Ron DeSantis: ‘I’m Fully Prepared to Have a Florida-California Showdown’ if Newsom Replaces Biden

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said he is “fully prepared to have a Florida-California showdown” if the Democrats replace President Joe Biden with Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) in the presidential election.

“So let me just end with a shallow question based on speculation: Do you think Biden will be the Democratic nominee?” Tucker Carlson asked DeSantis at the Blaze Media Summit on Friday. 

DeSantis responded:

Honestly, I go back and forth because it’s an incumbent president, and unless he’s willing to step aside, I don’t think they can get him out of there. On the other hand, I’m fully prepared to have a Florida-California showdown and let the people choose what’s the better vision for the United States of America because I’m very confident that the freedom in Florida is what more people would choose rather than the public defecation on the streets of San Francisco.

He also spoke with Carlson about the recent influx of Californian residents into Florida under his governorship.

“So here’s the truth: When I became governor, and I was born and raised in Florida, I had never seen a California license plate in the state of Florida in my life. And all of a sudden, we start seeing California plates,” DeSantis said. “My supporters are like, ‘Uh oh, who are these people?’ Because, remember, I may have won by 20 points in November, but the Florida races were one percent. So if you bring in 50,000 Californians, 50,000 people from New York, all of a sudden, it could be a blue state.”

“We would have supporters go to supermarkets in like Palm Beach, fine every New York or New Jersey license plate, put a flyer in the windshield and say, do not vote down here the way they vote up there,” DeSantis explained. “But what ended up happening was, I think we drew people who believe what we were doing, it wasn’t just these were liberals who just wanted no state income tax. There may have been some of those, but I think most of these people said you know what? Florida is a free state. I’m not dealing with these lockdowns.”

Jordan Dixon-Hamilton is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or follow him on Twitter.