Ron DeSantis blasts Trump for not behaving more ‘forcefully’ on Jan 6

The Florida governor finally took a stance on the former president’s role during the Capitol riot after previously dodging questions about the matter

Florida Gov Ron DeSantis accused former President Donald Trump of not doing enough on January 6, saying he should have acted more “forcefully,” hours after the news broke that Mr Trump could be federally indicted once again.

Mr DeSantis was speaking at a press event in South Carolina on Tuesday. The Florida governor called out the former president’s indifference while the Capitol riot raged on: “I think it was shown he was in the White House and didn’t do anything while things were going on. He should have come out more forcefully.”

However, Mr DeSantis said that he saw a difference between Mr Trump’s inaction and a Justice Department investigation. “But to try to criminalise that, that’s a different issue entirely,” Mr DeSantis said. “We want to be in a situation where you don’t have one side just constantly trying to put the other side in jail, and that unfortunately is what we’re seeing now.”

The Florida governor’s decision to talk about his former friend, Mr Trump, comes one month after he dodged a question about how the former president behaved on January 6.

When a Vermont high school student asked Mr DeSantis if Mr Trump “violated the peaceful transfer of power”, the Florida governor replied: “I wasn’t anywhere near Washington that day. I have nothing to do with what happened that day.”

The 2024 GOP hopeful’s decision to speak out against Mr Trump comes shortly after the former president announced on Truth Social that he was a “target” of the January 6 investigation led by Special Counsel Jack Smith.

A number of other Republican 2024 candidates have called for Mr Trump – the clear current frontrunner – to leave the race, given the potential indictment news.