Rolling Stone Reports: Donald Trump Complaining Florida Gov “mirroring” him, “right down to the hand gestures”
August 29, 2022 04:28 pm
Photo: Victoria Borodinova via Pixaby | Columbia
County Observer graphic
By
Travis Reuther
FLORIDA – A report yesterday from Rolling Stone details how Donald Trump is catching on to what many others have already noticed: Ron DeSantis is blatantly “stealing” Trump’s style and mannerisms in an effort to court Trump donors and challenge the former President. What’s more, sources say Trump finds DeSantis’ impression to be lame and severely lacking in charisma, and spends his time ridiculing DeSantis to his friends and confidants.
Rolling Stone:
Trump Family Dunks on DeSantis: You’re
‘Stealing’ Our Bit!
Donald Trump has been complaining that Ron DeSantis is “stealing” from him.
According to three people who’ve spoken to the former president about the Florida governor last year and in more recent months, Trump has repeatedly ridiculed DeSantis for ripping off the ex-president’s style. “There was this time, maybe a year ago that I remember him making fun of [DeSantis] for doing similar hand gestures and motions,” one of these individuals tells Rolling Stone. “He called it‘s stealing’ from him and [to paraphrase] described it as a lame impression of Trump.”
The sources note that when Trump has seen video clips of DeSantis speaking at public events over the past year and a half, the former president has scornfully mocked the ascendant Florida Republican for appearing to imitate Trump’s body language, movements, and even, at times, speaking rhythm. One of the other sources recalls Trump joking at a dinner event earlier this year that he’d ought to sue DeSantis for copyright infringement.
The alleged rip-offs have raised eyebrows with other members of “America First” royalty. Donald Trump Jr. has told those close to him that he has noticed an uncanny pattern: Often he will tweet something from @DonaldJTrump Jr — a culture-war grievance or a burgeoning trend among the online right — and then very soon after, he will see those specific topics incorporated into the Florida governor’s talking points. This has happened enough times that Trump’s eldest son has come to believe, according to a person familiar with the matter, that DeSantis and his staff likely look to his Twitter account for inspiration and to raid it for their latest policy ideas or red-meat-hurling rhetoric.
Trump and DeSantis have sniped at the other in public, each without specifically naming the other. DeSantis criticized the Trump administration for measures aimed at “locking down the country” at the dawn of the COVID-19 pandemic, while appearing on the conservative “Ruthless” podcast earlier this year. For his part, the ex-president had gone on the incredibly pro-Trump TV channel OAN to strongly suggest that DeSantis was “gutless.” Both Trump and DeSantis have tried to publicly downplay the budding feud as a supposed invention of the news media.
In the time since, Trump, who behind closed doors trashes DeSantis as charisma-free, has even toyed with launching a 2024 presidential campaign near the governor’s mansion in Florida, which would double as an obvious effort to troll DeSantis.
Travis Reuther is the Rapid Response Director for the FL Democratic Party
