Despite end of disinformation board, Ron DeSantis says Joe Biden still wants to crush ‘dissent’

What would you do with $20 billion? Ron DeSantis plans to sit on it.

Gov. Ron DeSantis is warning that even though “blowback” led to the Joe Biden administration shelving plans for a “disinformation bureau,” the fight to protect “dissent” against the federal government continues.

“The fact that they would even propose this really should raise questions about who is running this administration and what their designs are,” DeSantis told media and supporters at Retro Fitness in West Palm Beach.

“We’re glad that partially through our pressure and a lot of outrage from across the country, that they’ve had to retreat on that. But I don’t think this battle is over. The battle for free speech is going to continue.”

DeSantis said his administration was “very outspoken” about the “total farce” that was the proposed Disinformation Governance Board. The Governor also blasted the woman slated to head it, Nina Jankowicz, describing her as “totally off her rocker” and saying she had been “peddling misinformation for years.”

“They didn’t want people to be able to dissent. They wanted to be able to silence or marginalize people that were speaking out against their policies,” the Governor groused. “That is not an appropriate use of the federal government.”

Returning to an opinion he expressed days before, DeSantis noted he didn’t anticipate direct federal censorship of so-called dissent, but instead expected the Biden administration to enlist social media companies to do the work. He theorized the government would “give to the social media companies whatever they considered to be disinformation or misinformation,” then have the social media companies act on it.

“They would then put a warning label on, take the post down, suspend you — whatever they would do,” DeSantis added. “And so it was an attempt to try to control debate. It was an attempt to try to stifle dissent.”

DeSantis warned the Biden administration could circle back with a renewed effort following the board’s downfall.

“I think, strategically, they haven’t thrown the towel in completely,” DeSantis said. “I don’t think we’ve seen the end of it. I think you have an impulse in the Biden administration and quite frankly in these legacy media outlets in Washington and New York. … You know, they believe that what they say is what should be shoved down the throat of the public and the rest of us should just take it and not point out that they’re lying.”