Ron DeSantis warns ‘lockdowner’ Joe Biden not to ‘target Florida’
Image via AP.

DeSantis
DeSantis continued his attack on a hypothetical travel ban Sunday.

Florida’s Governor continued this weekend to rail against a potential travel ban floated by the Joe Biden White House, calling the President a “lockdowner” looking to target the Sunshine State.

“Biden is a lockdowner. His advisers are lockdowners. Lockdowns don’t work,” said Gov. Ron DeSantis, who went on to make a vow to the administration and its allies.

“We’re not turning back and they will not be able to get away with targeting Florida.”

The White House for its part has downplayed the prospect of travel restrictions any time soon, realeasing the following statement: “To be clear, there have been no decisions made around additional public health measures for domestic travel safety. The administration is continuing to discuss recommendations across the travel space, but no specific decisions are under consideration.”

Gov. Ron DeSantis made his most recent comments Sunday on the Fox News Channel’s Sunday Morning Futures, again responding to a Miami Herald report in which unnamed Biden administration sources mulled travel restrictions targeting the state’s prevalence of the B.1.1.7 strain of COVID-19. The Centers For Disease Control and Prevention report 347 of 981 known cases nationwide for the strain were detected in Florida.

The Governor says the travel ban trial balloon was tantamount to a “political attack against Florida” intended to “punish a state that is doing it better than what his experts have recommended.”

Though the Biden administration has tried to distance itself from the concept since (though not with the President himself coming out and saying it won’t happen), an exploitable opening has been created nonetheless for DeSantis and other Florida Republicans looking to score points against the Democratic administration.

DeSantis, who has been messaging aggressively against the proposition, was given ample time by host Maria Bartiromo to make an anti-administration indictment without pushback, and in addition to attacking “lockdowner” Joe Biden, he also went after “lockdown states that are putting people out of business.”

The Governor noted, regarding the B.1.1.7 variant, that “this strain is in blue states. They don’t talk about doing anything with blue states,” again decrying what he called a “draconian travel restriction with no basis in the Constitution” that have yet to be formally proposed.

But any travel restrictions, as reported by the Herald, would be implemented based on concentration of the virus, and right now that would include Florida and California, the latter a reliably blue state.

DeSantis found the scenario especially ironic given his claim that undocumented immigrants at the southern border aren’t being “screened at the border for COVID because it’s all political.”

“They’re not doing any COVID tests, they’re just coming into the communities,” DeSantis groused.

“This stinks to high heaven,” he added.

Beyond all that, the Governor had some advice for Biden’s team, who has contended that the Trump Administration had left a shell of a plan for fighting the virus.

Saying that Trump’s Operation Warp Speed “did a great job,” DeSantis advised Biden to “stop blaming your predecessor, stop playing politics.”

“Let’s work together,” DeSantis advised.

A.G. Gancarski

A.G. Gancarski has written for FloridaPolitics.com since 2014. He is based in Northeast Florida. He can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter: @AGGancarski


28 comments

  • RBE2004

    February 14, 2021 at 12:22 pm

    DeathSantis needs to shut down the politics and get to work getting the population vaccinated. Florida has done a horrendous job protecting its citizens.

  • Karellen

    February 14, 2021 at 12:34 pm

    How dare Biden trust scientists when deciding what is the best way to deal with this new variant!
    If memory serves me correctly way back in March DeathSentence had checkpoints set up in the panhandle to stop people coming in from La.
    An executive order for all residents arriving from N.Y.,N.J. and Ct. to self-isolate for 14 days also comes to mind. Hypocrisy much?
    When the new strain of Covid gets a firm foothold in Fl.the Ronster will either have to redouble his Covid data suppression efforts or begin restrictions again. Wanna bet which way he goes?

  • James Robert Miles

    February 14, 2021 at 12:44 pm

    DeSatan can not be trusted because he is still up Trump’s butt and he continues to live there which will be his undoing!

  • Ron Ogden

    February 14, 2021 at 12:45 pm

    You folks just loved it when the Dems/media concocted stories about Donald Trump and spent all Sunday mornings bashing him, and now you wriggle and writhe when a Republican busts Biden for something he actually said and has not walked back yet. Oh, the double standard! Where are the Dem members of Congress, who could so very easily say to their constituents “we won’t let Bidey do it”? Haven’t said it yet, have they?

  • Goldhoarder

    February 14, 2021 at 1:23 pm

    DeSantis is a great governor. Great to see a politician standing up for the people instead of big pharma and big tech. Biden and the democrats are totalitarians. Hell bent on destroying the middle class and bringing about Bill Gates’s Davos supported “Great Reset”

  • Bunni

    February 14, 2021 at 1:56 pm

    Super hypocritical considering he locked out New Yorkers and people from Louisiana! Like everyone has said. Get to work vaccinating the residents!

  • Raffa

    February 14, 2021 at 2:02 pm

    Governor DeSantis has & will do a great job. Im a Floridian, work in a senior community. DeSantis is doing the very best.Send him more vaccines. People are working & actually enjoying their lives. We in Florida are happy. Biden should follow our lead.

  • Sonja Fitch

    February 14, 2021 at 2:04 pm

    Duffus Desantis is willingly slaughtering Floridians! Stay out of Florida unless you are ready to sacrifice your life to Nazi herd immunity! Duffus Desantis is doing Fing notin to slow the curves of covid and its mutants. Stay away from Florida!

  • Sue

    February 14, 2021 at 2:10 pm

    Let’s just get this covid under control and maybe if we lock down the state and vaccinate people here we can get it under control. Nobody in nobody out.

  • Joann

    February 14, 2021 at 2:24 pm

    In my opinion. Florida Government needs to pay respect to the new President. Just because he is Trump’s puppet. Doesn’t call for him to be so disrespectful. He has his nose up Trump’s butt so far it is hard for him to breath.

  • Ross Poling

    February 14, 2021 at 8:19 pm

    Why is this red and blue think when it is black and white report of death’s! The new viruse out of Africa has no remotes or plays political prefix! You all should be some what concerned since it is here! The Governor has NO CONTACT TRACKING or even a Dept!

  • Lisa Lloyd

    February 14, 2021 at 10:00 pm

    DeSantis continues to play disfunctional trump politics, rather than follow data-based science, and genuinely work with the new administration. His bluster, b***s** and lies continue to drag down appropriate, effective response, and people have died, unecessarily, because he’d rather taunt and disparage.

  • Luisa

    February 14, 2021 at 10:08 pm

    Orlando Internacional AirPort full for arrivals!!! Spring brake is coming, this is crazy

  • Wanda

    February 15, 2021 at 2:33 am

    Ron needs to do the right thing Biden is right close it down at last someone with a brain is looking out for us thank you Mr Biden ,let’s vote Ron the moron out of office he is one of trumps cult member vote him out 2024 he is Trumps boot licker .

  • Yitz

    February 15, 2021 at 6:56 am

    The TRUTH why the Dems want to lockdown FL is so that President Trump can not travel

  • Beth

    February 15, 2021 at 7:23 am

    Traitor Ronnie only likes ignorant corrupt presidents that do nothing to try to control the pandemic. He did all he could to spread the big lie and help to incite a murderous coup. But when someone actually tries to help Floridians he flips out. Ronnie cares about himself only and his main objective is lining his own pockets. He needs to be voted out.

  • Tjb

    February 15, 2021 at 9:15 am

    Hey Ron Ogden,

    What did Mitch McConnell say about our former President that lost by 7 million votes? Was it something about trump being guilty of promoting the insurrection on our Capitol? Does not look good when a primary Republican leader harshly bashes Trump. Too bad DeSantis tries to be a tough guy, like his idol DJT , with his BS and the his creation of false narratives to divide the citizens of Florida.

  • Ross Poling

    February 15, 2021 at 9:33 am

    And please stop taking to Trumpski and grow your own brain cells. If you keep this up you are going to be a 1 term like your idol.

  • Ross Poling

    February 15, 2021 at 9:34 am

    And please stop talking to Trump and grow your own brain cells. If you keep this up you are going to be a 1 term like your idol.

  • Nina M Jones

    February 15, 2021 at 10:44 am

    DeSantis need to grow a pair and govern his people instead of brown nosing the loser. Sadly we who have lost someone know the pain…hey little man, have you lost anyone to covid? I pray you don’t…its a horrible death.

  • Lucille

    February 15, 2021 at 3:37 pm

    DeSantis is doing a fantastic job as governor. Are you kidding? Under Trump and DeSantis they created a vaccine and have been vaccinating millions of people in less than a year. This is un heard of. If you want to live like a pathetic scared little slave move out of state or just stay home. Do not terrorize young people with your completely irrational hysteria.

  • Lucille

    February 15, 2021 at 3:41 pm

    You are completely hysterical. Your non science based panic has actually killed people with serious diseases. Many people could not get care for cancer and other life threatening diseases because of this media hyped panic over a strain of the flu. Just stay home and hide under the covers. Desantis is doing a great job. We live better in Florida than anywhere else in the country. Lockdowns do not work. Lockdowns kill and de-humanize.

  • Claude Kirk

    February 15, 2021 at 4:13 pm

    The TDS commenters are for the most part just hurling childish insults.
    Meanwhile Trump proudly wears the badge of honor of being the only US President in forever to have been acquitted twice. Everything the TDS left has thrown at Trump has failed to stick. Everything.

  • Tjb

    February 15, 2021 at 4:15 pm

    Help me to understand, DeSantis implemented travel restrictions into Florida a year ago ( his Executive Order Number 20-82) but now he cries foul when the Biden administration is considering similar restrictions. I call BS on him for being a hypocrite and a despicable politician. Perhaps our governor is not happy that only 29,000 Floridians have died from COVID-19

  • Ross Poling

    February 15, 2021 at 5:12 pm

    DeSlantless is following Trump to a tee! His cabinet is leaving and I wonder why? Could it be the Governor has been fixing the numbers and that is the real reason why he does not want any one seeing his lies. One day the % is at 6 % infected and the next day it is over 15% . Hum does he think everybody dumb like him. ONE TERM TWITT!

  • Sir Farty Fartsalot

    February 15, 2021 at 6:04 pm

    By all means, Joe…. please make this idiot’s job miserable if you can.

    Floridians are suffering.

  • Yadja

    February 17, 2021 at 8:37 am

    I never was happier to live in Florida than now. Our governor is a sensible man and is always in the news for the success going on in Florida.

    He has never infringed on our Constitutional rights and he is highly respected in the U.S.A. I believe he and other governors of red states are the thorn in the hooves of the Covidians who want us locked down and up and under their thumbs.

    Thank God we still have, so far Separation of Powers.

  • Christi

    February 18, 2021 at 11:20 am

    Thank God for Governor DeSantis! He’s a true Governor for us here in Florida. We are grateful to live in the state of Florida. I’m creating a truth in news blog for the rest of the world. Hopefully they will follow DeSantis lead or the people will have power to step out and out. Launching soon>>> https://patriotsperspective.com

Comments are closed.


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