Opponents decry Anthony Sabatini’s ‘Mask-Nazis’ crusade as ‘childish,’ like ‘a baby’

As Lake County Republican Rep. Anthony Sabatini endeavors to make himself Florida’s leading opponent of face mask mandates, filing lawsuits around the state and decrying “Mask-Nazis,” his election opponents responded calling him “childish” and “a baby.”

Sabatini, of Howie in the Hills, has filed and discussed preparing lawsuits seeking to strike down face mask mandates filed in various counties initiated by officials seeking to stop or slow down the sudden resurgence of COVID-19, including in Orange and Leon. He’s also undertaken as high-profile a campaign denouncing such rules as unnecessary and unconstitutional.

In a tweet Friday he declared officials advocating such rules as “Mask-Nazis,” and urged them to read a post he retweeted about Scandinavian countries discouraging mask-wearing.

There are three Democrats running in the August 18 primary seeking a shot at Sabatini in House District 32, covering most of Lake County. Ryan Morales of Clermont called him “childish” and said, “he seriously just needs to grow up.” Linda Kero of Leesburg declared, “He’s a baby. He’s a spoiled baby.” A third Democrat, Stephanie Dukes of Clermont, did not respond.

“It’s sickening to see him do this,” Morales said.

“I think it is terribly irresponsible to the people of his district,” Kero said.

In response, Sabatini dismissed them as “nut jobs” throwing “emotional temper tantrums.”

Sabatini said he does not believe there is an imminent public health crisis in Florida.

Instead, he believes that the rising COVID-19 infection numbers are reflections of increased testing, finding large numbers of asymptomatic people who weren’t showing up in previous testing, and that even rising hospitalization numbers in places like Orange and Seminole counties are suspect indicators.

Masks, he said, should be left up to individuals and businesses. The government does not really have a crisis it needs to address, Sabatini claims. And even it did, it should not be addressed with what he considers an unconstitutional abridgment of people’s rights by requiring them to wear masks in public. “I think they’re worth fighting for,” he said.

“It does bother me that people try to silence and stop the debate and seek to inhibit conversation about these types of policies and try to vilify anybody who actually questions it. I think that’s sick and disturbing,” he said.

He defended his “Mask-Nazis” insult as a variation of the “soup Nazi” gag from the Seinfeld sitcom in the 1990s, saying it was his attempt to bring a sense of humor into politics.

House District 32 has a heavy Republican base and is in a county with a tradition of supporting politicians whose statements and policies sometimes test the extremes of right-wing conservatism. Sabatini has routinely sought to test those bounds himself. Democrats are charging that this time he may have gone too far, even for many of the county’s Republican voters.

They’re eager to try to hold him accountable.

“At the end of the day, he has blood on his hands,” Morales said.

Morales noted that he used to paint houses, a job that required him to wear masks for hours at a time. It was no big deal, and he thinks the health benefits in a pandemic make them worth it, he said. He pointed out that Sabatini himself wears masks when he is told to by commanders in the National Guard.

“I think people in his district should be incensed by his words. It’s not cute,” Kero said.

Sabatini’s response: “These are people that are complete nut jobs, radical, left-wing, goofy people who are going to lose by double-digits on Election Day and are probably already crying about it, so they’re having emotional temper tantrums.”

The greater-Orlando area is seeing dramatically increasing numbers of new cases in the past week, including in Orange and Lake counties. The region recorded 1,807 new cases on Friday, up from the record 1,238 on Thursday, up from the record of 1,017 on Wednesday.

In Lake County, a record 94 cases were recorded Friday. In Lake, 10% of 798 test results came back positive. Lake is now poised to become the sixth county in the six-county Central Florida region to surpass the 1,000 mark.

“The virus doesn’t know the difference between a Democrat and a Republican. This is not the flu. And the numbers are skyrocketing. He should know this,” Kero said.

“You know, with the recent spikes throughout the state of Florida, and the increases in deaths, technically people like him are partly responsible because they are continuing the narrative that masks don’t work,” Morales said.

But to Sabatini, there is nothing to see in those numbers.

“We’re more likely discovering the spread of the virus that had already been in place,” Sabatini said.

When asked directly if he thought there was an imminent public health crisis, he said, “No.”