DeSantis criticizes Trump for not fulfilling promise to hold Hillary Clinton accountable

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis criticized former President Donald Trump for failing to fulfill his promise to investigate Hillary Clinton, indicating that he may fail to fulfill a similar promise he recently made for the 2024 election.

DeSantis is competing against Trump to win the Republican Party’s 2024 nomination for the presidential election, with the former president still far ahead in the polls. Trump recently stated that he would have the Department of Justice prosecute his political opponents if he wins the 2024 election, as Trump is facing multiple indictments that include charges related to storing confidential documents at his Mar-a-Lago residence and the Jan. 6 Capitol protest.

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“I would note he ran in 2016 saying he was going to appoint a special prosecutor for Hillary’s emails,” DeSantis said. “You remember that? And a lot of us thought that that was appropriate because they didn’t really do a very thorough investigation of her. Two weeks after he got elected, he said, ‘Ah, forget it. That’s what you say before the election, it’s not what you say after the election.’ So he didn’t follow through on that promise.”

DeSantis noted that a president ordering the Department of Justice to take certain actions should not be about targeting specific opponents to the president’s party, but rather should be about “a single standard of justice.”

The Florida governor said he would not directly order the Justice Department to investigate one individual, but would rather tell the attorney general to investigate someone or a group of people if they were not being properly investigated.

“If you have the FBI that’s pursuing parents at school board meetings, you have every right to say: ‘Fire those agents who did that,'” DeSantis said. “So we’re going to hold them accountable. We’re not going to use it to go after people for no reason, but we are going to set the priorities that they’re going to do.”

At a recent rally, Trump tossed around the idea of having the Department of Justice indict a political challenger to him should he be elected again. Fellow GOP presidential candidate and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said that while he thinks Trump was joking, he believes that the former president would punish his political rivals using the DOJ.

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Trump maintains a major lead ahead of his opponents in the 2024 Republican primary, earning 53% in a poll that asked respondents what Republican should be the nominee. DeSantis was the only other candidate who received double-digit support at 14%, with business entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy at 6%, and former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley and former Vice President Mike Pence tied at 5%, according to the polling data from Economist/YouGov.

Trump and President Joe Biden were also virtually tied in the same polling, with 44% of voters supporting Biden and 43% backing Trump if the election were held immediately and the two men were on the ballot. The poll had a margin of error of 3.3 percentage points, making the race a virtual tie more than a year out from the next election.