‘Never, ever surrender to woke ideology’: Ron DeSantis rallies with Doug Mastriano in Pittsburgh

PITTSBURGH — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, rallying in Pittsburgh Friday for state Sen. Doug Mastriano’s campaign for governor in Pennsylvania, called on Republicans to unite behind the candidate.

DeSantis, in opening his remarks, appeared to single out the Republican Governors Association for holding Mastriano at arm’s length so far.

“It’s important all for all Republicans to get on board and support our governor candidate,” DeSantis said. “And that means not just Republican voters. It means Republican organizations in Pennsylvania and throughout the country need to be invested in this race. They need to devote resources to this race.”

The DeSantis rally for Mastriano was sponsored by Turning Points Action, a conservative nonprofit.

It was a showcase for conservative culture war complaints — from mask mandates and business restrictions to stop the spread of COVID-19, to immigration, crime, and transgender athletes competing in sports. And DeSantis cast Mastriano as the agent who could wage a Florida-style legislative war against “woke ideology” in Pennsylvania.

”We can never, ever surrender to woke ideology,” DeSantis said. “I’ll tell you this: The state of Florida is where woke goes to die. “

DeSantis and Mastriano also cast Democrats like Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, the Democratic nominee for governor, as soft on crime, especially during the 2020 protests after the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.

DeSantis also singled out Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, saying his approach to law enforcement has made the city “like a third-world country with how much crime is happening there.”

Mastriano, speaking before DeSantis, delivered his standard stump speech, lashing out at Democrats who have portrayed him as an extremist and media reports about that.

“They want to distract us with name-calling — a hater,” Mastriano scoffed. “Oh, shut up. And media, shame on you for perpetuating hate.”

» READ MORE: Doug Mastriano's 2018 comments on Islam and climate change resurface

And Mastriano, a leader in the state for spreading debunked lies about the 2020 election in Pennsylvania, attempted to recast his previous work on that as simply asking questions.

“They don’t want to talk about how they did everything they could to blunt our questions into voting integrity,” Mastriano said.

The rally with DeSantis, a rising conservative celebrity considered a viable challenger if former President Donald Trump runs in the 2024 Republican primary for president, injected a boost of enthusiasm for a Mastriano campaign lagging in resources and recent polling.

DeSantis hosted a Mastriano fund-raiser just before taking the stage Friday, with tickets priced as $2,500 to attend or $10,000 to have a photograph taken with the Florida governor.

Hours before the rally began, hundreds of supporters wound through the lobby of the Wyndham Grand hotel and into the streets of downtown Pittsburgh, many donning Trump hats, Mastriano signs, and American flag T-shirts.

DeSantis proved to be a big draw for Republicans across the state, but diehard Mastriano fans also came in full force.

It was the third Mastriano event for Gregory Pascale, 69, and his wife, Diana, who drove from Washington County. The state senator’s Christian-centric campaign — one of its slogans, ”walk free as people,” drawn from a Bible verse in the New Testament — has been a winning strategy for them. And they share Mastriano’s view that abortion is “the No. 1 issue” in the governor’s race.

”I’m no exceptions,” Pascale said, of outlawing abortion even in cases of incest or rape. It’s a view shared by Mastriano, despite recent comments downplaying the governor’s role in determining those caveats.

» READ MORE: Clout: Mastriano critics become Mastriano boosters while avoiding the name Mastriano

William Torbeck, who is running for the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in Lackawanna County and traveled more than four hours by bus on Friday with dozens of fellow Republicans, said Mastriano’s economic message resonated most with him.

”Inflation, inflation, inflation,” he said. “Shapiro will shut down fracking. Mastriano will fix all the above.”

As hundreds packed into the hotel ballroom ahead of the rally, there was also an unusual presence in the crowd: dozens of reporters and photographers, most of whom have been barred from covering Mastriano’s campaign events.

Turning Points Action, the conservative Charlie Kirk-founded nonprofit that organized the event, initially made press agree to a set of unusual provisions — like a ban on interviewing attendees — in order to attend the rally. But those restrictions were largely lifted or unenforced inside the event.

Torbeck said he didn’t think Mastriano’s tactic of shunning the press would hurt his campaign in the long run.

“I don’t blame him for being cautious,” he said. “He’s in the spotlight. They’re going to trash him.”

Mastriano’s campaign bus left shortly after the rally, and he did not take questions from reporters.

The DeSantis event also drew cries of protest from Pittsburgh to Florida this week, centered on the 2018 murder of 11 people at the Tree of Life synagogue, just five miles from the hotel where DeSantis spoke.

A Gab user charged in the killings allegedly posted plans describing them on the site just before the shooting started, something Shapiro has noted in a pair of campaign ads this week.

Shapiro’s running mate, State Rep. Austin Davis, stood with a multifaith group of Democrats Friday morning in Pittsburgh to denounce the event and highlight Mastriano’s ties to Gab.

Mastriano paid Gab founder Andrew Torba $5,000 in April for consulting services and, in an interview with Torba on the site, said: “Thank God for what you’ve done.”

Mastriano last month appeared to delete his Gab account, and also said Torba does not speak for his campaign, while complaining that the resulting controversy was the work of Democrats and the media.

» READ MORE: Ron DeSantis is campaigning for Doug Mastriano in Pittsburgh, but a multifaith group is pushing back

“He’s paid Gab to recruit supporters, people posting antisemitic, racist hate-speech look to him as their leader,” Davis said of Mastriano. “He’s actively seeking out their involvement in his campaign. … We know right here in Pittsburgh that hate-speech begets violence.”

Turning Points Action organized the DeSantis event as part of a four-state “Unite and Win” tour with the Florida governor making stops in Arizona, New Mexico, and Ohio.

Earlier stops highlighted conservative grievances about the 2020 election and the recent FBI search of Trump’s Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, where boxes of sensitive government documents were recovered.

Mastriano announced Friday night that Trump would hold a rally in Wilkes-Barre for Mastriano, Republican Senate nominee Mehmet Oz, “and the entire Trump Pennsylvania Ticket” on Sept. 3.