Congressman Ron DeSantis, who is hoping to claim Marco Rubio’s U.S. Senate seat in 2016, drew a large audience Monday at the Savannah Center.
DeSantis had in tow a recent headline-grabber, fellow Congressman Trey Gowdy, chairman of the U.S. House Select Committee on Benghazi.
DeSantis told the crowd that Gowdy “does the right things for the right reasons,” adding that Gowdy’s role on the Benghazi committee had nothing to do with scoring political points.
Thanks to Hillary Clinton’s recent testimony before the Benghazi committee, Gowdy fielded several questions on the hot-button topic.
Asked if he was aware of any terrorist groups involved in Benghazi, Gowdy gave a broader perspective stating that one person has been indicted since September 2012. He claims that not responding forcefully to those who were responsible, “invites more attacks on our interests.”
“Republicans are fighting against media and Democrats,” said Gowdy.
He called out U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Democratic candidate for president, for his defense of Clinton’s emails during the Democratic debate saying Sanders “absolutely folded on the issue.”
Gowdy added that Democrats are very disciplined in their message.
“And they have the media as their PAC,” Gowdy said.
The head of the committee said that there were 55 witness interviews conducted, and 24 more to go.
“The media’s fixation is on 1 out of 79 witnesses… the best place to run an investigation,” Gowdy says, “is the executive branch.” He then explained the difficulty of having only 10 minutes per person on the committee to speak, contrasting the situation to a normal prosecution that usually takes days.
DeSantis, who currently represents Florida’s 6th Congressional District, took center stage and ticked off several crowd-pleasers for the Republican audience.
• He pledged to “repeal and replace Obamacare.”
• He lamented what he termed the growth of government under President Obama and said, “We need to bring accountability to Washington.”
• DeSantis assured the crowd that he is taking a leading effort to remove the head of IRS.
