On the house turf of his chief Republican rival and in his adopted state, former President Donald J. Trump instructed a sprawling conservative gathering in Florida on Saturday night time that it was futile for Gov. Ron DeSantis to maintain battling him for the social gathering’s presidential nomination.
In a prime-time speech on the Turning Point Action Conference in West Palm Beach, Fla., Mr. Trump claimed that his polling lead over Mr. DeSantis and each different G.O.P. candidate was insurmountable, and urged that the Florida governor ought to stand down for the great of the social gathering.
Mr. Trump, who leads Mr. DeSantis by roughly 30 share factors in nationwide polls, dismissed Mr. DeSantis’s early momentum earlier than he formally entered the race in May as a mirage.
“He was never that close, by the way,” Mr. Trump instructed about 6,000 grass-roots activists on the Palm Beach County Convention Center. Turning Point Action is a political arm of Turning Point USA, a pro-Trump grass-roots group specializing in millennial conservatives that was based by Charlie Kirk.
Mr. Trump seized on his rival’s absence from the two-day occasion, which drew a couple of third of the Republican presidential area as audio system.
“I don’t know why he’s not here,” he mentioned. “He should be here representing himself.”
In an announcement on Saturday, Bryan Griffin, the marketing campaign press secretary for Mr. DeSantis, shrugged off Mr. Trump’s criticism.
“Governor DeSantis spent the day with Iowans and spoke to a packed house at the Tennessee G.O.P. Statesman Dinner later that night,” he mentioned. “This was a day after he delivered the strongest interview at the Family Leadership Summit, which Donald Trump notably skipped. Ron DeSantis is campaigning to win.”
Mr. Trump was greeted onstage with pyrotechnics and an almost three-minute video montage of the previous president. While organizers ready the stage for his entrance, Mr. Trump’s supporters, many of their ubiquitous pink caps, watched musical performances of Elvis and Pavarotti on big screens.
Mr. DeSantis declined an invite to talk on the finish of the convention on Sunday, in line with organizers, who famous that he had labored intently with Turning Point Action in the course of the midterm elections final yr and took half in a number of rallies that supported Trump-endorsed candidates.
But on the identical day that Mr. DeSantis introduced his marketing campaign in May, the conservative group introduced that Mr. Trump would headline its convention in Florida, maybe miffing the host governor.
The lineup of audio system on Saturday could have given Mr. DeSantis additional pause. It included three Republican House members from Florida who’ve endorsed Mr. Trump’s candidacy: Representatives Byron Donalds, Anna Paulina Luna and Matt Gaetz.
In succession, every professed their loyalty to the previous president, as booming subwoofers and smoke machines added to the theatrical impact.
Mr. Gaetz, the provocateur who nominated Mr. Trump for House speaker earlier this yr in the course of the G.O.P.’s protracted management combat, received a roar from the group when he mentioned that Mr. Trump’s allies have been unflinching.
“Of course, we ride or die with President Donald John Trump,” he mentioned.
And when Megyn Kelly, the previous Fox News commentator, dared to recommend on the occasion that the Republican nominating contest was in all probability a two-candidate race between Mr. Trump and Mr. DeSantis, a number of thousand activists booed.
Ms. Kelly, who famously tangled with Mr. Trump in a G.O.P. debate in 2015, relented.
“The vast majority of the Republican Party wants Trump,” she mentioned, including that Mr. Trump’s indictments had solely burnished his inventory with conservative voters. “We all know who the best middle-finger candidate is.”
In an almost 100-minute speech, Mr. Trump famous that Mr. DeSantis had as soon as been his ally and had sought his endorsement in his first race for governor in 2018.
“I got him elected,” he mentioned. “He was dead. He begged me to endorse him.”
Mr. Trump mentioned that he had been greatly surprised when Mr. DeSantis later declined to say whether or not he may problem him for the Republican nomination, utilizing an expletive to discuss with the Florida governor.
Tucker Carlson, who was fired from Fox News in April, whipped the viewers right into a frenzy with an look instantly earlier than the previous president.
“I don’t think most unemployed people get a reception like that,” Mr. Carlson mentioned.
Mr. Carlson doubled down on his baseless claims that voting machines had been rigged in the course of the 2020 election and expressed sympathy for the Capitol rioters, saying {that a} nation that squashes discussions in regards to the electoral course of was not a democracy.
Vivek Ramaswamy, the multimillionaire entrepreneur working for the Republican nomination, additionally spoke on Saturday. Three different long-shot candidates — Asa Hutchinson, the previous governor of Arkansas; Francis X. Suarez, the mayor of Miami; and Perry Johnson, a rich businessman from Michigan — are scheduled to talk on Sunday.
So are Stephen Ok. Bannon, Mr. Trump’s onetime chief strategist who was discovered responsible of contempt of Congress; and Roger J. Stone Jr., the pro-Trump operative who was convicted of obstruction however had his sentence commuted by Mr. Trump. In the conference middle’s foyer, Mr. Stone took selfies with Mr. Trump’s supporters.
“All the cool people are here,” Mr. Carlson mentioned.
Source: www.nytimes.com