Presidential candidate Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) said former President Donald Trump added trillions to the national debt and supported amnesty for illegal immigrants in an unusually direct criticism of his biggest rival in the 2024 Republican primary.
DeSantis acknowledged to reporters on Wednesday night that Trump was running attacks on him, specifically “attacking me for voting against an omnibus spending bill that he signed when he was president.” According to DeSantis, Trump was “drawing helpful contrast with me now.”
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“I think he should not have signed those omnibus spending bills,” DeSantis said. “He added almost 8 trillion to the debt in a four-year period of time.”
DeSantis said he was happy being “on the conservative side of that debate.”
“Our debt’s gone up way too much,” he added.
“He also attacked me for voting against an amnesty bill that he had endorsed — 2 million-person amnesty bill, Goodlatte II, in 2018,” DeSantis explained.
H.R. 4760 would have allowed those who qualified under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program to renew their legal status every three years, indefinitely.
The newly announced candidate said Trump framed it as “voting against a wall.”
“If you remember, that bill was like a pittance for that in exchange for a massive amnesty,” DeSantis said.
He then reiterated his opposition to amnesty and questioned how a bill including it could be considered “America first.”
At the time, Trump wrote that “House Republicans should pass the strong but fair immigration bill, known as Goodlatte II, in their afternoon vote today, even though the Dems won’t let it pass in the Senate.”
However, the then-president went on to say that he didn’t push for lawmakers to support the measure. “I never pushed the Republicans in the House to vote for the Immigration Bill, either GOODLATTE 1 or 2, because it could never have gotten enough Democrats as long as there is the 60 vote threshold,” he tweeted later on.
DeSantis said he thought it was “odd” that Trump’s campaign would want to remind voters about the spending and amnesty bills.
“He wanted omnibus. I opposed omnibus,” the governor added. “He wanted amnesty. I opposed amnesty.”
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DeSantis announced his candidacy for president in a tweet before joining Twitter owner Elon Musk on a Twitter Spaces discussion in which he took questions.
In Morning Consult’s latest polling data, DeSantis enjoys support from 20% of potential Republican primary voters, while Trump has 58%. The former president announced his 2024 bid last year.
