Ron DeSantis says he can get the RFK anti-vaxxer vote in General Election

Image via AP.

In New Hampshire, Gov. Ron DeSantis is again arguing that he is a better bet to counter Robert Kennedy in a General Election than Republican front-runner Donald Trump.

“RFK Jr. will be a vessel for anti-lockdown and anti-Anthony Fauci voters if Trump is the nominee. If I’m the nominee, they all go to me because I stood up against Fauci,” DeSantis said, in footage recorded in Londonderry by reporter Stephanie Murray.

DeSantis added that he would “clean out” the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“It’s a big part of my platform with Trump though; he created Fauci. He elevated Fauci, he never fired him. He said that he did everything right during COVID. He claims he saved 100 million lives, you know, with the mRNA vaccine and all this stuff,” DeSantis said.

“And I think those voters who are understandably still very frustrated with how this federal government handled COVID and the lies that were told and all the mistakes that were made with no accountability, they’re going to want a vessel for that and I think they may default.”

DeSantis has been arguing that he could bring home Kennedy voters based on COVID-19 politics for some time now.

“This RFK third party I don’t think would be a factor if I’m the nominee. But I think it would be a factor with Trump because I think some of the issues RFK raises like Dr. Anthony Fauci, the COVID lockdowns, all that, I’m very strong on that and I did something about it,” DeSantis said on WGIR’s New Hampshire Today earlier this month.

DeSantis suggested that Trump would “bleed support” due to his approach to coronavirus mitigation.

“Trump is very weak on that. He says he did everything right. He’s the one that empowered Fauci to begin with. He said the mRNA shot saved 100 million lives, which is just preposterous that he would say that. So that would be something where he would bleed support potentially there as well.”

The Governor has discussed Kennedy at various points during this campaign cycle, seemingly embracing him at times.

During an interview in July with Outkick, DeSantis said he’d “sic him on the FDA, if he’d be willing to serve, or sic him on CDC” if elected President.

DeSantis said those comments were misinterpreted as endorsing Kennedy to lead those agencies. The Governor made a clean-up attempt days later, telling Megyn Kelly that he really meant that he wanted to put Kennedy on a “bipartisan task force” to “hold them accountable.”

Kennedy, whose vaccine skepticism predates DeSantis’ pandemic-driven interest, claimed this summer that COVID-19 may have been “ethnically targeted” to spare Jewish and Chinese people. He has since backpedaled, saying he should have been “more careful” with his words.

DeSantis hasn’t addressed those claims, but told Jesse Watters this summer that he aligned with Kennedy in opposition to “censorship” around the coronavirus.

The Governor already ruled out picking Kennedy as a potential running mate, meanwhile, saying that the anti-vaccine candidate was a “liberal Democrat” on most issues.