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The 2022 midterm election has two faces: that of Ron DeSantis, Republican and great rival of Trump, confirmed governor in Florida, and that of John Fetterman, the Democrat recovering from a stroke that gave the Pennsylvania seat to the elephant decreased. Two American stories that offer an important litmus test for understanding where the United States is headed midway through Biden’s tenure, with Trump most likely seeking a re-nomination. But above all he will have to beware of the rivals he has “at home”.
The Italian-American who attacks immigrants
See the entry DeSantis, to whom Trump dedicated one of his famous derogatory puns (he called him “Ron De-Sanctimonious” to call him a moralist and fanatic). The curriculum is top notch: The 44-year-old Italian-American of Irpinia descent, with degrees from Harvard and Yale, a former athlete and ex-military, rose to prominence at the national level in 2019, the day after his inauguration. when it came to the damage caused by Hurricane Michael and he removed his jacket and tie to don his anorak with the state symbol on it, a stance well-liked by the public. By his side was his charming wife Casey, a former TV presenter.
Goal: Presidential election 2024
One of his first targets back then was the jackals who plundered the abandoned houses: “These people are foreigners. They are illegal in our country. And not only that: After a natural disaster, they don’t loot anything else. They should be prosecuted, but they must be returned to their country of origin. You shouldn’t be here! ‘ Then came Covid and DeSantis once again shone with an unorthodox response to the pandemic that made him a hero to Conservatives. Since then, he has used a combination of cunning and calculated pursuit of the enemy—once the foreigners, another the elites, another the liberal media—to become the man of the moment for foreign populists and sovereignists. Granted, in orbit around DeSantis and the surrounding area, he’ll be running for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024. That’s why Trump fears him, that’s why he attacks him like he’s a rival.
Fetterman, the “casual” dem who beat stroke
Countertenor John Fetterman, who caught on in Pennsylvania. The 53-year-old, who is studying finance behind his back (an MBA from the University of Connecticut), had made headlines back in 2020 with his unconventional looks: He usually wears a sweatshirt and shorts, has a bald head, a goatee and lots of tattoos that protrude more than 2 meters on the body. As lieutenant governor of the disputed state of Pennsylvania, shortly after the presidential election, he responded to Trump’s allegations of fraud by saying: “The only cases of fraud on record in the state are Republican voters who vote for dead or alive relatives.” A few days before his official nomination for the Democrats he had suffered a massive stroke.
The aftermath of the illness has limited his electoral campaign: now he has some difficulties processing the information bestowed on him by what he hears and has to resort to technologies that provide real-time captioning to answer questions in an interview . Sometimes he has difficulties with pronunciation or he is spotty in his speeches: his Republican rival Mehmet Oz attacked him because of his disability and wondered whether he could be of use to the electorate in terms of empathy. The attacks were obviously not doing Oz any good.