DECLARATION OF ECONOMIC INDEPENDENCE

Declaration of Economic Independence

America is in a state of decline -- militarily, culturally and economically. 

People across our nation are collapsing under an economy that no longer works for the American family. 

Americans have been saddled with persistently high prices and weak economic growth. American families have seen their quality of life and economic security diminish while our national debt has exploded, and our country loses to Communist China. 

We need an economic policy that is focused on making the cost of living more affordable for working families.  

Our policies can no longer be driven by the ruling class. 

It's time to name names and defeat those people and institutions that have formed the root cause of this economic malaise. And a family-focused economy means having the courage to take on our enemies. 

We are no longer going to Kow-Tow to Wall Street and big corporations who don't have your interests front and center. 

 We are no longer going to sell out to China at the expense of the American working family. 

The American Dream is slipping away from our nation's middle class. Federal government policies -- COVID lockdowns, reckless borrowing, printing and spending -- have escalated the costs of life's essentials so much so that buying a home, purchasing a car, or starting a family is cost prohibitive; and for many, even affording groceries has become a matter of saving. 

The bottom half of American households have less wealth today than in 1989 while the top 10% have added $29 trillion in wealth over the same period.   

This trend accelerated in 2020 with Covid lockdowns and money-printing, crippling the market share of small business, diminishing the purchasing power of middle-class wages, and upending our workforce.    

Over six million prime-age men are neither working nor looking for work. The labor force participation rate for this group fell from 98% in 1953 to 89% today. 

Mass illegal immigration has undercut American jobs and wages, the rule of law, and our wider social fabric.  

We have spent hundreds of billions propping up our broken university system, which charges exorbitant tuition and fees while producing substandard results, leaving students behind, often buried in debt and in weaker positions to start families. 

Deaths of despair due to opioids, alcoholism, and suicide surged for Americans without a college degree -- with rates doubling between 2000 and 2017. Depression and anxiety have risen even higher in the wake of the pandemic lockdowns.  

Over the last decade, Americans' life expectancy has fallen.  

This is not normal. 

Yet, entrenched Washington politicians in both parties refuse to change course.   

Why would they? For those connected to the DC ruling class, life has never been better. Five of the eight wealthiest counties in the US are suburbs of Washington, DC. 

Multinational corporations, especially in sectors such as tech, have seen a massive surge in wealth while selling our assets and outsourcing our industrial base to China. 

Since 2020, our nation's growth has essentially been in 7 large technology companies like Apple and Google; the increase in market capitalization of these companies has exceeded the increase in our nominal GDP over the same period of time. 

The elites that have orchestrated policies leading to our current state of malaise have failed.

Time and again, those entrenched in power have imposed policies on us that have proved short-sighted and counterproductive. 

Nearly a quarter century ago, we were told that welcoming Communist China into the World Trade Organization and granting it 'most favored nation" trading status would lead to democratic reforms in China, would protect against forced transfers of technology, would not cause manufacturing to relocate to China, and would safeguard against surges of imports from China.   

What actually happened? 

The rise of so-called quantitative easing (QE) as a mainstay of monetary policy has made the wealthy richer while neglecting the middle class.   

Major corporations have secured massive carveouts and bailouts, a form of venture socialism in which gains are privatized and losses are born by taxpayers; and have avoided accountability for mismanagement.   

"Too big to fail" for big institutions has led to "too difficult to succeed" for the middle class. 

More recently, the elite's response to COVID-19 -- lockdowns, mandates, and massive borrowing and spending -- has proven disastrous.

In Florida, we led the charge to drag our nation out of lockdown, to protect freedom, to ensure the viability of small businesses, and to preserve the education of our youth.   

We cut against the grain of elite opinion and faced massive blowback for bucking the system, but we stood our ground.   

We fought for Floridians who were being ignored by the elites, whose livelihoods hung in the balance, and who didn't have a voice. 

We were their voice. We were their fighter.   

We seek to reverse the decline and restore American greatness:  

• We want to be a country that makes things 

• We want to be a country where a family can raise children on a single income 

• We want to be a country that both inspires and demands loyalty from its elite 

• We want to be a country where young people feel they can develop the skills and values to build a decent life and contribute productively to their communities 

We will declare our economic independence:  

• from the failed elites that have orchestrated American decline; 

• from the profligate federal spending that has inflated prices and plunged our nation to the brink of insolvency;  

• from the Chinese Communist Party that has run circles around us for a generation; 

• from central planners who seek to advance their political agendas at the expense of the standard of living for the average American; 

• from destructive policies like the Green New Deal that seek to hinder our domestic energy production; 

• from a class of progressive corporations looking out for every interest except for that of the American people. 

The goal of our declaration of economic independence is simple: We win. They lose.

RON DESANTIS' DECLARATION OF ECONOMIC INDEPENDENCE

Taking Back Control of our Economy from China and Restoring our Economic Sovereignty  

• DeSantis will end our abusive relationship with the CCP, reverse our ever-increasing trade deficits, ban imports of goods made from stolen intellectual property, strengthen protections to stop child and forced labor, and end China's preferential trade status.  

• DeSantis will demand that American companies act in accordance with American interests --- which means preventing companies from sharing critical technologies with China and banning the sale of strategic assets like farmland to CCP members and their affiliates. 

• DeSantis will incentivize the repatriation of U.S. capital from China through strategic tax abatements and aligning market incentives with strategic goals to help secure our supply chains and invest in America.  

Achieving 3% Growth by Incentivizing Investment, Eliminating Bureaucracy and Red Tape, and Keeping Taxes Low 

• DeSantis will advance an ambitious tax and regulatory reform agenda to unleash American production, increase productivity and growth, and support our families, workers, and small businesses while lowering inflation.  

• DeSantis will reverse Biden's job-crippling and ideological regulations and executive orders on Day One.  

• DeSantis will eliminate the fourth branch of government. The days of attempting to regulate the American economy into oblivion by ideological extremism will be done. 

• DeSantis will work to not only extend the individual tax rates and further simplify the tax code, but also seek permanence. 

• DeSantis will seek a more competitive tax system that incentivizes long-term, domestic investment over financial speculation and short-term returns while purging the code of K Street carveouts and loopholes. 

• DeSantis will seek to make permanent full immediate expensing, maintain territoriality, and further strengthen base erosion measures to ensure corporations are investing in America. 

• DeSantis will use all available Article II authority to restore accountability in the executive branch, move agencies out of DC and slash the bureaucratic state, restrict foreign lobbying and post-employment revolving doors by former government officials, and ban individual stock trading by members of Congress and executive branch officials. 

Unleashing American Energy Independence 

• DeSantis will unleash our domestic energy sector, modernize and protect our grid, and advance American energy independence. This will not only increase our economic and national security while reducing inflation, it will also help fuel a manufacturing renaissance that will create jobs, revitalize our communities, and improve our standard of living. We can no longer afford to tie one arm behind our economy's back by prioritizing the left's ideological agenda, crushing regulations, and endless permitting requirements. 

• DeSantis will reverse the federal government's attempt to force people to buy electric vehicles. We will save the American automobile.

Ending Environmental, Social, and Governance Standards and Political Engineering by Large Investors 

• DeSantis will not tolerate woke corporations using ESG as an end-run around our constitutional system to impose heavy-handed, left-wing edicts through concentrated private power. There will be no ideological litmus test for getting a loan, establishing a bank account, or running a business. 

• DeSantis will strengthen rules governing fiduciary responsibilities, transparency requirements, and scrutiny of firms that manage public pension funds. 

Restoring Merit and Respect for the Individual as the Central Criteria for Economic Advancement 

• DeSantis will instruct the DOJ Civil Rights Division and relevant agencies to root out discrimination under the false guises of diversity, equity, and inclusion. "Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion" programs are racist, discriminatory, and obscure the fundamental truth that all men are created equal.

Reforming our Education System and Lowering Barriers to Entry for Working Class Americans 

• DeSantis will support school choice nationwide, protect parental rights, reform accreditation, and steer funding towards programs and institutions that support the jobs of the future. Our students will learn how to read, write, do math, and think critically instead of learning to hate our country. DeSantis will educate artisans and engineers instead of politicized administrators and bureaucrats, seeking to accelerate students along these career paths as early as possible. 

• DeSantis will work with the private sector to accelerate and develop vocational and apprenticeship programs in anticipation of our great industrial revival, with a goal to become #1 in the world for skilled trades by 2030. 

• DeSantis will no longer incentivize useless degrees and courses with blanket government loans. To that end, he will make universities, not taxpayers, responsible for the loans their students accrue. He will also seek to allow student loans to be discharged through bankruptcy like any other loan. 

Creating a Fair Labor Market by Securing the Border and Enforcing our Laws 

• DeSantis will create a fair labor market by securing the border, enforcing our laws, eliminating chain migration and the diversity visa lottery, and limiting unskilled immigration. 

• DeSantis will make it a top priority of his administration to destroy the fentanyl market in America. 

• The American immigration system will serve Americans --- not multinational corporate elites.  

Reining in the Federal Reserve 

• DeSantis will appoint a Chairman of the Federal Reserve who will focus on maintaining a stable dollar instead of the political pressures of the day. The Fed must focus on stable prices; it is not a social engineer and cannot be allowed to be an unaccountable economic central planner. 

• DeSantis will ensure that the Federal Reserve does not implement a central bank digital currency to control the finances of hardworking Americans. DeSantis will block any attempts to establish a Central Bank Digital Currency or any other policies that will move us closer to a social credit system. 

• Where Washington has sought to regulate and inhibit innovation such as Bitcoin and other new technologies, DeSantis will protect entrepreneurship from central planners who seek to stifle what they cannot control. 

Opposing Bailouts and Holding Bad Economic Actors Responsible 

• DeSantis will require "clear language" disclosures by banks and shadow banks to increase transparency and better track systemic risks. 

• DeSantis will support community and regional banks that bolster the economic front lines of main street America 

• DeSantis will protect cryptocurrencies and work to end politically driven debanking and financial doxing. 

• In the event of an existential economic crisis, DeSantis will seek to strip those accountable of all golden parachutes and prevent the further accumulation of wealth to those already deemed too big to fail. 

Fighting Reckless and Wasteful Federal Spending 

• DeSantis will be a new sheriff in town when it comes to spending, and he will not be afraid of using his veto pen. Our government programs as they exist today are wrought with waste, fraud, and abuse, and continue to be a major drag on our economy, our budget, and the flourishing of our citizens. 

• DeSantis use his Article II authority to prohibit federal grants to entities that engage in active discrimination through DEI or other unconstitutional initiatives. He will no longer allow hardworking families and taxpayers to have their tax dollars flow to organizations that seek to undermine their values and beliefs. 

• DeSantis will also mandate work requirements for welfare programs.