DeSantis defends Trump LGBTQ video derided as 'homophobic'

Gov. Ron DeSantis Wednesday night defended a video shared by his campaign that some Republicans derided as "homophobic," saying it's "fair game" to criticize former President Donald Trump's record on LGBTQ issues.

DeSantis was asked by conservative commentator Tomi Lahren about the controversy surrounding the video, which she described as "attacking Donald Trump for, I guess, his advocacy for the LGBTQ community."

The video portrays Trump as supportive of the LGBTQ community while celebrating DeSantis' aggressive efforts to outlaw LGBTQ discussions in schools and restrict transgender health care.

The video is accompanied by dark, thumping music and images of DeSantis, spliced together with footage of muscular, shirtless men and several Hollywood actors, including Brad Pitt, seen wearing a leather mask from the movie “Troy.” It promotes headlines that DeSantis signed “the most extreme slate of anti-trans laws in modern history” and a “draconian anti-trans bathroom bill."

It also includes a clip of Trump telling an interviewer that transgender women can compete in his beauty pageants and shows a CNN headline stating: "Trump repeatedly celebrated the inclusion of transgender women in his beauty pageant."

Back story: Conservative LGBT group: Anti-Trump video shared by DeSantis campaign is 'homophobic'

The CNN article notes that "Years before he said he was running for president to 'defeat the cult of gender ideology,' Donald Trump welcomed and praised the inclusion of transgender women in the Miss Universe pageant."

DeSantis, who is trailing Trump by wide margins in the polls for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, focused on Trump's stance on transgender beauty pageant contestants in his response to Lahren.

"I think identifying Donald Trump as really being a pioneer in injecting gender ideology into the mainstream where he was having men compete against women in his beauty pageants, I think that's totally fair game because he's now campaigning saying the opposite, that he doesn't think that you should have men competing in women's things like athletics," DeSantis said.

The video was shared by the DeSantis War Room Twitter account on June 30, the last day of Pride Month, which celebrates the LGBTQ community.

"To wrap up 'Pride Month,' let’s hear from the politician who did more than any other Republican to celebrate it…," tweeted the DeSantis War Room in promoting the video, which begins with a clip of Trump in the weeks after the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando saying "I will do everything in my power to protect our LGBTQ citizens."

Log Cabin Republicans, a group representing LGBT conservatives, called the video "divisive and desperate" and said the DeSantis campaign "ventured into homophobic territory.”

GOP presidential candidates Chris Christie and Will Hurd also criticized the video and Richard Grenell, a prominent gay Republican with 1.1 million Twitter followers who served as Acting Director of National Intelligence under Trump, called it "insanely homophobic."

DeSantis Rapid Response Director Christina Pushaw defended the video, tweeting: "Opposing the federal recognition of 'Pride Month' isn't 'homophobic.' We wouldn't support a month to celebrate straight people for sexual orientation, either... It's unnecessary, divisive, pandering."

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Ron DeSantis defends 'Pride' video, hits Donald Trump's LGBTQ record