Ron DeSantis and Charlie Crist got personal in their lone gubernatorial debate on Monday, with DeSantis deflecting inquiries about a run for president with insults and Crist questioning DeSantis’ basic decency.
The debate at the Sunrise Theatre in Fort Pierce, Florida, kicked off with divided camps of Crist and DeSantis supporters shouting at each other from behind barricades, a raucous atmosphere that continued into the debate hall.
The candidates often returned to rehearsed talking points aimed at reinforcing key themes of their campaigns.
Again and again, DeSantis sought to link Crist with President Joe Biden, who polling shows is unpopular with Florida voters, repeatedly saying that when Crist was a Democratic congressman he supported Biden on 100% of votes.
Crist, for his part, repeatedly called DeSantis a divider and described himself as a champion of abortion rights and reminded the audience of DeSantis’ opposition to abortion rights. Often those reminders came during responses to questions that had nothing to do with abortion.
Despite agreeing beforehand not to ask each other questions, their back-and-forth quickly set the tone for the debate.
Crist asked DeSantis multiple times whether he would run for president in 2024, and DeSantis never answered.
“You talk about Joe Biden a lot,” Crist said. “I understand, you think you’re going to be running against him. I can see how you might get confused. But you’re running for governor. I have a question for you. Why don’t you look in the eyes of the people of the state of Florida and say to them if you’re reelected, you will serve a full four-year term as governor. Yes or no?”
“I know that Charlie’s interested about talking about 2024 and Joe Biden,” DeSantis said. “But I want to make things very clear, the only worn-out donkey I’m looking to put out to pasture is Charlie Crist.”
Crist responded by referencing DeSantis telling high school students at an event in March to take off their masks, calling it “COVID theater” and “ridiculous.”
“I know you like to bully people,” Crist said. “... I can take it, but you shouldn’t do it when children are standing behind you at a press conference.”
They didn’t agree on anything — until just before the end of the hourlong debate. Both Crist and DeSantis said the shooter who killed 17 people in the Feb. 14, 2018, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School massacre should have received the death penalty.
On Oct. 13, a Broward County jury rejected a death sentence, recommending instead a maximum of life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Crist called the crime “absolutely abhorrent” and DeSantis said “the ultimate punishment” is the only appropriate sentence “when you murder in cold blood 17 innocent people.”
The massacre took place before DeSantis was governor. He said as a candidate he became friends with Andy Pollack and Ryan Petty, two of the parents of children killed in the massacre.
And within days of taking office, DeSantis reminded the audience, he suspended Scott Israel, who was Broward County sheriff at the time of the massacre “for the ineptitude that was displayed.”
He said he has enhanced school safety and bragged that he suspended four Broward School Board members that a statewide grand jury “said was derelict” in discharging their duties.
The subsequent back and forth was typical of the entire debate.
Crist didn’t directly respond, but said DeSantis has abused his suspension authority, citing the removal of Hillsborough County State Attorney Andrew Warren. Crist said Warren’s only offense was disagreeing with DeSantis.
DeSantis’ response was that he wouldn’t allow prosecutors in Florida to take the law unto themselves.
Crist alleged DeSantis’ presidential ambitions caused him to “take his eye off the ball” when it came to property insurance.
“He could have addressed it in this first special session,” Crist said. “He didn’t. He’s now calling a third special session. I don’t think the third time is going to be the charm. Because his purpose is not on Florida. It’s not on you.”
DeSantis defended the special sessions, saying the problem is too much litigation.
“We’re No. 1 in the nation in litigation with respect to homeowners insurance,” he said. “We have 8% of the policies, but 78% of the litigation. ... It’s not about lining the pockets of lawyers. It’s about having a competitive market where people have a shot to make ends meet.”
DeSantis also did not completely answer when asked at what stage of pregnancy abortion should be banned.
DeSantis defended the 15-week ban he signed this year without exceptions for rape or incest, telling a story about a Jamaican woman who chose not to abort her pregnancy, whose daughter, Renatha Francis, was appointed by DeSantis to the state Supreme Court.
“I just think we’re better when everybody counts,” DeSantis said. “I understand not everyone’s going to be born in perfect circumstances.”
Crist pointed out DeSantis’ non-answer, citing reports of a middle school girl and victim of incest in Florida who had to leave the state for an abortion.
“That’s not compassionate leadership,” Crist said. “That’s not doing the right thing. That’s not even having a heart. That’s callous. It’s barbaric, and it’s wrong and Florida deserves better.”
Crist also used similar language in attacking DeSantis over transgender rights.
DeSantis defended the state Department of Health’s position opposing care for trans children, saying “you should not mutilate minors. ... And in Florida, we are not going to allow that to happen here.”
Crist, who said DeSantis is refusing to “respect some other family’s decision about what they want for their children,” said DeSantis doesn’t want to follow the golden rule, “Do unto others as we would have done onto us.”
“You don’t have the temperament to be kind and decent to other people who don’t look like you, who don’t act like you, and don’t contribute to you,” Crist said.
Questions about the state’s response to COVID brought up an issue rarely spoken of on the campaign by either side: the 82,000 deaths from COVID in the state.
“When you look at the Thanksgiving table, one of those empty seats is probably one of those people for many families watching tonight,” Crist said. “And if we had only had the standard of other states in the United States, 40,000 of those people would still be alive, enough to fill Tropicana Stadium in St. Petersburg. That’s tragic.”
Crist also took an unexpected tack, pointing out that the only governor between the two of them to shut down the state was DeSantis himself in April 2020.
DeSantis cited Crist and other Democratic members of Congress calling for further lockdowns in July 2020, when Florida was the epicenter of the pandemic in the U.S.
“If that had happened in this state, it would have destroyed the state of Florida,” DeSantis said. “Our hospitality and tourism industry, which is thriving, would have gone into disrepair, it would have thrown millions of Floridians into turmoil. ... I lifted you up, I protected your rights. I made sure you can earn a living, I made sure you could operate your businesses. And I worked like heck to make sure we had all our kids in school five days a week.”
Crist fired back that DeSantis was actually “the most anti-business governor I’ve ever seen,” citing DeSantis’ policies including dissolving Walt Disney World’s self-governing district because its CEO criticized the so-called “don’t say gay” law.
“I’m not the governor who attacked Walt Disney World,” Crist said. “... I’m not the governor who would attack the cruise industry because I just wanted to make sure that their customers weren’t sick before they got on the boat. That’s you.”
DeSantis praised the “Parental Rights in Education” law, the one critics call “don’t say gay,” as well as his ban on “critical race theory” in schools.
The law “prevents 6-, 7-, 8-year-olds from having sexuality, gender ideology injected into their curriculum. You’re the one that’s waging the culture war,” DeSantis said. “I’m simply defending parents and students.”
“You love dividing our state,” Crist responded. “Whether it’s blacks against whites, whether it’s gay against straight, whether it’s young versus old.”
A couple of hundred DeSantis fans lined the sidewalk opposite the Sunrise Theatre in Fort Pierce, with many arriving three hours before the debate started to hold signs. Several carried large “Keep Florida Great DeSantis 2022″ flags.
About an hour before the debate’s start, 150 or so Crist supporters arrived en masse — managing to get themselves in the background of live early evening TV newscasts. They were dressed in pink T-shirts proclaiming, “For Choice For Charlie,” and many carrying matching signs to drive home Crist’s support of abortion rights and DeSantis’ opposition.
As they chanted, “my body, my choice,” a woman with the DeSantis supporters across the street repeatedly yelled back, “baby killers are in the house.”
Inside the theater, each side repeatedly applauded and cheered its candidate, sometimes drowning out parts of the answers. The moderator repeatedly asked people to stop, but the audience didn’t heed her admonitions.
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