DeSantis Has Two Words For Reporter Who Straight-Up Confronts Him On Polling ‘Substantially Behind’ Trump

Florida Republican Governor and presidential candidate Ron DeSantis had a two-word zinger when a reporter confronted him about spending time campaigning in Utah while nationally, he’s polling “substantially behind” former President Donald Trump.

On Friday, DeSantis spoke at a press conference ahead of a campaign event in Salt Lake City, Utah, where he took two questions from reporters.

The first exchange involved his state’s new Black history curriculum teaching the “benefits” of slavery to enslaved people, and the vociferous criticism Vice President Kamala Harris leveled at the new curriculum in two speeches on consecutive days. DeSantis defended the standards.

The next question was a fairly blunt and brutal one, as the reporter essentially asked him how campaigning in Utah is supposed to help him cut into Trump’s enormous lead. DeSantis laughed at his own two-word quip, and insisted Utah’s 6 electoral votes and 40 primary delegates were just part of a state-by-state strategy:

REPORTER: Why Utah today? Your poll numbers behind President Trump have been pretty substantially behind and…

RON DESANTIS: Not here! (HUMAN LAUGH) (CHEERS) No look, I think at the end of the day…

REPORTER: You think you can parlay this into a national resurgence to overtake…

RON DESANTIS: It’s a state, it’s a state by state race. And so that’s how we’ve set everything up. You know, we are we are focusing on Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina. And then as we get into Super Tuesday, which of course, is is Utah. And that really requires being on the ground or requires building out the organization. And we’re doing that and we’re doing that better than anybody is doing that right now. We really, I think most of you saw last Friday we were in Iowa for the Family Leader summit. That really was the kickoff to the caucus season.

Watch above via KUTV.

Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com