Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, 44, finds himself caught between a rock and hard place over his views on the Ukraine War. Only recently, DeSantis said the U.S. had other priorities than Ukraine, saying that Ukraine would not be his priority. Offending war hawks in Congress, especially Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), DeSantis deviated from former President Donald Trump’s position on Ukraine. Trump said, if elected president in 2024, the Ukraine war would end before he place in left hand on the bible. Trump’s position on foreign wars is clear: America first. No wasting blood-and-treasure on costly foreign wars for Trump, nothing ambiguous about his policy. For DeSantis, considering a White House bid, he must placate GOP war hawks, all backing 80-year-old President Joe Biden’s Ukraine War policy. Biden, at least for now, gives Ukraine’s 45-year-old President a blank check.
Not yet announcing for president, DeSantis tries to distinguish himself from Trump, and, at the same time, figures out what will fly in any campaign for the 2024 nomination. Judging by the majority inside the GOP, Trump is definitely the minority on the Ukraine War, something he’d end in heartbeat. Calling Russian President Vladimir Putin a “war criminal,” saying he should be “held accountable,” DeSantis told Piers Morgan, in a Fox New interview. “I think he’s hostile to the United States, but I think that we’ve seen is he doesn’t have the conventional capabilities to realize his ambitions,” DeSantis told Morgan. “And so, he’s basically as gas station with a bund of nuclear weapons and one of the things we could be doing better is utilizing our own energy resources in the U.S.,” DeSantis said. DeSantis hasn’t yet evolved his own positions on foreign and domestic policy.
Trump’s opposition to Biden’s proxy war in Ukraine presents problems for DeSantis, as he carves out a more compatible space for himself in 2024. Trump opposes the Ukraine War in the strongest possible way, saying he would immediately stop all U.S. military support for Ukraine, while re-engaging diplomacy with the Russian Federation. War hawks in Congress back Biden’s proxy war against Russia, insisting Putin has ambitions beyond Ukraine, seeking to take over more former Soviet satellites in Europe. Graham has morphed into his late colleague, Sen. John McCaine (R-Az.) whose anti-Russian rhetoric was known to all. Trump’s unequivocal opposition to the Ukraine War make it difficult for Graham and other GOP war hawks to back him in 2024. DeSantis wants the GOP holy water so he’s staking out a middle ground while disagreeing with Biden’s foreign policy.
Polling shows Trump still the frontrunner in the 2024 GOP nomination but only because DeSantis has not yet thrown his hat in the ring. DeSantis drew groans from GOP war hawks last week when he said the Ukraine War was a “territorial dispute,” highlighting other priorities, including energy independence and the Southern border. “While the U.S. has many vital national interests—securing our borders, addressing the crisis of readiness with out military, achieving energy security and independence, and checking the economic, cultural and military power of the Chinese Communist Party—becoming further entangled in a territorial dispute between Ukraine and Russia is not one of them,” DeSantis said in a statement to Fox News. DeSantis clearly falls far away for GOP war hawks in Congress. Dealing to Graham and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fl.) won’t be easy for DeSantis in 2024.
Graham and Rubio, like Biden, have a vendetta with Putin, would do anything to remove him from office. DeSantis far more closely aligns with Trump’s view on Ukraine that the U.S. should mend fences with the Russian Federation. Calling Putin a war criminal makes it difficult for DeSantis to backtrack, knowing the U.S.-Russian relations must be fixed in the future. With Democrats and the press calling Trump a Russian asset, DeSantis faces the same criticism if he shows any opposition to the Ukraine War. Graham and Rubio have seized the Ukraine War as an opportunity to finally defeat the Russian state. Cold War warriors to a fault, Graham and Rubio reject decades of diplomacy with Russia and China. Both seek confrontation over diplomacy, leaving the U.S. in the worst national security position since WW II. DeSantis still has to nuance his position for the 2024 campaign.
DeSantis has a ways to go in refining his message on the Ukraine War. He told Morgan that his comments about a “territorial dispute” have been taken out of context, considering that Russian battles for independence of Donetsk and Luhansk in the Donbas region. “What I’m referring to is where the fighting is going on now which is that eastern border region Donbas, and then Crimea,” DeSantis told Morgan. However DeSantis’ position evolves, he’ll have to oppose the Biden policy to present a viable alternative to the White House policy. Speaking to Fox News, DeSantis wanted to put on record he doesn’t support Putin’s invasion. Unlike Graham and Rubio, when you look at SeSantis words, he doesn’t back Biden’s proxy war against the Kremlin, thinking it hurts U.S. national security. As the campaign evolves, look to DeSantis to offer a clear alternative to Biden’s foreign and domestic policy.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
