Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) abruptly shut down a reporter's attempt this week to use his children as bait in a question about LGBTQ issues.
In a wide-ranging interview about fatherhood and parents' rights, Time magazine national political correspondent Molly Ball asked DeSantis how he would respond if "one of his children turns out to be gay or trans."
DeSantis, according to Ball, momentarily demonstrated his displeasure with the question — the framing of which implied a progressive view about LGBTQ identification — by flashing his eyes before "swiftly" shutting it down.
"Well, my children are my children," DeSantis said. "We'll leave that — we'll leave that between my wife and I."
DeSantis and his wife, Casey, have three children: two girls and one boy. The oldest child is 6 years old and the youngest is 3 years old. So it's not clear why Ball sought to use DeSantis' young children to make a point about his personal views on parenting children who identify as LGBTQ.
Meanwhile, DeSantis refused to back down on his position that it is "totally appropriate" for a government to intervene and prevent "gender transitions" of children.
"As a parent right now, I can’t take my 6-year-old daughter and get her a tattoo, even if I want to do that," DeSantis said. "You don’t have the right to do things that are going to be destructive to kids.
"I think that some of these parents are being told by physicians who are making a lot of money off this that you have to do this, otherwise your kid can end up doing something like commit suicide. I think that they get bullied into thinking this is the right decision," he said.
DeSantis, according to Ball, is billing himself as the "parents' candidate" in the 2024 election because, as a 44-year-old parent of three children, he understands what parents care about. He believes that fighting for the issues important to them — whether they're Republican, Democrat, or independent — will help win him the election.
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