‘Silly season’: Ron DeSantis again refuses to fire back after Donald Trump attacks

Gov. Ron DeSantis continues to get hammered by Donald Trump, but he says the attacks are just part of the political “silly season.”

In an interview on the Brian Kilmeade Show, the Florida Governor again sidestepped a question about Trump’s repeated and vicious personal attacks.

“I mean it’s silly season,” DeSantis contended. “You know how some of this stuff goes, and obviously he does his thing and it’s just that’s kind of who he is.”

DeSantis then turned to his newly released book, arguing it was a way to understand the former President’s success.

“What I wanted to do was just give an honest appraisal of how we got to this point the failures of the D.C. Republican establishment and how Donald Trump was speaking to things that some of the old guard refused to address,” DeSantis explained.

DeSantis then transitioned from dodging a chance to engage Trump to offering cautious praise of the former President.

“You know, he can say what he wants about me. I always give him credit for the things that he did that were positive, and I’m appreciative of a lot of the things that he did,” the Governor said.

“That doesn’t mean I agree with everything that he’s doing lately or whatever. But ultimately, it’s about delivering for the people you represent and delivering for the country. So I wasn’t really into kind of, trying to, you know, throw potshots at anybody.”

Trump has been paying attention to DeSantis’ media blitz Tuesday. His campaign tweeted out a story from Mediaite showing Kilmeade, when hosting Fox & Friends from inside a diner in Ponte Vedra Beach, having a hard time finding someone who wanted DeSantis over him for President.

The attacks have been steady from Trump toward DeSantis, of course. Trump has compared DeSantis unfavorably to Jeb Bush, falsely claimed George Soros is backing DeSantis for President, argued Florida was already “great” when Rick Scott and Charlie Crist were Governor, and contended DeSantis is “trying to hide his past.”

Trump recently knocked down reports that he maligned DeSantis as “Meatball Ron” on his Truth Social account. But he keeps playing up other controversies, with the most personal attack arguably being a re-truth on a post with text on an image stating, “Here is Ron DeSanctimonious grooming high school girls with alcohol as a teacher.”

The picture purportedly dates back to the Governor’s short-lived career as a teacher at a college preparatory academy, where he reportedly fraternized with students.

It remains to be seen when or if DeSantis will hit back in kind.