In DeSantis v. White House, Guess Who’s Winning?

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At times it feels as if Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida is fighting on the side of the virus. Since the beginning of the pandemic, he has railed against lockdowns, mask mandates and vaccinations in defiance of public health policy experts and the CDC. As a result, Florida predictably was hard hit by the second Covid-19 (despite DeSantis having taken a premature victory lap in April of 2020), and the state now faces a crushing wave of infections and hospitalizations from the highly transmissible delta variant.

The numbers are grim. Yesterday, Florida hit a new pandemic high of over 12,000 Covid-19 hospitalizations—this after earlier hitting a new pandemic high for daily cases earlier in the week. But the patient demographics are quite different than the earlier wave: Over 96% of those in the hospital are unvaccinated, and unlike the earlier wave that affected mostly the elderly in the state, today 50 percent of those hospitalized are between the ages of 25 and 55. Florida’s death count from the pandemic is now over 39,000.

In early July, DeSantis was still mocking the vaccine and masks, selling “Don’t Fauci My Florida” merchandise to raise campaign funds, but by mid-July even he began to realize that his policies were driving his own state to ruin. At an unusual press conference, he finally urged vaccinations for his state’s residents, even while still vowing to oppose mask mandates.

That about-face earned him scorn and ridicule across the far right, which comprises his own base of supporters. As a leading contender for the GOP nomination in 2024, DeSantis is accustomed to goading these supporters on, not answering their condemnation. To placate them, DeSantis revived an old target: government mandates. The argument amounts to something like this: Vaccines and masks may save lives, according to the “experts,” but no God-fearing conservative Republican has to believe those experts or do what they say if they don’t want to. That’s freedom.

DeSantis even took his controversial and dangerous policies one step further, signing an executive order to defund any school district that imposed a mask mandate for children when classes resume in the fall. This threw school districts into chaos as parents on both sides of the debate weighed in, with big districts such as Broward County initially rescinding their mask mandates while other districts moved to keep them despite DeSantis’s threats. (As a sign of the unfolding chaos, Broward County school district has since rescinded its rescission after a contentious meeting that involved screaming matches and mask burnings by anti-mask parents.)

The White House had heard enough. On Tuesday, President Biden called out hot-spot governors, including DeSantis, for failing to implement restrictions including mask mandates in schools. “If you're not going to help, at least get out of the way of people trying to do the right thing,” Biden said.

DeSantis, seeing another opportunity to stake out yet another extreme position and score political points, shot back. “I am standing in your way," DeSantis said of Biden on Wednesday, declaring that Florida would remain a "free state" that would never require proof of vaccination or force children to wear masks. As if on cue, he then falsely blamed immigrants for the crisis: “You have hundreds of thousands of people pouring across every month,” DeSantis said without basis. “Not only are they letting them through, they’re farming them out all across the country, putting them on planes, putting them on buses. Do you think they’re worrying about COVID for that? Of course not.”

Pressed by reporters eager to see a spat, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki responded cooly along with some hard facts on Thursday:

Well, first, from Day One, we've approached this not as a political issue but a public health issue. We remain in touch with officials in Florida, just like we're in touch with officials from around the country about how we can provide assistance from the federal level to help address this public health crisis.

It is a fact -- and data that you all are aware of -- that 25% of hospitalizations in the country are in Florida. It is also a fact that the governor has taken steps that are counter to public health recommendations. So, we're here to state the facts. 

Frankly our view is that this is too serious, deadly serious to be doing partisan name-calling. We're focused on providing public health data information to the people of Florida to make sure they understand what steps they should be taking, even if those are not steps taken at the top of the leadership in that state.

Later, President Biden, who was touting the benefits of electronic vehicles at curbing emissions, was asked by a reporter about Governor DeSantis’s comments slamming him.

“Governor who?” Biden responded.