Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said on Monday that he supported a blockade by Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) on hundreds of military promotions, asserting that the Pentagon was “violating the law” with its abortion travel policy.
The new policy — which pays the travel costs for service members who don’t have local access to reproductive health care, including abortions — is “not consistent with longstanding U.S. law,” DeSantis said Monday during an interview in New Hampshire with FOX News’ Bret Baier.
“I think it plays into a larger problem that we have seen in the military,” the Republican presidential hopeful added. “You have a lot of civilians forcing them to engage in political and culture issues that are detracting from [the] mission — this is one of them, but the pronouns and the drag queens and all those other things.”
Tuberville’s hold is set to leave the Army and Navy without Senate-confirmed nominees to replace retiring leaders by mid-August. The monthslong logjam has already left the Marine Corps with a temporary commandant — the first time in 100 years the branch has not had a Senate-confirmed leader — and has kept more than 270 military promotions in limbo.
DeSantis, who during the interview on Monday noted that his own experience in the military differentiated him from the crowded GOP field, said it was the Pentagon that picked the fight with Tuberville “by violating the law.”
“So I think that standing up for that is the right thing to do,” DeSantis said.
Both the Senate GOP and Alabama Republicans are split over Tuberville’s blockade, while President Joe Biden has warned that the hold will lead to “a growing cascade of damage and disruption.”
On Monday afternoon, the White House announced that the permanent headquarters of the U.S. Space Command would be in Colorado, instead of Tuberville’s home state of Alabama.
The move prompted outrage from lawmakers in Alabama, including Tuberville, who called the decision “shameful” in a statement on Monday evening.
