Ryan Nicol
More than two months into Florida’s novel coronavirus outbreak not much has changed. Democrats continue to charge Gov. Ron DeSantis with mismanaging the crisis every step of the way.
Some of those previous criticisms have failed to bear out, however, as Florida has fared far better than many models predicted.
Thursday, Democrats jumped on allegations from former Department of Health employee Rebekah Jones that she was fired for refusing to “manually change data to drum up support for the plan to reopen.”
The Governor has countered that Jones was fired for attempting to place invalid data into the state’s COVID-19 dashboard. Democrats ignored that rebuttal in their Thursday remarks.
U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz asserted Jones was removed for “refusing to manipulate data” and accused the Governor of launching a “smear campaign” against her.
“Public health and our economy are inextricably linked and we need to make sure there is total transparency when it comes to how widely COVID-19 is really spreading and who it’s impacting,” Wasserman Schultz added.
“This was a highly-touted website. It was highly-touted because it showed a lot of different types of broad data and it was something that was comprehensive and easily accessible.”
U.S. Rep. Donna Shalala also hammered DeSantis for a Wednesday appearance with Vice President Mike Pence where the duo was filmed at Beth’s Burger Bar in Orlando without wearing masks.
“What kind of role model is that?” Shalala asked.
“This Governor is dangerous to our health. Not only has he been incompetent in his management of the unemployment insurance system, but he sends the wrong message,” referring to the mask incident.
The state’s unemployment woes also received attention from U.S. Rep. Lois Frankel. The Governor has been combative when confronted with claims that many Floridians are still struggling to access the state’s unemployment benefits well into the crisis.
“We’re grateful for progress made but the fact of the matter is we are getting still hundreds of calls to our offices and people are desperate,” Frankel explained.
“We’re hearing from people who’ve never been unemployed before. They don’t even know what to do.”
A Thursday morning jobless report showed an additional 223,000 Floridians filed for unemployment in the past week. That means more than 2.1 million have filed claims since mid-March.
Unemployment failures have been widespread as the Governor has recently sought to downplay the severity and cast blame toward the previous administration.
Florida, however, has not experienced as severe an outbreak as some models predicted — a point the Governor has been more than willing to emphasize as the state has begun its phased reopening.
Yet Democrats have consistently warned of a worst-case scenario when it comes to the Governor’s handling of the crisis.
DeSantis largely deferred to local governments before issuing a statewide stay-at-home order in early April.
Prior to that order, Democrats argued a delay would be deadly.
In a March 31 letter, Frankel warned such an order was “necessary to save lives and keep our health care system from being overwhelmed.” U.S. Rep. Ted Deutch made a similar argument a week earlier.
The Governor has pointed to the fact that Florida’s hospitals were never over capacity as a sign his approach was successful. He was, however, granted an assist from the state’s population. A Tampa Bay Times investigation showed Floridians were staying at home in significant numbers before being ordered.
“Thank God Floridians decided, on their own, to stay home as they saw the virus overwhelming hospitals in New York,” Deutch said.
Democrats have also warned against a “rushed reopening” of the state, though early data hasn’t shown any additional strain on the hospitals.
Democrats glossed over positives on Thursday’s call as they continued to frame DeSantis’ leadership as a doomsday scenario for the state.
“As a manager, as a leader of out state, he has failed the people of our state on every count,” Shalala asserted.
“You’re dangerous to our health and you need to stop acting like an adolescent.”
Added U.S. Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, “We demand better. We will be holding the Governor accountable.”
7 comments
VOTE DEM 2020
May 21, 2020 at 12:47 pm
Republicans AT ALL LEVELS – nationwide and including the rank and file – have become “dangerous to our health” and welfare – and allowing them to remain in office represents a clear and present danger to the future of this country. The only possible resolution – short of armed rebellion – is for a landslide effort to vote them out of office this November 3rd! That will clear out a lot of the current bad actors – but – if will have to be an action that occurs regularly over local and state elections over the next few years.
As there was once a “Red Menace” – there is now a “Republican Menace”. The Red Menace was foreign-based – but the Republican Menace exists right here – in the once “shining city upon a hill”!
Margaret Blustine
May 21, 2020 at 2:04 pm
Ryan nicols.flas numbers are not improving.never were.hospitalizations increasing fast.may 1 were 6035 now over 9000 increasing.de santis not stating true new case daily numbers.ask why fla now at 50000 cases 7th worse state cases of of 50 and always was.how is such a daily case total shown as massive total called by de santis as declining or improving as simple daily math shows he’s stating half of true new cases?? If fla is in such good shape as he lies about deliberately why are more and more cases deaths hospitalizations as reported on accurate sites.how can a state be better when it has now and increasing over 50000 cases 9000 now hospitalizations to go up up up as new daily cases way too high to open mayour 4 and much earlier at 1000 now 700 900 800 974 way to high.just do math of total daily fla chart.even 500 or 600 daily as he states falsely is 5600 a week added is 11200 more every 2 weeks and 22400 every 4 weeks.unacceptable to not immediately do strict lockdown.and he admits to his lower manipulated 500 to 600!! Actual 900 to 1000 daily as totals show is 6300 more cases a week 12600 every week and 25200 every 2 weeks.those are non manipulated numbers.america trump said 90000 by August new cases.is now still may.if cases still rising so hugely trump should have not opened.he should have like many countries did in early March or Feb when he was told he could easily singlehandedly signed for paying americans their salaries and paid bussinuses to shut down until virus stopped.who knew? He knew.he could have ordered and gotten enough supplies in Feb or early march.he didn’t use fedl resources to get them.told governors without resources figure it out.he disn’t do his job as president.never did.rich people created economy.not trump.he’s now destroyed it when he could have stopped virus.he’s lazy played at being president then when had to work at it told governors do his job when not possible.we don’t want more of notions hunches lies to run our government.look at what that caused in americas cases and deaths.he’s a con artist salesman consumed with power and ego and wouldn’t isn’t using it to save americans.a complete deadly dictator.fires his own experts told him to act in ja.Feb March etc.3 yrs been firing needed military medical health financial experts in chaos and put his inexperienced puppet kids in charge our government.a complete dictator of doom. America elected an ignorant stupid obviously arrogant deadly dictator.donto do it again.look what doing it in 2016 caused today in america.and it’s out of control.because trump unlike other countries never tried to control it.months promises lies deflections.peak tantrums as he kills america consumed with nothing but himself as america is dying.a deadly dictator.he must be stopped.
Nathan Biddle
May 21, 2020 at 1:40 pm
The Governor has done an outstanding job on everything except unemployment (some of the blame isn’t with him). Which is ironic, the government’s “safety net” didn’t work, and yet Democrats are yelling for more spending on government safety nets. If you want a Democrat Governor, move to CA, IL, or NY, and see how that works out for you….
Ray Blacklidge
May 21, 2020 at 3:50 pm
Dum Dems
https://floridapolitics.com/archives/334760-divided-by-covid-19-democratic-u-s-areas-hit-three-times-as-hard-as-republican-ones
Democrat areas are hit three times worst than Republican held areas.
martin
May 22, 2020 at 8:19 am
Lets restrict access to 1,000+ acre parks and beaches while allowing people to wander around home depot and lowes holding paint and carpet samples. Good job dems on that one.
We keep hearing the term “follow the science”. Yet the dems ignore the science and write their own narrative.
Science; the mortality rate is .03%. 50% of those infected were/are over the age of 70. 80% of this .03% mortality rate was/is among those over 80. This age group has the greatest number of lung, heart, kidney, type II diabetes.
Who did the dems fail to protect? Re-read the above statistics. Where is the media uproar?
66% of those infected in NY city were those in “lock down”. Cuomo ordered hospitals to release infected seniors to nursing homes and other senior care facilities.
Basic science; virology, microbiology, as well as public health teaches us that we do not isolate the healthy. We isolate and treat the sick. The healthy develop herd immunity, thereby reducing further spread.
Science, Dem’s do not want to hear science. They are more interested in their anti-Trump agenda. Keep the population scared and locked down.
The science is out there for everyone to easily find and read. Ignore the media.
Need balance
May 22, 2020 at 8:23 am
The Democrats decision to tie themselves to the lockdown crowd, and hold that crazy lady at DOH as some kind of martyr, is really going to come back to bite them. But I never underestimate the ability of the Florida Democratic Party to shoot themselves in the foot. Repeatedly. In a very purple state, they’ve won two statewide elections in this century. Pick the worst candidate, cater to the fringe, lose. Almost every single time.
Arthro
May 22, 2020 at 1:33 pm
Just ridiculous. Democrats are so desperate for misery that they ignore the facts – Florida handled this crisis much better than ANY Democrat controlled state. Thank you Governor Desantis.
Democrats are happy when there is a crisis and people live in fear and dependent on the govt and they claim that everybody who disagrees with them is a racist. COVID is the Democrats wet dream.
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