Ron and Casey DeSantis Joint NBC Interview Transcript

You guys are crisscrossing the country right now. You both grew up in small town, blue collar communities. How different is the experience for your kids right now than the experience for you two when you grew up?

Well, I’m just thinking, my father is from Western Pennsylvania. His dad was a steel worker outside Pittsburgh. My mom was from Youngstown, Ohio, so growing up in Florida, we did visit the family there when I was a kid. But other than that, I didn’t really have experience going very many places. I was a baseball player, so that kind of took me around Florida and eventually with tournaments and everything. But our kids, six, five, and three, just on this campaign so far, they’ve done Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Nevada, Utah, California, Texas.

It’s true.

They’re getting around and they’re getting to see the country. And it’s kind of neat because they’re young enough, all the bad stuff about politics and all the nastiness, that’s right over their head. They don’t know about any of that. But they do get to see, so for example, before we took them to Iowa for the first time, I showed them the movie Field of Dreams because I remembered that as a kid. So yesterday we’re playing catch at the county fair, Clayton County Fair, right next to a bunch of corn, and my son said, “Is this heaven?” I said, “No, it’s Iowa.” Because he remembers it from the movie. They’ve really, I think, enjoyed being able to do that and have the experience. Then just as parents, we just want to spend time with them. So if we weren’t doing this, if I had something else we had to do, I would still want them around. Sp part of it, I think they do enjoy it. But part of it is we don’t want them at home while we’re out on the road. We want to do it as a family.

And to be brutally honest, I have always wanted a Winnebago to travel the country. This is what I’ve always wanted to do anyway with him, so now it’s perfect.

You’re getting most people’s retirement dream.

This is exactly what I want to be doing because I want to be with the kids and I want to be able to stop over and meet folks and go out to different places to eat and experience different things with the kids. And as you know, they grow up so fast and it’s like a blink of an eye and they’re driving and going to school and we don’t want to miss a moment. So that’s why they’re with us as much as possible.

And one thing I would say though that’s interesting, given that we’re coming from Florida, I could be in the most rural part of Iowa, I could be in far-flung part of New Hampshire, someone will come up to me with a Florida connection every single time. “My sister lives in Naples. I go down in the winter.” This or that. So I think just as governor of Florida, it’s kind of a unique platform to be running for president because there’s so many people that have a connection in one way or another. And then I run into people say, “Yeah, I live half the year in Florida, half in Iowa.” I was like, “Keep your Iowa voting. I need you to vote for me in the caucus. I’m good in Florida. I need that.”

But it is different though. I mean crisscrossing Florida versus crisscrossing the country with the whole family in tow, how has the experience of crisscrossing the country been different from campaigning in Florida for you guys?

Well, Florida’s a big state. It’s a very diverse state, so it’s very different in Northeast Florida versus the Panhandle versus Miami versus Orlando. And so it’s neat. You get to meet a lot of folks traveling the state of Florida, which is the third largest state in the country. But traversing the United States, I mean, that’s just special. Honestly, we’re very humbled at the opportunity to be able to get out and meet folks in different parts of the country. And they’ll invite you into your home and you get to meet people and you’re having dinner with them and coffees. And no other opportunity would you be able to do something like this not running for President of the United States. And it’s pretty cool and it’s a neat opportunity.

A lot of folks know the governor as a governor, as a political candidate now. What’s he like as a dad?

He is the best dad you could possibly imagine. I think you probably know a little bit about my story. You probably know about a year and a half ago I got a diagnosis that nobody wants to hear, especially when you have a fourth, three and a at the time, that’s how old my kids were. And that was, I was diagnosed with cancer. And at that time we didn’t really know what was going to happen. You never know when something like that comes upon your family. So I had to rely on him in a really big way. There were times when I was going through six rounds of chemotherapy, I was going through six weeks of radiation and three surgeries, and I couldn’t get up, couldn’t do very many things. I couldn’t pick up my three-year-old when they wanted me to hold them. And I had to tell them a little bit of a fib that, “Mommy’s arm hurts and I have to go back to the hospital about my arm.” And it wasn’t about the arm. And to this day, they have no idea of what I’ve been through. And I’ll tell them someday.

It’s not [inaudible 00:04:34] to have to tell your kids that.

They don’t know. I’ve never told my kids about the cancer battle because I don’t think that they’re old enough to really understand what that means. And so at some point we will tell them. But you ask the question about what kind of a dad he is, when you’re going through opportunities where you can barely scrape yourself off the bathroom floor because you’re sick and your children are calling for you and you physically cannot get to them, but you have somebody who was not only running the state of Florida and was there for the people of his state, he was there for me. And he was there to go pick up my kids when I couldn’t. And he did it with humility and he did it with love. And I’ll tell you what, can’t ask for a better husband than that.

Yeah, I mean-

How does it feel to hear her say that?

Well look, in sickness and in health, that’s what you sign up for. So she’s not only my wife, she’s my best friend and she’s the person that I’ve always dreamed to be the mother of my children. So this is just what you do. When I think I was in third or fourth grade, my mom had breast cancer, and I remember I didn’t really understand what that meant even at that age. Our kids were so much younger, and so this was just something that our lives changed, our schedules changed all that. But they just knew something, but they didn’t really know that. So in that sense, they were young enough, on the one hand when she got the diagnosis, it’s like the worst thing you can do when you have these very young kids because you’re thinking like, “Okay, what’s going to happen if we don’t come through with this?”

(06:09)
But on the flip side of that, it was not something that they had really a good sense of. They just knew mommy had to deal with issues. But it was a trying time. But we had so many people praying for us. We had so many people. Just the outpouring was unbelievable. And she served as an inspiration to a lot of women in Florida and throughout the country. I’ve had people come up to me saying, “I went through what your wife did through. And she gave me hope on how she handled it.”

And it’s happening all over the country. So today you probably saw that we did an announcement with having 10,000 people sign up as caucus goers and whatnot. Well, the 10,000th person was somebody who had beat cancer 30 years after that and after they had gone through a cancer diagnosis. And she said, “I watched you from afar and you gave me hope. You gave a lot of other people hope.” And a lot of people have come up and they have said to me in really every state I think that we have been in, whether it’s particularly in Iowa, we were up in New Hampshire, I know for certain when we were not in Oklahoma with Governor Stitt, that they had been praying for me. That means the world. And that was one of the things that was really able to get me through it, knowing that so many people were pulling for me. I thought that was very special.

It’s not an easy story to share. Those are vulnerable moments in your life and your life and your children one day will be watching this. So to share so much of yourself is a tough thing to do. But it does reach a lot of people. And I’m wondering too, as you’ve put more and more of yourself out there, what made you both decide to bring Casey in as such a big part of this campaign? It’s not typical that you run an entire initiative Mamas for DeSantis, you don’t see a lot of spouses of candidates doing something like that.

Can I answer this for the first one? Okay. Because it’s not like anybody said, “Oh, we need to deploy Casey to get out there and to do it.” No, this is totally because I want to do it. And so particularly when I saw him during the COVID fight, I saw him standing up to the media. I saw him standing up to people on the left, I saw him standing up to people in Washington DC who were telling him, “You’re doing it wrong. You have to shut down the beaches. You have to lock kids out of school.” And every step of the way, I watched him from behind the scenes, whether it was reading the data himself, whether it was talking to experts like Dr. Bhattacharya and Gupta and Kulldorff, these are Nobel laureates who had been silenced on social media. But he held the line in defense of people’s rights, liberties, livelihoods and happiness. And he did not waiver.

(08:39)
He knew what the data was saying out of places like Sweden and United Kingdom and Israel. He was following this. And he also understood the constitutional structure of our country, that our rights come from our creator, that government is put in place to protect those rights. There was a limited and defined role for government. And you had different states across the country and a federal government wanting to lock people out of church. That was unconstitutional. And through every step of the way, I watched him stand up for the people of his state.

(09:11)
And when you see that, and he said so many times, he’s like, “If it means I lose my job, so be it. But I want the people of Florida to be able to keep their jobs.” So when you see that firsthand and you understand the fight that he was taking, why would I not be in this fight? Why would I not want to be out there singing from the rooftop that this is a good dude, he’s in it for the right reasons. He’s not in it because he wants to be something. This isn’t about a position. He’s in it because he wants to do good things on behalf of the people of this country. And it would be malpractice for me to sit on the sidelines. So you’ll see a lot of me because I want to be here for him, for the kids and for the future, really, of all Americans.

She’s done a lot as first lady, I mean just the cancer stuff. They now have a Casey DeSantis Cancer Fund for more research. And she’s done things for resources for people like that. She’s done things for school children and mental resiliency. She’s done things on substance abuse to educate about… Because now you could be a high school kid, you try something, if it’s laced with fentanyl, you can die. So the stakes are very high with this. So she’s gotten people, athletes, all this stuff, to participate in this. And then she’s created things to help low-income people get a step-up in life called Pathway to Prosperity, Hope Florida, there’s a care portal. She’s mobilizing businesses and charities and all this stuff. So she’s done things to make a difference on behalf of people in Florida. She’s the first lady. She does not have to do this. She’s got a lot of things that keep her busy with the family and whatnot. But she’s wanted to go out and do this and has made a great difference.

(10:45)
So I think people see that in Florida, and that’s why she’s become very beloved in the state of Florida. And then in terms of the political stuff, look, she was in your industry for a while. She’s very good at articulating things that I think a lot of parents feel right now. So I think she resonates and she resonates really across the board, I think, with a lot of mothers.

You already have experience as first lady of Florida. When you think about potentially being first lady of the United States, do you have any role models in mind? Do you have an idea of what kind of first lady of the United States you’d want to be?

Yeah, my whole philosophy is when the good Lord gives you an opportunity to make a difference, what do you do with it? Right? Do you sit on the sidelines? Do you enjoy the cocktail parties? Or do you get out and put yourself into the arena to try to make a difference on behalf of people? And when he talked about some of these initiatives, I mean this initiative, Hope Florida Pathway to Prosperity and Economic Self-Sufficiency, by incorporating communities and going outside of government, we’ve been able to get 6,600 people off of government assistance since we launched it. And those are people who now are living on their own, they’re in their apartments or their homes, their kids are taking part in school choice opportunities and they’re happy. So when you can be in a position to make a difference, you should do it. And so it’s not really about me as first lady, it’s about the position as first lady to be able to get in and do something to make a difference.

When you’re not on the bus with the kids, when you’re at home, what’s family night like? Are you doing movies? Are you doing board games, sports? What’s going on?

So if you walk up to the governor’s residence in Tallahassee, you get to the front door, on the front porch you see balls, gloves, tees, bats, all this stuff. So we’re out in the front yard. Our kids are into baseball and tee-ball now, so we’re doing it. My son’s five, he likes to coach pitch. So we’re pitching.

Following the footsteps.

He’s hitting that. Our little three-year-old, Mamie, she’s whacking. They do tennis, they do swimming. They love swimming. So there is a pool in the governor’s compound, and they’re in that as much as they can. So they really like to be active. Now, we have shown them things. We’ve shown them Field of Dreams because of Iowa. As our kids got into baseball, they like some of the movies like Rookie of the Year. We’ve shown them age appropriate of The Natural and stuff. So there are definitely sports things that they’ve liked. They were into football during the NFL season, and I think they’ll probably get back. And I had to make a decision. I’m a Bucks fan because I grew up in the Tampa Bay area.

Right, right, right.

But I knew Tom Brady was going to retire and the Bucks were probably not going to do as well. So I introduced my kids to the Jacksonville Jaguars. They have a young quarterback. They have a lot of upside. So they got involved with the Jags in this playoff. And we actually went, I took our six-year-old and five-year-old to Arrowhead Stadium for the Jaguars-Chiefs playoff game. So we’re literally in the stands there. They have Jags jerseys on, but they’re in Tallahassee, so they know Florida State. And what does Florida State do? It does the tomahawk chop? What do the Kansas City Chiefs fans do? They do the chop. So my two kids were the only two people in Arrowhead Stadium in Jags jerseys standing up doing the tomahawk chop during the Arrowhead Stadium and Kansas City Chiefs playoff game.

And if you know one thing about Trevor Lawrence, right? He has a little bit longer hair. A lot of the ladies like him for that. Well, my son came up to me the other day and he’s like, “Mom, look.” And I’m like, “What, Mason?” He’s like, “Look, my hair is growing like Trevor Lawrence.” So he’s really into the sports. But Madison, she’s into art. She loves art, she loves theater, she loves all of that. And Mamie-

That’s the paintings you’re trying to sell, right?

There are so many around the house. That is her number one thing. And then Mamie big into the animals. So she’s the one who either wants to leave Iowa with a dog or a cow. We haven’t figured out what we can fit on the way back in the bus. But no, it’s just fun.

Who likes to cook?

I’m good at it. No, no, no. I’m not good at it. What I’ve really become good at is macaroni and cheese in a box, because we do it literally around the clock. So we’ll wake up in the morning and I found a way to make it in a way that they like instead of using milk, you can use a little something else.

Well, that’s the thing. So when we first got married, I would grill, I’d do burgers, I do steaks, all that stuff.

Oh, all the time.

Now it’s cooking for the kids especially.

Yeah, yeah. Exactly.

Who’s the better chef, though?

Well, on the grill you are.

Yeah, but she’s better at doing normal dishes. But I’ve gotten to point, I can do them, I get the batter from Waffle House, I do a Waffle House on the griddle. They love the Waffle House waffles. That’s really, really good. So I’m very good at that. They like pancakes and then they actually do like the eggs, and so they like hard boiled eggs, they like scrambled eggs-

So you’re a breakfast household?

Oh, yeah.

Well, the thing is, I’m just drinking coffee. I am actually not doing that. We’re doing that for them. And then, yeah, the thing is they will do mac and cheese. We think everyone’s getting ready for bed, 9:00, “I need mac and cheese.” So it’s like, “Okay, we got to go rustle up mac and cheese.”

And it has to be in the box. It has to be. That’s their thing. They like it in the box. But the one thing we have to do for breakfast is for Waffle House, the scattered, smothered, covered, diced, chunked and topped. We have to get to that. We haven’t done that yet. I have to get my abilities up there.

That’s on the way. Who’s a tougher parent?

Tougher parent?

Well, I think they think they can get away with more with her.

That’s true, they can.

And that sometimes it’s just… I’m very even keeled. But if I do raise the voice a little bit, they do, they snap to attention.

But not even a half of a decibel. You know what’s really funny about him though is he’ll be traveling the state, or he’ll be running around and going to various states now, and it’ll be like 8:00 or something and we’re getting ready to go to bed. And every mom knows this. We have gone through the routine. We have brushed our teeth. We have on our pajamas. We are doing books. We are slowly making our way upstairs. And then what’s funny is, and I actually relish it now, he’ll come in at about 8:00 or 8:30 at night, and somebody along the way has given him some sort of a sweet treat. And he walks in the door and he’s happy to see everybody. And then the kids go wild, and they’re getting cookies and cupcakes and what have you. And so I love it. However, I have to go through the whole process again of going through the… And then one time, it’s a lot of times too, I just hand them over to you and you do it, and I go to bed.

That’s right.

But sometimes you come in and cause a little trouble?

Look, I mean, when you have these things, and if someone’s going to give some nice treats that I know the kids would go get excited about, I’m going to be the good guy. I’m going to deliver that. And then they get happy and it’s fun. And tell you what, just on the road they get a lot of opportunities to do things. Just yesterday they did a creamery where they got ice cream, there were cheese curds. There was a pie store where they got that.

Milkshakes at the fair.

Milkshakes at the fair. So they are living large on all this.

And think about this, a lot of sugar for small children inside in enclosed space such as a bus, sometimes, yeah, it gets to be a little harrowing.

The first thing Mamie said to me when I asked her about the bus, she goes, “There’s cookies on the bus.”

And she found those in like two seconds.

Just last question for you guys. I noticed sometimes you do the speech, Casey comes in, does her portion, and a lot of the time I’ll look at you while she’s talking. Especially the first time she came up on the stage, I actually think it was in Iowa the first time that you came and addressed voters.

Pastor Reynolds.

That’s right. And you looked really emotional as you were watching her up there. And I just wonder, especially given the story you told about the time you were really struggling, how he stepped up for you and the relationship you two have and how important it is, especially right now, this is tough, what you’re doing right now, it’s not easy, what runs through your mind when you watch her, when you watch her make the case for you?

I mean, I think it’s pride. I think I’m proud of what she’s been able to accomplish. I’m proud of how she’s handled very difficult situations in our lives. I’m proud how she’s been a great mother and a great wife. And sometimes I’ll start to kind of chuckle to myself because look at the audience and they’re like, “Wow, she’s awesome.” And people say that. And you could get this sense, because I do different things as governor, I’d show up at an event and people would be like, “Where’s your wife? We wanted to see your wife.” And so you start to see that. So I just think if this is the first time they’ve seen her or heard her, I’m like, “They’re going to be fans.” And I just kind of sit back and enjoy it.

So when people say Casey brings the charm, the personality, is that offensive or is that a point of pride for you?

Look, she’s great. She’s infectious. People love it. And I think it’s great. And I think she’s done great with the politics, but also just great as a role model as first lady. I mean, people really look up to her and I’m proud of that.

For as much he says that he is proud of me, I cannot tell you how proud I am of him for everything he has done and everything that he has stood for for the innocence of our children, for the rights of parents, and standing up for our rights and liberties. So I am probably more proud of everything he’s done.