To the other 49 states: You don’t want to make America Florida

Leading up to Gov. Ron DeSantis’ official announcement on Twitter Wednesday that he is entering the presidential race, I have become ever-more-seriously concerned about a number of issues affecting our state. The governor’s repression of ideas he disagrees with makes him a poor candidate for the White House.

First, and most importantly, is DeSantis’ vitriolic attack on the First Amendment. Fortunately, U.S. District Judge Mark Walker granted a temporary injunction to block enforcement of the governor’s “Stop WOKE Act.” The judge described the state law as “bordering on unintelligible” and a violation of both the First and 14th amendments. The judge further found the state law unconstitutional, vague, “positively dystopian” and an encroachment on academic freedoms.

The governor’s attack on the First Amendment continued with his support of House Bill 991, a bill designed to make it easier for public officials to sue journalists for defamation. The ultimate goal of this and similar bills is to hinder reporters from doing their jobs. According to Katie Fallow, senior counsel at Columbia University’s Knight First Amendment Institute, this bill “threatens one of the bedrock principles of free speech in America, which is the right to criticize government officials and other powerful figures without fear of financial or other types of retribution.”

Not yet done with his assault on free speech, the governor enacted significant restrictions that severely limited our right to be heard at the Capitol. It certainly makes one wonder how we can be considered the free state of Florida when we are not free to voice our opinions and beliefs.

The governor will tell you that he kept Florida open during the pandemic, which in itself is a half truth. But he won’t tell you that during the pandemic, at times, Florida had not only the highest number of COVID infections, but also the highest number of deaths in the entire country.

As the pandemic started to subside, our governor’s crackdown on his perceived political enemies only increased. After complaining that students attending New College in Sarasota were being indoctrinated by far-left professors, DeSantis restructured the school’s board of trustees to his liking. The board proceeded to fire the president, a career educator whose salary was $305,000, and replace her with a career politician whose salary was elevated to $699,000 — shameful for a school that has been criticized for decrepit facilities. And the new president wasted little time in firing the school’s dean of diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. DeSantis’ stated goal is to remake New College in the image of Hillsdale College, a small, private Christian school that has been active in conservative politics. It would seem that indoctrination is acceptable if it follows the governor’s beliefs. Is this really the job of the governor?

The legislative session that wrapped up this month handed the governor a number of wins that arguably make Florida the most right-leaning state in the entire country. It will be interesting to see how many of these new laws will, like the governor’s Stop WOKE Act, fall flat in the face of the First Amendment.

Among the most polarizing bills that the governor signed was the law to ban abortion at six weeks. So afraid was DeSantis of this bill’s backlash that he signed it quietly at midnight in a closed-door meeting without his usual fanfare.

Another bill will allow people to carry concealed guns without a permit. This bill raises the question of how many mass shootings are enough before we take some serious steps to stop the insanity.

Other legislative victories for DeSantis include the expansion of his “Don’t Say Gay” law; another law banning diversity, equity and inclusion programs in state colleges; and yet another bill that prevents teachers from being required to use pronouns that don’t correspond to a person’s birth sex. This last bill sent one of Florida’s greatest athletes, Dwyane Wade, out of Florida to the state of California, a state with a more friendly environment to Wade’s transgender child.

And as the governor continues to wage his personal all-out war against Disney, Florida residents are left wondering — where is the war against outrageous property insurance? Where is the war on the housing crisis? And where is the war against the toxic algae threatening our state tourism?

The governor seems rather quiet on these issues.

One can only imagine the damage he would do as president.