DeSantis Campaign Press Release - ICYMI: Ron DeSantis on the Simon Conway Show

"No one's going to outwork us. I think that's the important thing."

Tallahassee, FL - Ron DeSantis today joined the Simon Conway Show live. The highlights are below.

Listen to the full interview HERE.

On liberal universities justifying comments about the genocide of Jews:

How pathetic. Now, these are universities that will justify saying that it's okay to talk about the genocide of Jews because of quote, free speech, but they don't allow free speech on their universities. They have taken action against people, like Penn has taken action against faculty members or staff members who have opposed things like affirmative action and taking conservative positions on just run of the mill issues. So they have created a hotbed of radicalism at these universities. There's a sickness in these universities. You saw it on display there. You've seen it on display with these ridiculous protests in favor of Hamas that we've seen since October 7. But we've got to get smart about how we deal with these universities. We can't keep funding universities that are creating this type of toxic environment and toxic ideology. In Florida, I'm one of the few who have actually taken action. In our state, we passed legislation. All tenured professors, they have to undergo review every five years and can be let go for poor performance, particularly if they're spending all their time politicking. We also eliminated this DEI, which I know Iowa has now followed suit with. And that's kind of the root of some of this because they try to divvy up people based on race or ethnicity, and they create divisions where we should be judging people based on merit and based on the content of their character. So I think both of those presidents should be fired. But I think there's a larger task ahead of us. We give federal money to these universities in large numbers. And the question is, if this is the nonsense, and this is the crap that they're producing, why are we sending your tax dollars to them?

On the upcoming CNN debate in Iowa:

My view is, is I'm going to show up and debate. I don't know if any other candidate is accepted. My understanding is the only invited candidates would be Donald Trump, me and Haley. And I don't think Donald Trump's willing to debate it may be a one on one with me. And Haley. I don't know if he's accepted that. But my view is, is I want to go out there. I want to be able to contrast my successes and my leadership with the other candidates and show people that I'm the better choice. And so I'm willing to show up, wherever we're gonna go. I will tell you this. The RNC kind of took hold of the debate for precisely the reason you mentioned, but I'm not sure very many people were happy with how those debates turned out. In fact, I've had a lot of people tell me that the best debate of the cycle was not any of those primary debate. There was a debate I did against Gavin Newsom on Fox News with Sean Hannity that was substantive. Hannity wasn't doing gotcha. He was just teeing up all the important issues. And we were able to tussle back and forth. And I think we were really able to show that that conservative principles work and that freedom works and that the leftism that you see in California has not only failed California, it would fail this country.

On his ground game in Iowa:

I would just tell people, you know, some of the stuff that gets put out there, that's meant to create a narrative. I remember Bob Vander Plaats was down 30 points the day before the primaries 2010. He closed it to two. Most of these polls have not predicted the Iowa caucus winner, you know, we've got 10s of 1000s of people that have already committed to caucus ratting a lot every day. We're moving around the state, we're generating a lot of enthusiasm. The Governor's been a huge help to us. Vander Plaats has been a huge help. And then some of the more recent debates have been helpful, Newsom, and then the more recent one in Tuscaloosa. So we feel really good about the progress that we're making. Our data shows that it's very, very competitive. And no one's going to outwork us. I think that's the important thing. And what I find is when I go, I'll go maybe a small town, we'll get 100 people show up. There'll be people that are that want to vote for me anyways, there'll be some that are undecided and some may be leaning Trump. We flip a lot of those people once they're able to see me ask me questions and shake my hand. That's the way Iowa voters want it to be done. They want you to earn it, and we are going to earn it.