President Donald Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis restart relationship

President Donald Trump and Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis appear to have turned a corner.

In July 2025, the president put aside their previous conflict stemming from competition in the 2024 election, and the two appeared to chart a new course for their relationship since then as Florida supported Trump policies.

For example, DeSantis has endorsed several agenda items from the Trump administration, including embracing the “Make America Healthy Again” initiative launched by Trump’s Department of Health and Human Services.

As a result, DeSantis launched the state’s “Healthy Florida First” initiative in January; The initiative was a statewide effort to test food products for contaminants and was in line with the administration’s priorities, DeSantis said.

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“Our ‘Healthy Florida First’ initiative fosters innovation, ensures accountability, and enables Floridians to make the healthiest choices for their families. Transparency is vital to this mission,” DeSantis said in a statement Monday. he said. “Today, First Lady Casey DeSantis, Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo, and I were proud to announce that Florida is expanding this initiative by evaluating other products marketed for children. Through these transparency efforts and our long-standing commitment to medical freedom, Florida is doing our part to help Make America Healthy Again.”

DeSantis and Trump’s relationship thawed as DeSantis emerged as a possible rival in the 2024 election, prompting Trump to claim that the Florida governor was “desperately in need of a personality transplant” after DeSantis officially announced his candidacy for the White House.

President Donald Trump speaks with Gov. Ron DeSantis during a roundtable meeting at “Alligator Alcatraz,” a new immigrant detention facility at the Dade-Collier Training and Transitional facility in Ochopee, Florida, on Tuesday, July 1, 2025. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

In June 2023, DeSantis said in an interview with “Good Morning New Hampshire” that Trump’s attacks were “childish” and that he believed they were a contributing factor to his loss in the 2020 election.

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But the pair appeared to have put the past behind them in 2025, with Trump reaffirming that the pair “have a lot of respect” for each other.

“You are my friend and you will always be my friend,” Trump told DeSantis in July 2025 during a trip to Everglades, Florida, to open an immigrant detention center. “We might even have some conflicts in the future, I doubt that. But we’ll always come back because we have blood that seems pretty compatible.”

DeSantis and Trump embark on the “Alligator Alcatraz” tour on July 1, 2025, in Ochopee, Florida. (Andrew Caballero-ReynoldsAFP via Getty Images)

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Fox News Digital has contacted the White House and DeSantis for comment.

While DeSantis cannot run for governor again in 2026 when his term ends, he has recently weighed in on the 2026 midterm elections, telling conservative commentator Mark Levin that he believes Democrats will come up with a plan to remove Trump from office if Democrats regain control of the House of Representatives.

“They will do whatever they can to throw sand into the gears to prevent the president from carrying out the duties for which he was elected — including possibly trying to fabricate another impeachment,” DeSantis said in an interview on “The Mark Levin Show” on Tuesday.