One thing that is evident from the position that you took as governor of Florida, the
00:06:01.000 decentralization and the ability that you had to take that position, which must have
00:06:06.000 felt like a huge risk given that it was in opposition to the proposed mandate in elsewhere,
00:06:14.000 the sacking of key workers in New York City, the advocacy for shaming by CNN of people
00:06:21.000 that were hesitant or reluctant to pursue certain medical propositions, a risk that
00:06:28.000 has doubtlessly paid off, but also it helps us to identify the importance of decentralization.
00:06:36.000 With this in mind, how do you feel that you would preside over the United States of America
00:06:42.000 if you fundamentally believe in the rights of individual states to establish their own
00:06:47.000 laws and govern in their own way?
00:06:51.000 Well there is way too much authority in Washington, D.C.
00:06:55.000 and in the federal government right now, and a lot of that is, I'd say, illegitimate authority that has been accumulated over many, many decades.
00:07:04.000 Some of that is because Congress has been neglectful, presidents have been neglectful, but you have a massive bureaucratic administrative state that exist almost outside of typical elections.
00:07:16.000 They exert power over the populace regardless of the outcome elections.
00:07:21.000 None of these people are elected and they purport to tell us what kind of
00:07:24.000 energy we can use, what kind of car we can drive, even whether potentially you're allowed to have a gas stove.
00:07:32.000 In Florida, we made gas stoves tax-free because we believe that you should have the ability to do all that.
00:07:38.000 Part of the project, I think, is to take power out of Washington and send it back to the states, the localities, and individuals.
00:07:47.000 That means we need a radical reduction of the federal bureaucracy.
00:07:51.000 We're going to tell our cabinet secretaries that they have to reduce the number of employees that they have inside D.C.
00:07:59.000 by 50 percent.
00:08:01.000 And that's going to probably be the biggest reduction in power in Washington in modern American history.
00:08:07.000 But we cannot go down the road of letting more and more power consolidate in Washington, D.C.
00:08:13.000 Part of the reason is the founders never wanted to have consolidated power like that because they
00:08:18.000 understood that's a threat to freedom. You also have another problem that the ruling class in D.C.,
00:08:24.000 they get almost every major issue wrong. And so these are the last people you would want to
00:08:29.000 surrender judgment and freedom to. They're going to lead us down the road to ruin. So we've got a
00:08:35.000 lot of work to do. But at the end of the day, part of the reason we've been successful in Florida
00:08:40.000 is we fought back against the federal government. For example, when the federal government tried to
00:08:45.000 impose the COVID-19 vax mandates on the economy, you had one through the main economy, which we
00:08:51.000 fought back and won. Then they did one on the medical personnel, nurses, who a lot of these
00:08:56.000 nurses had had COVID. They didn't want to take the vax. And so we called a special session of
00:09:01.000 the legislature. We're going to have to do it again.
00:09:03.000 We said, you don't have to do it in Florida.
00:09:05.000 Federal government said, well, we're telling you you have to.
00:09:07.000 And we said, go pound sand.
00:09:09.000 We're not going to cooperate.
00:09:10.000 So the federal government fined us $2 million.
00:09:13.000 But you know what?
00:09:14.000 We saved the jobs of tens of thousands of people throughout our state.
00:09:19.000 And so there's a lot you can do when you just stand up to these people to do what's right.
00:09:23.000 But there's no question that there's too much power in Washington, D.C.
00:09:28.000 Presumably, this process of devolving power and breaking down centralized bureaucratic power in Washington,
00:09:36.000 if undertaken in good faith, would mean in states like California and New York State,
00:09:42.000 you would get different cultural and ideological inflections, certainly based on a current reading
00:09:50.000 from the type of cultural values that are espoused and somewhat represented and, in fact, embodied by you, Ron.
00:09:59.000 And I wonder, if this process is undertaken in good faith, how will that affect the culture war, an issue that you've
00:10:06.000 been most outspoken on, if you genuinely are devolving power in the manner that you have described?
00:10:14.000 That's the first part of my question that I may offer you, because presumably, California
00:10:16.000 because presumably, California would have a whole different set of values, different policies
00:10:18.000 would have a whole different set of values, different policies on green issues, for example,
00:10:23.000 on green issues, for example, different policies on homelessness, and many of the topics loosely corralled
00:10:25.000 different policies on homelessness, and many of the topics loosely corralled
00:10:31.000 under, let's say, wokeness and the anti-woke discourse that's been dominating political and culture more broadly for a
00:10:31.000 under, let's say, wokeness and the anti-woke discourse that's been dominating political and culture more broadly for a
00:10:37.000 while.
00:10:37.000 while.
00:10:37.000 And the second part of my question is, are you willing to approach and rebut centralized power
00:10:44.000 in its corporate and private form in the same way that you would confront it in the state form?
00:10:50.000 I'm talking, of course, of giant monopolies and duopolies in the areas of big tech, and even energy and media.
00:10:58.000 Because of course, one of the arguments that is advanced, that is for pro-state power, is that it gives us the
00:11:04.000 ability to confront corporate power, even if that isn't happening
00:11:07.000 anywhere in American politics at the moment.
00:11:10.000 Well, no, I mean, I think it's a great, great issue.
00:11:12.000 But I actually think it's just the opposite.
00:11:14.000 I think what you've seen is a collusion between big government and big business.
00:11:19.000 I mean, just take big tech.
00:11:20.000 A lot of the things that were being censored during COVID, for example, that wasn't just being done because Mark Zuckerberg thought that he wanted it censored.
00:11:28.000 No, he was working with people like Fauci.
00:11:31.000 They were working with people inside of government to censor dissent on lockdowns, on mask mandates, on school closures, on vax mandates.
00:11:40.000 All these things that, I mean, if you think about it, a free society has to have debates over important issues.
00:11:47.000 What more important issue have we had in the last decade or two Then whether society should be locked down.
00:11:53.000 I mean, are you kidding me?
00:11:55.000 And they didn't want to have that debate.
00:11:57.000 So I actually think that, yes, obviously when there's less power in Washington, individual states, they have certain powers to make different decisions.
00:12:05.000 but i do think if we break up the relationship
00:12:09.000 between big government and some of these big monopolies particularly in the text
00:12:13.000 fear uh... i think that's actually gonna have universal benefit
00:12:17.000 third throughout the country because there's going to be more ability to
00:12:20.000 speak freely uh... you're not gonna have on call sam with its thumb on
00:12:24.000 the scale and let's just be clear about this
00:12:26.000 the federal government could not censor you and say you can't say something
00:12:30.000 about say lockdowns that would violate the first amendment everybody knows that
00:12:35.000 but they can't subcontract doubt that to a private entity and have the private
00:12:40.000 entity do what the federal government couldn't do directly It's still a violation of the First Amendment.
00:12:45.000 One of the things we did in Florida as governor, I signed legislation expressly prohibiting
00:12:50.000 our state and local government employees from colluding with big tech for any type of speech
00:12:56.000 censorship or to police quote misinformation or disinformation.
00:13:00.000 They are not allowed to do that as a matter of law.
00:13:03.000 As president, I'll issue an executive order basically barring federal employees from colluding
00:13:10.000 with big tech like we've seen in the past.
00:13:12.000 But I think this whole idea of freedom in our society has got to be through a view to
00:13:17.000 the lens of yes, we know big government, it can be bad for freedom.
00:13:21.000 There's no question about it.
00:13:23.000 But we live in an era where a lot of these big private concentrations of power are exercising
00:13:29.000 kind of government like power.
00:13:31.000 I mean, if if you have Wall Street banks collude to deny funding for, say, gun shop owners,
00:13:38.000 well, that's an indirect attack on the Second Amendment.
00:13:42.000 When you have different types of tech companies colluding with government to censor certain subjects, that's an attack on the First Amendment.
00:13:50.000 So you've got to understand that freedom's under attack, not just from government power.
00:13:57.000 There's also concentration of private power, which does threaten a free society.
00:14:03.000 So far, so good, so presidential, and so many questions yet remaining.
00:14:09.000 Of course we have to follow up Ron on the aspect of my question that touched on the
00:14:13.000 culture war because freedom is a two-way street and if we're going to grant freedom to people
00:14:20.000 to express themselves culturally in the manner that is embodied by your success there in
00:14:26.000 Florida then what about the freedom of those opposed?
00:14:29.000 But the next question that I'm going to ask Ron DeSantis is would you pardon Trump on
00:14:36.000 the charges around January 6th and the handling of classified documents.
00:14:40.000 And if this man can speak so eloquently and appealingly, how is it that Trump is still soaring in the polls?
00:14:47.000 To hear the answer to those questions, you are going to have to join us on Rumble.
00:14:51.000 There's a link in the description right now.
00:14:53.000 If you watch it, so join us over there on the home of free speech.
00:14:56.000 We're going to be speaking freely because some of the issues that Ron's already touched upon are most relevant to us on our independent media platform.
00:15:04.000 If you're watching us on Rumble, press the red button on your screen now and join our locals community.
00:15:10.000 You may be familiar with the former proprietor of Locals, our friend, our mutual friend, Dave Rubin, Floridian gay man, friend of Ron DeSantis.
00:15:22.000 Actually, before we get on to Trump, Ron, could I just say that are you willing to acknowledge and accept that the kind of freedom that you're talking about, and of course it's telling that the example you use is like, you know, gun shop owners, Would you, as president, a president that's looking to decrease state power, recognise that in states that are conventionally more aligned with liberal values and even the kind of woke values that you have publicly condemned, would they have the right to pursue policies in those areas?
00:15:54.000 Would they be granted the same freedom that you have demanded and exhibited in Florida Well, actually, I don't even think it's a question of granting.
00:16:05.000 I think our Constitution is set up.
00:16:07.000 It was created by the states.
00:16:09.000 The states created the Constitution.
00:16:11.000 They retained the bulk of the power, and they're allowed to use that power to do what their constituents want.
00:16:18.000 and as much as I kind of look to see some of the stuff that may go on in California and shake my head,
00:16:25.000 clearly they're gonna have a right to pursue some of the things.
00:16:28.000 Like for example, how they handle their energy situation.
00:16:31.000 I think it's a mistake.
00:16:33.000 You have rolling blackouts, you have all these problems.
00:16:36.000 I think they're putting ideology ahead of sound science, but nevertheless, if people don't like that,
00:16:42.000 they can vote in a new government.
00:16:44.000 They can vote them out of office.
00:16:46.000 So that's just the nature of a federalist system.
00:16:49.000 We understand that there's 50 different states.
00:16:51.000 We say it's a laboratory of democracy.
00:16:53.000 I would point out though, that the people are leaving those woke states
00:16:58.000 and they're migrating to states like Florida who are doing it differently.
00:17:02.000 So I think in terms of the experiment of people voting with their feet,
00:17:05.000 the results of that have been very, very clear.
00:17:08.000 They're choosing Florida above all else.
00:17:09.000 They're choosing Texas, Tennessee.
00:17:11.000 They're basically choosing states that have rejected the woke agenda.
00:17:15.000 And that are focusing on what I would say are just common sense principles,
00:17:19.000 but certainly things like safe streets, quality education.
00:17:24.000 Yeah, that's just been our bread and butter.
00:17:26.000 In Florida, we're ranked the number one economy in the country out of 50 states by CNBC,
00:17:31.000 which is not a fan of mine.
00:17:33.000 We have the number one for new business formations and we've had more wealth migrate into Florida
00:17:38.000 since I've been governor than has ever migrated into an individual state over a similar period of time
00:17:43.000 in American history.
00:17:44.000 So we're proud of that and we think Americans can make judgments about where they wanna live.
00:17:49.000 No one's saying you haven't done a great job in Florida.
00:17:52.000 I've been to Florida.
00:17:53.000 I had a good time in Florida.
00:17:54.000 My stand-up comedy audience love you in Florida.
00:17:57.000 No one's saying that except perhaps when it comes to devolving the power for schools and allowing them and allowing their parents to participate in all Which books should be permitted when it comes to ideology, and which books should be banned?
00:18:11.000 Now, I agree with decentralisation, and I fundamentally believe that true freedom is other people's freedom.
00:18:20.000 And I wonder, just to use this rather localised example, if you were to grant similar freedoms in California, You can imagine that the types of books that might get banned wouldn't be books that promote certain sexualities and certain lifestyles.
00:18:36.000 They might be more traditional and orthodox books.
00:18:38.000 Would you be happy with that and would you permit that?
00:18:41.000 If schools, for example, in California said we want to ban the Bible or we don't want to talk about Christianity or we don't want to talk about heterosexual families or we want further gung-ho legislation, you'd be down for all that?
00:18:52.000 Well, they've done that for years.
00:18:53.000 I mean, I don't think in California they would allow a Bible.
00:18:56.000 I think it should be allowed, of course, but I don't think that they do do that.
00:18:59.000 In Florida, what we've really done, though, is we have devolved power to the parents, because ultimately school systems don't exist Uh, just for their own sake.
00:19:10.000 They exist to serve the community.
00:19:12.000 And so we think it's appropriate that the education reflects community standards.
00:19:16.000 So when you have some of the stuff which has been very graphic and pornographic in a fourth grade or fifth grade classroom, it's not a question of banning it because you as an adult are free to do that in Florida.
00:19:27.000 We're not getting rid of it.
00:19:28.000 It's not like Amazon where they won't put books on that talk about negatively, talk about like gender ideology.
00:19:34.000 In Florida, everything's available for adults.
00:19:37.000 But there's a time and a place to have something that graphic.
00:19:39.000 We don't want to be treating kids like adults.
00:19:42.000 We want to be treating kids like kids.
00:19:44.000 And so injecting some of these concepts in first or second grade is just not appropriate.
00:19:48.000 So we're just giving parents the ability to know what's being taught in schools.
00:19:52.000 And then if something violates the standards that Florida sets, they can do it.
00:19:56.000 For example, take it away from the sexualization.
00:20:00.000 We have Holocaust education in Florida.
00:20:02.000 If a teacher teaches that the Holocaust didn't happen, we obviously, the parents would blow the whistle and there would be issues.
00:20:09.000 So we have a right to set what standards we want to be taught.
00:20:12.000 We can pick what subjects that we want to be taught and do it in that direction.
00:20:17.000 But nothing is being banned.
00:20:19.000 You guys can knock yourself out on any of that stuff.
00:20:22.000 Just don't put it in a fourth grade classroom where it's not appropriate.
00:20:26.000 So I think we've gotten it right.
00:20:28.000 I think we're getting the education back on the idea that this should be about instructing kids for a better life so that they can think for themselves, be citizens of the republic.
00:20:38.000 We don't want our schools to just be indoctrination centers where it's all about imposing an ideological agenda.
00:20:45.000 And here's the thing.
00:20:46.000 There's an opportunity cost for doing some of the sexualization and some of the other stuff, because you're not doing as much as you need to on reading.
00:20:54.000 You're not doing as much as you need to on science and math.
00:20:57.000 And so from both what's appropriate and what parents find appropriate, but also from the perspective of opportunity costs, let's just focus on things we can all agree on and we all know are important and we can do it.
00:21:09.000 But anytime the media says there's any type of bans, That is a total hoax.
00:21:14.000 All these books are available for people who are of age.
00:21:18.000 And in a truly decentralized model that enshrines decentralization and democracy, what would be important would be the principle rather than the subject.
00:21:27.000 So you would likely get schools that said, yeah, we want these type of books.
00:21:32.000 And if that were democratically agreed upon by the parents of those schools, you as president of the United States would say, sure.
00:21:39.000 Well, obviously, I think the president's role in K-12 education is incredibly limited.
00:21:45.000 These are things that are really bottom-up, school districts and states, and I think the proper recourse would be for parents on that local level to elect more people to the school board.
00:21:56.000 uh... so that they could uh... change the curriculum in ways that they think
00:21:59.000 are appropriate but yet we will not be having a federal government imposed
00:22:04.000 uh... national k_-twelve curriculum uh... first of all i don't think that he would even work in
00:22:08.000 second of all i don't think the federal government has the affirmative authority
00:22:12.000 to do that that's interesting because it seems increasingly what you're
00:22:14.000 saying is from the office of president you would be involved power
00:22:18.000 wherever possible and leave ideology to democracy
00:22:22.000 Yeah, I would eliminate the Federal Department of Education if we can.
00:22:26.000 I don't think that the federal government was never envisioned to have really any role in K-12.
00:22:31.000 What they've tried to do is they've tried to use funding to force behaviors of K-12
00:22:37.000 districts, school districts. So for example on the women's sports, they say you have to have,
00:22:44.000 if a man identifies a woman, they have to be allowed to do women's sports, otherwise you
00:22:48.000 lose lunch money.
00:22:49.000 So they've used that aggressively under the Biden administration to try.
00:22:53.000 to try to change behavior.
00:22:54.000 My view would be like, let's take education, send it back to the states, get the federal government out.
00:22:59.000 Yes, is Oakland and in Berkeley, are they gonna do it a way that I would like it?
00:23:03.000 No way they're gonna do that.
00:23:04.000 But that would free up the vast majority of school districts
00:23:08.000 who probably would see it my way to have the freedom to be able to institute sound policies.
00:23:14.000 Yeah, man, democracy works.
00:23:15.000 Thank you, that's really interesting.
00:23:17.000 Now, what is evident, even after just this limited amount of time in your company, is that you are a competent orator, that you are a successful politician, that you are very appealing, that you've succeeded in Florida, and yet you have to deal with the spectre and the phantom, the gargoyle demagogue that is Donald Trump.
00:23:39.000 How do you, in your position, knowing that there is no pathway to the presidency via Donald Trump, that this is a phenomena and a fact that you're going to have to deal with, how do you confront his position in the polls?
00:23:50.000 And what would you do about some of the charges that Donald Trump is facing in the event that you were president?
00:23:56.000 And also, how does it personally feel as, you know, like just talking to you for a while, and clearly you and I would see a whole host of issues very differently, but It's pretty clear that you're a pretty potent political voice and figure and orator.
00:24:11.000 How do you deal with the sort of wild card of Donald Trump and what he represents to so many people?
00:24:18.000 Well look, this is a campaign that's still very early on.
00:24:23.000 Most people are not paying attention over the summer.
00:24:25.000 They're doing things like be with their families, and they're enjoying themselves.
00:24:29.000 So we've been laying the groundwork in the early states.
00:24:31.000 The media will talk about polls, but they'll take a poll from the whole country.
00:24:35.000 That's not how the primary process works.
00:24:37.000 You do Iowa, then New Hampshire, then South Carolina.
00:24:40.000 So we're actually on the ground in those states doing the work that is not always kind of headline-grabbing, But it's really grassroots and we're building support.
00:24:48.000 So we're doing a good job.
00:24:50.000 We're going to continue to do more.
00:24:51.000 I think at the end of the day, looking forward, our voters, they want to win.
00:24:57.000 And so we need to beat Biden.
00:24:58.000 I will beat Biden.
00:25:00.000 And then they want somebody that's actually going to be able to deliver Well, I think I'm one of the few where I made bold promises, no doubt, but I over-delivered on the promise.
00:25:06.000 some of the issues. We als also have a whole bunch o
00:25:10.000 I have a record in florid I'm gonna do something, I
00:25:14.000 out there doing idle prom many people run for offi
00:25:19.000 and under deliver. Well, few where I made bold pro
00:25:24.000 I over delivered on the p the reason I do it is bec
00:25:30.000 military officer, so I'm I don't give the other side a lot of rope to hang me with.
00:25:37.000 I'm not shooting myself in the foot.
00:25:38.000 I'm focusing on the task at hand.
00:25:40.000 I'm focused, I'm disciplined, and it's all about accomplishing the mission.
00:25:45.000 And I think our voters are in a situation where increasingly they're saying, you know, that's what we have to do.
00:25:50.000 Also, the way the United States is with the two-term limit for president, Trump would be a one-term lame duck.
00:25:56.000 I could serve two terms.
00:25:58.000 So I'm in my 40s.
00:26:00.000 I would go in on day one.
00:26:01.000 I'd be incredibly energetic.
00:26:03.000 I would be very active.
00:26:05.000 You want to talk about the administrative state?
00:26:07.000 We would be able to slay the administrative state.
00:26:11.000 We'd secure the border.
00:26:12.000 We'd do all these things, and it would really be a flurry of activity.
00:26:15.000 So more and more people are going to see that.
00:26:17.000 We haven't even had debates yet.
00:26:19.000 And just keep an eye on those early states, because I like what I'm seeing there.
00:26:23.000 It's a little bit different on the ground than some of the stuff that gets put out
00:26:28.000 on some of the national stuff.
00:26:30.000 How do you manage the tension when there is a plain appetite in your country
00:26:35.000 for anti-establishment figures?
00:26:38.000 RFK becoming an emergent force in the Democrat Party, Trump having been the defining figure in the last five, six, seven years in American politics and American campaigns.
00:26:50.000 How do you deal with managing the tension of being a representative of establishment forces while acknowledging that many people no longer trust the media?
00:26:57.000 Many people no longer trust the government.
00:26:59.000 Many people are deeply cynical about American institutions.
00:27:03.000 How do you deal with the massive mistrust and neonialism of American cultural life?
00:27:09.000 Can we imagine a situation where whatever the result of the next presidential election, the opposing side will likely say, The election was stolen, it was because of Russians, it was because of broken or corrupt voting machines.
00:27:23.000 How can you ever bring together and justify a centralised American experiment, particularly when you seem to believe so strongly in decentralisation, federalism and maximum democracy?
00:27:36.000 How do you deal with this mistrust and this great appetite for outsiders?
00:27:42.000 Well, one, I would push back on this idea that I'm representing establishment forces.
00:27:48.000 I get attacked by the corporate press more than anybody running for office, more than Joe Biden, and now more than Donald Trump, because I think the corporate press views me as a bigger threat.
00:28:00.000 They understand that I will beat Biden, and they know I will actually deliver on all these things.
00:28:05.000 Whereas I think they think that Trump would not beat Biden, and then I think they think even if he did, that he would be distracted with all these other stuff and wouldn't be able to deliver.
00:28:14.000 So I've been the target of all these people, and I think it's because I've been willing to lead.
00:28:20.000 Also, I would point out during COVID, I was the one fighting Fauci.
00:28:25.000 Donald Trump put Fauci in charge.
00:28:28.000 He never fired Fauci.
00:28:30.000 In fact, Donald Trump's last day in office, he gave Fauci a presidential commendation.
00:28:37.000 And I'm just thinking to myself, this guy had been responsible for justifying school closures, for justifying mandates, for justifying lockdowns, and by January of 2021, we knew how destructive it was.
00:28:50.000 We knew it had failed.
00:28:54.000 So on the biggest hysterical issue, the biggest current thing, where all these elites got together, COVID-19, I was one of the leaders throughout this world to stand against those people, fight back against them.
00:29:08.000 And so I think that the fact that I've been willing to do that, I mean, for example, I've got a grand jury.
00:29:14.000 hearing evidence in Florida about misrepresentations by pharmaceutical companies over COVID-19
00:29:22.000 jabs.
00:29:23.000 There's not another elected official in the country who's been willing to ask those types
00:29:29.000 of questions.
00:29:30.000 You know, we're doing it and we're getting answers for that.
00:29:33.000 So I think I present a great opportunity for people because I have all the right enemies.
00:29:39.000 You see it by how they're attacking me, but I also have a proven record of beating these people, and we would do the same thing as president.
00:29:47.000 Two of the most powerful voices in the space that you currently occupy, Governor, have to be regarded as Donald Trump and Tucker Carlson.
00:29:57.000 Both of them have taken strong Over-explicit anti-war stances, saying, among other things, that the Pentagon can't pass an audit, that the money that American taxpayers are funneling into this Ukraine war that increasingly seems like a disaster and a proxy war ought be
00:30:18.000 As a former military officer, where do you stand on this conflict and are you willing to match that kind of anti-war rhetoric?
00:30:31.000 And how do you reconcile the enormous revenue, the vast budgetary and treasury weight that this war and the military-industrial complex places on the American people generally, With the conditions that many former military personnel are enduring.
00:30:50.000 Many of them having to use food banks.
00:30:52.000 Many of them, like a significant number, ending up homeless.
00:30:56.000 A great stain on American culture, I would say, is the rhetoric that supports veterans and the shameful way in which they are treated.
00:31:04.000 What is your stance on this current conflict and would you end this war?
00:31:08.000 So one on the military industrial complex, we are actually going to overhaul how these retired generals are allowed to then just go work for defense contractors.
00:31:20.000 As commander in chief, you can put restrictions on that.
00:31:23.000 You basically have a revolving door.
00:31:25.000 Uh, where people go from high military positions into just a handful of major, uh, defense contractors.
00:31:31.000 We're also gonna, uh, democratize the ability of people, because we obviously need to have a strong defense.
00:31:37.000 Uh, but we don't want it to go to just a handful of companies.
00:31:40.000 We used to have all these companies, like, during World War II.
00:31:43.000 Uh, so we want to do that, uh, for sure.
00:31:45.000 And we absolutely need an accounting to just do a blank check.
00:31:49.000 Uh, that doesn't serve the American people.
00:31:51.000 As in, when I was in Iraq, The thing that I noticed was, and this was 2007, so we were there fighting Al-Anbar province, Al-Qaeda in Iraq.
00:32:01.000 I was attached to Navy SEAL Team 1, and the mission was very murky.
00:32:06.000 Yeah, beat Al-Qaeda, but then create a democracy in the Middle East, in Iraq.
00:32:10.000 Well, we weren't able to do that.
00:32:12.000 And so you ended up being there for many years.
00:32:14.000 There was a lot of money spent.
00:32:16.000 There was no clear-cut victory.
00:32:18.000 Same with Afghanistan.
00:32:19.000 And I think what's happening in Ukraine is they're barreling towards a multi-year stalemate where a lot more people are gonna die, where you're gonna have a lot of treasure that's gonna be spent.
00:32:32.000 For basically no change in outcome.
00:32:35.000 And so what I've said is we need to focus on achieving a sustainable peace in Europe.
00:32:42.000 We should not want to see this thing go on.
00:32:45.000 We have pressing problems at home that we're neglecting, as you mentioned, our own veterans.
00:32:50.000 We have an open border in the United States of America.
00:32:53.000 We have American families that are losing children to fentanyl overdose by the tens of thousands because we haven't secured our own border.
00:33:03.000 And yet what?
00:33:03.000 We've sent how many hundreds of billions of dollars there?
00:33:07.000 They're not sending that to us.
00:33:09.000 Also, I do think we have threats in this world, such as the Chinese Communist Party, which you've seen as the amount of ammunition and the amount of weapons that have been sent to the Ukraine has actually Dwindled our own stocks so that if we were potentially in a major conflict, we would not be able to likely to respond.
00:33:31.000 Now, Donald Trump, you know, had made different comments the other day.
00:33:34.000 He said he wanted to flood Zelensky with weapons.
00:33:37.000 So I'm not exactly sure, you know, where he is on that.
00:33:40.000 But I think the goal needs to be no blank check and have a sustainable peace in Europe.
00:33:47.000 It doesn't serve our interests to be involved in this thing infinitum.
00:33:52.000 As you have identified as an outsider and an anti-establishment figure, what are your views on two men that have perhaps done more to reveal the deep corruption of the American experiment?
00:34:05.000 Julian Assange, currently facing extradition to your country under the Espionage Act, and Edward Snowden, of course, currently in exile in Russia.
00:34:14.000 Do you think these men should be pardoned?
00:34:16.000 Do you think their status should be revised to that of heroes?
00:34:19.000 Or would you similarly persecute those individuals in the way that they currently are?
00:34:24.000 You know, it's interesting because I think this is an issue that was raised when Donald Trump took office.
00:34:30.000 And of course, we've seen a lot of abuse of power by the deep state during the Trump administration.
00:34:35.000 And I know there were a lot of people that were counseling him to pursue relief on these
00:34:41.000 two individuals, you know, and he didn't do it.
00:34:44.000 And I think he said that there was reasons why he didn't do it.
00:34:47.000 So I think when you're talking about using power under Article 2 for pardon, you really
00:34:52.000 need to get all the information.
00:34:54.000 You got to look at the files and you got to see, okay, what is this all about?
00:34:58.000 But I am definitely convinced that a lot of those agencies have abused their power over the years.
00:35:04.000 I would not have probably said that as a young man, as a young military officer, because I was working with people in the intelligence and FBI in different capacities in my young professional life, and I found everyone to be very professional.
00:35:18.000 I thought that these were very patriotic people, but I think what we've seen, particularly over the last 10 years, is we've seen exposed a lot of abuse of power.
00:35:29.000 So there's a lot that needs to be done to rein all that in.
00:35:33.000 And so I would say I go into this stuff with much more skepticism about government's rationale for things than I probably would have 15 or 20 years ago.
00:35:44.000 Finally, Governor, your critics have noted that post January the 6th, a repressive anti-riot bill was passed that previously had failed.
00:35:54.000 And even in the video promoting the bill, there were images of the Capitol breach alongside images of the George Floyd Black Lives Matter protests.
00:36:04.000 When we are talking about freedom, freedom of speech, freedom to protest, how do you reconcile that with the passing of this bill?
00:36:13.000 Well, it doesn't infringe on anyone's ability to protest.
00:36:16.000 That's protected.
00:36:17.000 That's First Amendment speech.
00:36:19.000 When that goes into violence, so for example, during the Floyd, you know, we saw a lot of violent activity.
00:36:24.000 And then the question is, is how do you deal with those folks?
00:36:27.000 So we all agree, you can protest, you can say whatever you want about me, about anybody else.
00:36:33.000 If it does go into violence, how are those folks treated?
00:36:36.000 And I think in a place like Portland, You'd have people riot, they'd be violent, they'd get arrested, they'd get slapped on the wrist, they'd go out and do it again.
00:36:44.000 Harassing police officers, doing things like that.
00:36:46.000 That's not conducive to a healthy society.
00:36:49.000 If you look at what happened with the BLM riots in Minneapolis, Minneapolis has still not recovered from that.
00:36:57.000 It is something that's likely going to take many, many years to be able to do.
00:37:00.000 And so I think we can all agree, yes, say what you want, it's a free country.
00:37:05.000 Don't attack police officers.
00:37:06.000 Don't throw Molotov cocktails.
00:37:08.000 Don't do any of that.
00:37:09.000 And I would note, as much as the corporate press has tried to demagogue our anti-riot bill, they've not actually found anybody who wasn't able to protest.
00:37:18.000 There's massive protests that take place in Florida.
00:37:21.000 about different issues almost every other day.
00:37:25.000 A lot of times there's messages that are done that I don't particularly agree with,
00:37:29.000 but that's the way the world works.
00:37:30.000 People are free to express their mind.
00:37:32.000 But I do think if you let riots take over a city like they did during the BLM, that has huge, huge impact.
00:37:40.000 And the thing about it was with BLM, they were talking about racism,
00:37:45.000 but a lot of the businesses that they were burning down were black owned businesses.
00:37:50.000 And so you're ruining those people's lives?
00:37:52.000 Why?
00:37:53.000 That didn't do anything to solve any problems, and so we're very strong on that.
00:37:57.000 I had the National Guard called out in Florida during BLM because I didn't want to see any of our cities burnt down, and nobody did.
00:38:04.000 They did protest, that's fine.
00:38:06.000 They protested in front of the governor's mansion.
00:38:08.000 Uh, and they were, they were, um, you know, saying a lot of nasty things.
00:38:11.000 I have young kids that were, that were there hearing it and that's fine.
00:38:14.000 But, um, but definitely we got to draw the line at violence.
00:38:17.000 And so that bill struck the right, right balance.
00:38:20.000 And in fact, uh, it's been, um, uh, they have not been able to bring a successful challenge in the courts.
00:38:27.000 Ron, thank you so much for joining us for this conversation.
00:38:32.000 It seems to me that your country is in the midst of an ideological reckoning, much like the one that you pledged would take place in the agencies around health in your country in the event In the event that you were to ascend to this position, what I find most heartening and interesting is your commitment to decentralisation, your acceptance that free speech means the rights of the free speech of people that you oppose, the acknowledgement and recognition that different communities will want to live life differently, and it seems that decentralisation and diversity, to me, live hand in hand.
00:39:11.000 I wonder what you feel in particular about the protests around January the 6th.
00:39:17.000 Do you think that they were insurrectionists as described?
00:39:20.000 Do you consider them to be protesters?
00:39:23.000 What do you think about the subsequent funding that the Capitol Police received and how the Democrat Party in particular has used these events to enact more power and to control media spaces?
00:39:35.000 Well, I think it's ridiculous how much money that they pumped in for the Capitol Police.
00:39:40.000 It was not an insurrection.
00:39:42.000 These are people that were there to attend a rally, and then they were there to protest.
00:39:47.000 Now it devolved, and it devolved into a riot.
00:39:51.000 But the idea that this was a plan to somehow overthrow the government of the United States is not true, and it's something that the media had spun up just to try to basically, you know, get as much mileage out of it and use it for partisan and for political aims.
00:40:07.000 And so I know there were a lot of people that were there who were just there, and they didn't have any designs on doing anything.
00:40:15.000 And so we just have to be honest about it.
00:40:17.000 If somebody is honestly doing an insurrection against the U.S.
00:40:21.000 government, then prove that that's the case, and I'll be happy to accept it.
00:40:25.000 But all you're showing me is that there are a lot of protesters there, and it ended up devolving, you know, in ways that was unfortunate, of course.
00:40:33.000 But to say that they were seditionists is just wrong.
00:40:36.000 Who's your favorite tech billionaire?
00:40:38.000 Is it Elon Musk?
00:40:39.000 Is it Mark Zuckerberg?
00:40:40.000 Do these figures have too much power?
00:40:43.000 Well, they do have too much power, but obviously I would take Elon because he's done Twitter and he's actually opened it up.
00:40:50.000 And if you think about how Twitter censored things like the Hunter Biden laptop story to try to interfere with the 2020 election, that would never happen under Elon.
00:40:59.000 So I think he understands the threats posed to a free society by woke ideology and by
00:41:05.000 some of the other corporate consolidations of power.
00:41:09.000 He's obviously very rich himself.
00:41:11.000 Nevertheless, I'd like what he's done with Twitter and he even floated maybe buying CNN.
00:41:16.000 So hopefully if he did that, I bet you'd probably be a little bit more reasonable by my lights.
00:41:21.000 Oh, Ron DeSantis, I appreciate you taking the time to speak with us.
00:41:26.000 I'm going to be back in Florida soon.
00:41:28.000 I'd be grateful for the opportunity to meet with you and even interview you again in person if you would permit it.
00:41:33.000 Let us know, man.
00:41:34.000 It was great.
00:41:34.000 I appreciate it.
00:41:35.000 You asked really, really good questions, and I would not have gotten those questions with just kind of corporate journalists, so good.
00:41:43.000 I think you're actually talking about things that people care about.
00:41:46.000 Thank you, Rhonda Santis.
00:41:47.000 Thank you for your time and for your eloquence.
00:41:49.000 It's a great privilege to speak with you.
00:41:50.000 Thank you so much.
00:41:52.000 Thanks very much, mate.
00:42:02.000 Switch on.