ORLANDO, Fla. — Neo-Nazi demonstrations in Orlando over the weekend drew bipartisan condemnations from state and local officials, but Gov. Ron DeSantis remained silent until Monday afternoon, when he responded to a question about the rallies with a tirade against his political enemies.
“So what I’m going to say is these people, these Democrats who are trying to use this as some type of political issue to try to smear me as if I had something to with do that, we’re not playing their game,” the governor said during a press conference in Palm Beach.
He referred to the demonstrators, a group of about 20 who shouted antisemitic slurs while waving Nazi flags near a University of Central Florida-area shopping plaza and on an Interstate 4 overpass, as “some jackasses doing this on the street” and said they’d be held accountable by law enforcement.
