Florida’s rightwing governor, Ron DeSantis, has backed UK business secretaryDeSantis, who is expected to challenge Donald Trump for the Republican nomination for the 2024 presidential electoin, met Badenoch and foreign secretary James Cleverly on a visit to London this week.
Some of DeSantis’s views would be considered far outside mainstream UK politics – he recently signed a law to ban abortion in Florida after six weeks of pregnancy, for example.So-called parental rights legislation passed under his governorship has also led to the removal of hundreds of books from school libraries in the state.
He told the Sunday Telegraph: “At the end of the day you cannot have a successful society if it is being operated by woke ideology. It is fundamentally at odds with reality and facts and truths, and ultimately a society needs to be grounded in truth.” Some of his interventions have echoes in the UK, where the Conservative government has waded into rows over issues including historic statues, free speech at universities and the National Trust.