Ron DeSantis Avoids Criticizing Donald Trump in New Book Ahead of Expected 2024 Presidential Rivalry

Tristan Wheelock/Bloomberg via Getty Ron DeSantis

Ron DeSantis' new book appears to be the latest sign that the Florida governor is mulling a 2024 presidential campaign — one that would be full of the sort of culture wars for which he has recently become known.

CNN reports that DeSantis' book, The Courage to Be Free, doesn't offer too much insight into the governor's personal history. But it does, however, offer what he calls a "blueprint for America's revival."

That blueprint, he writes, can be seen in the "battles" he's fought in his home state, such as "defeating the biomedical security state" — a nod to his efforts to ban COVID-19 mask and vaccine mandates — and "stifling woke corporations" — a nod to his ongoing fight against Disney World.

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Perhaps more interesting, however, is what — or who — DeSantis doesn't criticize. Namely, as CNN reports: Donald Trump.

Describing the former president as someone with "unique star power," and a "massive following," DeSantis does offer a slightly different telling of Trump's endorsement of him in the 2018 gubernatorial race.

Trump has said in recent weeks that DeSantis — then a member of the House of Representatives — came to him and "begged" for an endorsement, with "tears coming down from his eyes."

Speaking to conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, Trump claimed earlier this month that "DeSantis got elected because of me. You remember he had nothing. He was dead, he was leaving the race. He came over and he begged me, begged me for an endorsement. He was getting ready to drop out."

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But in his own telling of the events, DeSantis writes that he simple asked Trump for the endorsement, but "was not holding my breath," CNN reports.

While he ultimately did secure the endorsement, the now-governor writes in his book that it wasn't a make-or-break moment for his political career.

"I do not think Republican primary voters are sheep who simply follow an endorsement from a politician they like without any individual analysis, but I do believe that a major endorsement can put a candidate on the radar of GOP voters in a way that boosts a good candidate's prospects," he writes, per CNN.

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Trump announced his own run for the presidency in November.

Meanwhile, calls for DeSantis to run for higher office — particularly as he won reelection as Florida's governor in a landslide amid Republican losses in many other parts of the country — have only grown since then.

While Trump's own public comments have suggested a growing rift between he and DeSantis leading into the next election cycle, the Florida governor has taken a page from the former president's book by waging culture wars against companies like Disney.

DeSantis recently signed a bill that gives him more control over the Reedy Creek Improvement District, a special zone encompassing 25,000 acres in two counties that include Disney properties.

The zone has historically given the company special privileges, including tax exemptions and certain autonomies like providing its own fire, police and other services such as building and maintaining roads.

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DeSantis began publicly urging lawmakers to pass a law that would affect allow for a takeover of the district after he publicly butted heads with the company over the so-called "Don't Say Gay bill," which restricts mention of LGBTQ topics in schools.

After Disney denounced the bill in a statement March 28, DeSantis lashed out at the company, calling it "woke" and saying in a fundraising email that the company had "lost any moral authority to tell you what to do."