What a trio! The Florida men — Trump, DeSantis, Suarez — are a hoot to watch | Opinion

Donald. Ron. Francis.

Palm Beach. Wherever he’s from this week. Miami.

What a trio of Florida men, all vying to be president of the United States, the top job in the land — and, until standards were lowered to pave the way for celebrity Trump’s 2016 election — the most influential in the world.

In the crowded field of 2024 Republican presidential candidates, our forcibly adopted resident Trump, our cruel Jacksonville-born DeSantis, and Miami native son Suarez are standouts, if not for their policy points, then at least for the gumption of thinking themselves worthy.

And, as they travel around the country selling themselves through ads and appearances, the GOP primary is starting to feel like a referendum on the Sunshine State.

And now, there may be a fourth Floridian running — Sen. Rick Scott, who despite two Tea Party terms as governor is still seen as a carpetbagger.

We’re in trouble, America.

Only in Florida

For one, the Trump-DeSantis-Suarez triptych has amassed so many legal issues between them — from matters of national security to state and local pay-to-play politics, with a dash of anti-drag thrown in for flair and civil-rights violations for outrage — that Florida has become a haven for lawsuits.

Our new state motto should be: “No Lawyer Shall Go Unemployed.”

Trump and DeSantis, the reason Floridians are at each other’s throats and, in the 21st century, fighting for civil rights as if we were living in the 1950s, both have a real shot at the presidency.

Suarez, the son of Miami’s first Cuban mayor, knows his odds are only a little better than going after Cuba’s presidency. He’s in the race to raise his national profile a la Pete Buttigieg, but unlike President Biden’s secretary of transportation and former South Bend, Indiana, mayor, without much to offer for a track record.

Except for a yet-to-be-built soccer stadium by the airport, where the great Argentine star Lionel Messi may one day play, and his tarnished “crypto mayor” title, almost everything else Suarez touted as his accomplishments to a small, welcoming audience at the Reagan Library in California, his presidential opening act, was somebody else’s doing.

As a part-time mayor, he couldn’t even rein in Commissioner Joe Carollo. How’s he going to oust China from Cuba, as he was promising on Twitter? But he’s fun to watch. He has that Miami bro charm about him.

Juxtaposed against dour DeSantis, whose hatred of immigrants is so strong he has to persecute them in other states, Suarez is a one-man techno music party. Juxtaposed against Trump, his alleged intervention on behalf of a developer paying him $10,000 a month is nothing. He’s Saint Francis.

But Miami, now insanely pro-Trump and red, rural Florida mean neither Suarez nor DeSantis can touch the MAGA marvel.

Trump is capable of more incarnations than Spider-Man in the movie “Across the Spider-Verse.”

The discredited president could dress in drag and read to children — and Florida would still vouch for him. The rape allegations against him and being found liable for sexual abuse in New York do Trump no harm with Christian nationalists. He could write a book about his trysts with Stormy Daniels — and it wouldn’t be banned by Moms for Liberty in elementary schools.

Trump is Trump — and he fulfills one basic need: We demand to be entertained by our president.

In the age of dumbing down education and whitewashing history, the presidency, in Trump’s hands, would continue to play out like the ultimate video game, the ultimate reality series. And we’re all players!

The star president throws us red hats, paper towels and promises of free croquetas in Miami!

Always the con man, Trump didn’t pay for anyone’s meal at Versailles like he promised | Opinion

Who needs decency?

Decency is boring in Florida — and makes one look weak.

Biden, especially, demonstrating all that unconditional love for his son through drug-addiction and tax troubles, suffers from this affliction. Being a great father, as DeSantis recently boasted on the Christian Broadcast Network, is raising a 4-year-old who wants to build a sling to slay Goliath! Same kid DeSantis featured in an ad pretending to build a brick wall to keep the less fortunate out of America.

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the most Christian of them all?

Well, leading the GOP pack — by far — is the indicted and arraigned ex-president, who left the White House with America’s secrets, hid them in a ballroom and a bathroom, and cheated on his pregnant wife with the porn actress to whom he paid hush money, for which he also was indicted for the campaign-funds violation.

It’s such a minor point that he tried to stage a coup on Jan. 6, 2021, which made him the first twice-impeached president — and twice more loved.

He’s so Christian that, after he was booked in Miami last week, local GOP operatives staged a prayer circle around him at Versailles. Thanks to the supremacy of Fox News’ access, we got to see Trump’s prayer face: tightly scrunched. And so enlightened by a rabbi and a pastor that he felt generous enough to offer food for everyone — for which he did not pay.

What other state can provide such drama and pathos?

What other state can import the hate bug of “The Other,” more transmissible than the coronavirus, with more exploitable high-jinks and success than DeSantis’ Florida?

In fact, here the bug of hate for immigrants mutated into the bug of hate for Black history, which mutated into the bug of hate for gays. And now, it’s a national virus coming to a state near you. Not even California liberals are safe.

Trump, DeSantis and Suarez — our gifts from Floriduh, MAGA-branded, crated and shipped in lieu of oranges, unpicked, thanks to the migrant exodus.

Warning label: The damage to democracy may be irreversible.