DeSantis says he won’t meet with Biden in Florida, cites Idalia recovery – National | 24CA News
Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ‘ office said Friday that he has “no plans” to meet with President Joe Biden when the Democrat flies to Florida this weekend to survey damage from Hurricane Idalia, suggesting that doing so could hinder disaster response.
“In these rural communities, and so soon after impact, the security preparations alone that would go into setting up such a meeting would shut down ongoing recovery efforts,” DeSantis spokesman Jeremy Redfern said in a statement.
Idalia made landfall Wednesday morning along Florida’s Big Bend area as a Category 3 storm, inflicting widespread flooding and harm earlier than transferring north to drench Georgia and North Carolina. Biden is about to fly to Florida on Saturday to tour the harm personally.
DeSantis preemptively heading off a gathering contradicts Biden himself, who, when requested after an occasion on the White House earlier Friday whether or not he would meet with DeSantis throughout his journey to Florida, replied, “Yes.”
It’s additionally a break from the current previous, since Biden and DeSantis met when the president toured Florida after Hurricane Ian hit the state final 12 months, and following the Surfside condominium collapse in Miami Beach in summer time 2021. But DeSantis is now working for president, and he solely left the Republican major path final week with Idalia barreling towards his state.
White House spokeswoman Emilie Simons responded, “President Biden and the first lady look forward to meeting members of the community impacted by Hurricane Idalia and surveying impacts of the storm.”
“Their visit to Florida has been planned in close coordination” with the Federal Emergency Management Agency “as well as state and local leaders to ensure there is no impact on response operations,” Simons stated in her personal assertion.
The politics of placing apart rivalries following pure disasters can certainly be tough.
Another 2024 presidential candidate, former Republican New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, was extensively criticized in GOP circles for embracing then-President Barack Obama throughout a tour of harm 2012’s Hurricane Sandy did to his state. Christie was even requested in regards to the incident final month, through the first Republican presidential debate in Milwaukee.
Both Biden and DeSantis at first stated serving to storm victims would outweigh politics, however DeSantis started suggesting that logistical issues may complicate a presidential go to because the week wore on.
“There’s a time and a place to have political season,” the governor stated earlier than Idalia made landfall. “But then there’s a time and a place to say that this is something that’s life threatening, this is something that could potentially cost somebody their life, it could cost them their livelihood.”
By Friday, the governor was telling reporters of Biden, “one thing I did mention to him on the phone” was “it would be very disruptive to have the whole security apparatus that goes” with the president “because there are only so many ways to get into” lots of the hardest hit areas.
“What we want to do is make sure that the power restoration continues and the relief efforts continue and we don’t have any interruption in that,” DeSantis stated. The assertion about not planning to satisfy got here later, and Redfern pointed to the governor’s earlier feedback when requested how Idalia’s aftermath may differ from that of Ian or the Surfside collapse when DeSantis and Biden met.
DeSantis has constructed his White House bid round dismantling what he calls Democrats’ “woke” insurance policies. DeSantis additionally steadily attracts applause at GOP rallies by declaring that it’s time to ship “Joe Biden back to his basement,” a reference to the Democrat’s Delaware dwelling, the place he spent a lot of his time through the early lockdowns of the coronavirus pandemic.
Still, Biden prompt earlier within the week that he and DeSantis have been cooperating simply. While delivering pizzas to employees at FEMA’s Washington headquarters, the president stated he’d spoken to DeSantis so steadily about Idalia that “there should be a direct dial” between the pair.
Homeland Security adviser Liz Sherwood-Randall pointed to the experiences after Ian and Surfside when telling reporters on the White House this week that Biden and DeSantis “are very collegial when we have the work to do together of helping Americans in need, citizens of Florida in need.”
And but, the post-Idalia politics may very well be difficult for either side.
The president introduced his bid for reelection in April however has largely shunned campaigning, preferring as a substitute to steer by governing. The White House is now searching for an extra $4 billion to handle pure disasters as a part of its supplemental funding request to Congress — bringing the whole to $16 billion and illustrating that wildfires, flooding and hurricanes which have intensified throughout a interval of local weather change are imposing ever increased prices on U.S. taxpayers.
DeSantis, in the meantime, is going through questions on whether or not his marketing campaign can survive for the lengthy haul, at the same time as he helps Florida navigate not simply Idalia’s harm, but additionally a capturing the earlier week through which a white gunman killed three Black individuals at a comfort retailer in Jacksonville in a racist hate crime.
Four months earlier than the primary ballots are to be solid in Iowa’s caucuses, DeSantis nonetheless lags far behind former President Donald Trump, the Republican major’s dominant early front-runner. And he has cycled by repeated marketing campaign management shakeups and reboots of his picture in an try to refocus his message.
The tremendous PAC supporting DeSantis’ candidacy has halted its door-knocking operations in Nevada, which votes third on the Republican presidential major calendar, and a number of other states holding Super Tuesday primaries in March _ an additional signal of bother.
Associated Press author Brendan Farrington in Tallahassee, Florida, contributed to this report.
© 2023 The Canadian Press
