Assessing DeSantis’ handling of the coronavirus crisis, one year in,
TALLAHASSEE
Since the state’s first confirmed COVID-19 case one year ago, Gov. Ron DeSantis has unilaterally managed Florida’s response to the pandemic.
His administration published detailed data on the state’s outbreak and also hid unflattering numbers. It saw an unemployment system crash and burn and rebuilt. Hospitals filled and emptied and filled again. It decided how billions of dollars in aid would be spent on those struggling to cope. Vaccination plans were made, scrapped, and remade on the fly.
More than 1.8 million people have caught the virus in Florida and more than 30,000 have died. But those numbers represent better per capita figures than the United States as a whole. DeSantis has pushed officials to reopen schools and businesses, and the unemployment rate is down to less than half of its April peak.
DeSantis is widely considered a leading candidate for president in 2024, and he’s already giving campaign-style speeches about his coronavirus record.
The Herald/Times reviewed eight key calls DeSantis made during the first year of the pandemic.
Those episodes reveal an executive who opted to go it alone, drawing his own conclusions from preferred metrics. Even when his instincts proved right, DeSantis was often undercut by mixed messaging and unclear orders.
DeSantis, through a spokeswoman, declined an interview for this story.
But in a lengthy statement, his office said DeSantis’ actions have protected the most vulnerable residents while keeping “our economy and society functioning.”
“The governor has been able to lift Floridians up instead of locking our state down,” spokeswoman Meredith Beatrice wrote in the response, which appears in its entirety at the end of this story.
MARCH 14: DESANTIS STOPS VISITS AT LONG-TERM CARE FACILITIES
● Caseload: 77 known cases; four deaths
On March 9, Veronica Catoe, the CEO of the Florida Assisted Living Association, was called into the state Emergency Operations Center to discuss a growing concern. How would millions of confined elderly residents withstand the onslaught of a novel respiratory virus?
Catoe said she’d never met Emergency Management Division Director Jared Moskowitz before that day. At that moment, she felt part of the decision process.
So it surprised Catoe when, five days later, DeSantis’ administration dropped a stunning order: Most visitors would be barred from entering the state’s 4,000 long-term care facilities.
“There was no collaboration, it just came out,” Catoe said recently. “Initially, it was extremely hard for providers.”
Ultimately, Catoe said DeSantis made the right call. Not only did he end visitation at long-term care centers, he stopped hospitals from transferring COVID-positive patients back to their original facilities. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whom DeSantis has used as a foil throughout the pandemic, directed facilities to accept COVIDpositive transfers, and the results were disastrous.
Beatrice noted DeSantis also set up dedicated nursing homes equipped to handle coronavirus cases.
“It was a good plan because we kept our seniors safe,” Catoe said.
APRIL 1: STAY-AT-HOME ORDER
● Caseload: 6,955 cases; 85 deaths
Through the early weeks of the pandemic, DeSantis insisted most of the state could remain open for business even as the virus rapidly spread. Many cities and counties, including in South Florida, took matters into their own hands, issuing lockdowns and asking people to stay home to flatten the curve.
Then came a shift in tone from the White House. President Donald Trump, who had promised an Easter revival, announced a 30-day extension of his administration’s social-distancing guidelines, an acknowledgment that the outbreak was growing out of control. Trump’s actions gave DeSantis cover to order non-essential workers to stay home.
The decision briefly kindled a show of unity in a divided state. Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, a Democrat, said it was “the right call.” Public health officials agreed.
The solidarity was shortlived. Local leaders strained to understand the rules and couldn’t get answers from the governor’s team. The order appeared to instruct all senior citizens and anyone with a “significant underlying medical condition” to remain homebound. It would take days for DeSantis’ administration to clarify that wasn’t the case.
There was confusion, too, over whether businesses had to close, what work was considered essential and whether local governments could shutter churches.
DeSantis further muddied matters when he quietly signed a second executive order that appeared to override local ordinances. He later claimed the second order did the opposite of what was clearly written on the page. Some Florida mayors called each other in a panic, trying to piece together the meaning, St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Kriseman said.
“What it felt like to a lot of us is the governor would go out and give a press conference and his office would scramble to write an order that matched what he said in the press conference,” Kriseman said. “We had to try and enforce it and interpret it. And you couldn’t get clarity from his office.”
APRIL 13: RIVKEES PULLED FROM MEETING
● Caseload: 21,019 cases; 513 deaths
With Floridians still trying to adjust to life in a pandemic, state Surgeon General Scott Rivkees warned residents during a news conference that they should be prepared to social distance and wear masks for a year until a vaccine arrives.
Within minutes, a DeSantis aide hustled him out of the meeting.
At the time, a DeSantis spokeswoman said Rivkees was pulled because he had a meeting scheduled. But Politico later reported there was no record of any meeting.
For critics and some experts, the odd episode exemplified how the DeSantis administration viewed scientific expertise and downplayed information about the impact of the coronavirus.
“It was a rare public glimpse into how ineffective the decision-making apparatus was,” said Thomas Hladish, a research scientist at the University of Florida who worked for the Florida Department of Health for several months during the pandemic. “Everything Rivkees said there was accurate, but that wasn’t what DeSantis wanted to hear.”
DeSantis’ administration moved to keep unfavorable information from the public on other occasions. State officials delayed sharing breakdowns of cases and deaths at long-term care facilities and prisons, and stopped medical examiners from releasing coronavirus death lists. News outlets have had to enlist lawyers to get the state to hand over public data.
Rivkees, the state’s top health official, mostly vanished from public view following that April news conference.
Public health experts have expressed frustration that the state has not relied more heavily on scientific evidence.
Rivkees in March convened a scientific advisory committee on the pandemic, according to Dr. Glenn Morris, director of UF’s Emerging Pathogens Institute. The initial phone conference included about a dozen experts from multiple universities, Morris said.
But at the end of the meeting, Rivkees announced that would be the only meeting. It was not clear why.
“What should have been a highly collaborative process, taking advantage of scientific expertise across the state, has instead become divisiveness and controversy and adversarial relationships,” Morris said. “The governor knows what he wants to do, and he’s going to do it.”
APRIL 15: DESANTIS REPLACES HEAD OF UNEMPLOYMENT SYSTEM
● Caseload: 22,519 cases; 627 deaths
When he strode to the podium at a news conference April 15, the state’s unemployment benefits system was in a monthlong meltdown, and he was facing a compounding crisis.
Even worse, he was flying blind.
When asked how many jobless applications the state had processed and how many were outstanding — simple metrics to mark the state’s progress — DeSantis rifled through his notes for the data before looking up, empty-handed.
“I don’t have exactly that number,” he said, wincing. “I ask for the numbers every morning.”
He cited the lack of data as one of the reasons why he was replacing the head of the unemployment agency, Ken Lawson, with Jonathan Satter, a different department head.
The unemployment system showed slow but significant improvement under Satter. A month after he took over, DeSantis claimed many of the problems had been fixed, and that “99.99%” of people who had filed claims correctly had been paid. Those who hadn’t been paid made a mistake filling out forms, the governor said.
For many waiting on benefits, that comment seemed insulting. Carolyn Hustedde, a Tampa events bartender, waited 10 weeks for her state unemployment benefits — and not because she filled out a form incorrectly.
“I was a Gov. DeSantis fan before all of this. But I don’t like the lack of acknowledgment,” Hustedde told the Herald/Times in May. “I just feel like he’s just really slighted the little people.”
The system has improved in the past year. A dashboard set up by the state showed that 96.7% of eligible unemployment claimants had been paid as of Monday.
APRIL 29: DESANTIS ANNOUNCES HE’LL START LIFTING RESTRICTIONS
● Caseload: 33,193 cases; 1,240 deaths
Within weeks of closing down the state, DeSantis was itching to restart the economy. In mid-April, he assembled a task force led by some of the country’s most notable corporations and trade groups — Disney, Lockheed Martin, Florida Power & Light, AT&T and the Florida Bankers Association — to strategize a safe reopening. Noticeably absent was medical and scientific expertise.
On April 28, as the state health department announced a new daily record of 83 deaths, DeSantis joined Trump in the Oval Office and declared Florida ready to reopen. At the time, Florida had yet to meet the White House’s guidelines to resume business and social activities.
“He’s doing a very good job,” Trump said of DeSantis during their appearance.
The next day, DeSantis unveiled his three-phase strategy for reopening. In many ways, it was a more cautious approach than his Republican counterparts in nearby southern states. Restaurants and retail stores could open at limited capacity, but bars, gyms, spas and salons remained closed. Even movie theaters, which the White House allowed to operate in its phase one guidelines, would stay shuttered for a few more months.
Wearing a mask was encouraged but not required, which would become a point of contention between DeSantis and many local leaders.
“I erred on the side of taking measured steps, even baby steps, to start on the road of a brighter day,” DeSantis said at the time.
In the ensuing weeks, DeSantis appeared confident that Florida had avoided a more deadly outbreak. He declared Florida a coronavirus success story. When Vice President Mike Pence visited Orlando, DeSantis roasted reporters and, in a widely shared video, accused the media of fearmongering over the virus. By June, DeSantis had further eased restrictions on restaurants and allowed bars and breweries to welcome back patrons.
That turned out to be short-lived. As the summer heat pushed people into air conditioning, cases spiked. Florida became ground zero for the country’s outbreak. On June 26, the state shut down bars again.
JULY 6: CORCORAN ORDERS SCHOOLS TO REOPEN TO IN-PERSON INSTRUCTION IN THE FALL
● Caseload: 206,447 cases; 3,880 deaths
In March, Florida, like other states, moved to shut down in-person classes for K-12 students. Beatrice, DeSantis’ spokeswoman, said it was “done out of an abundance of caution.”
But as summer began, DeSantis made clear that he wanted schools to reopen at “full capacity” come fall, saying it was crucial for learning and the state’s economy. Florida’s 67 school districts mobilized to enact plans.
Soon after, Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran issued an emergency order saying that districts must provide in-person instruction five days a week for all students as long as local health