Both go back to Flor-i-daaaaaaaaaaaa.......

Trump to DeSantis: Go back to Florida

By KIMBERLY LEONARD

Former President Donald Trump is using Florida’s problems to roast Gov. Ron DeSantis.

During a rambling speech delivered close to his Mar-a-Lago club, Trump last night called on DeSantis to drop out of the presidential race and said Florida had been neglected while its governor was “wasting his time” campaigning for president.

“DeSanctus has been flying around the country, setting fire to his reputation and destroying the reputation, frankly, of Florida,” said Trump, who is leading the GOP field for president by wide margins.

Trump singled out property insurance costs, saying the crisis affected Floridians “like never before.” It wasn’t the first time Trump criticized DeSantis over the problem, but it seemed to hit differently last night in front of an audience of 3,500 supporters here in Florida. Soaring property insurance rates are a hard problem to explain to voters — unless they’re going through it firsthand.

Members of the audience said, “That’s right” and murmured in approval when Trump brought up how hard it was to stay insured and to pay crushingly high monthly rates. Just this week, a key state senator downplayed the possibility that the next Legislative session would tackle the issue, and a new report predicted costs would stay high.

The former president spent much of his speech, to the Club 47 Trump fan club, blaming President Joe Biden for the war in Israel. But Trump still had plenty of criticisms against DeSantis tucked into his meandering, 100-minute remarks. He boasted about beating DeSantis in a Florida poll and said the governor was without talent or personality.

“Florida families are getting clobbered while he’s off on his failing campaign,” Trump said.

When reporters asked DeSantis about the property insurance problem before, he pointed to a new law he signed in Florida that is supposed to try to keep costs down by making it harder for people to sue insurers, though he warned the changes would take time. His campaign would only address Trump’s comments calling for him to drop out by saying it was “wishful thinking” on the part of the former president because he is “feeling the heat.”

“DeSantis is setting the pace in the early states and building the largest grass-roots infrastructure of any candidate this cycle,” said press secretary Bryan Griffin.

— WHERE’S RON? Gov. DeSantis will be campaigning in New Hampshire with the super PAC supporting him, Never Back Down. He’ll also file for the primary in Concord, N.H.