DeSantis keeps waging culture wars as more GOP critics emerge

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Instead of easing up on a two-year culture war in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis is doubling down on his anti-“woke” agenda as potential rivals for the GOP presidential nomination target him.

He’s surveying state universities and colleges for diversity, equity and inclusion and critical race theory programs, apparently to target them for budget cuts, as well as asking how much the schools are spending on gender-affirming care for transgender students.

He’s attacking COVID-19 vaccines and drug stores, lambasting President Biden’s immigration and economic policies, ridiculing California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s pandemic protocols and railing against the federal government’s caution about gas stoves, even producing flags with stoves on them.

On Tuesday, he went full anti-vax by calling for permanent laws banning vaccine and mask mandates.

“Florida is where woke comes to die,” DeSantis proudly proclaimed during his inaugural address a few weeks ago, where he rattled off a list of accomplishments of the past four years and said his administration had just begun to fight.

DeSantis’ actions of recent weeks came as his star is rising among conservative voters, simultaneously triggering a round of criticism from other potential contenders in the 2024 GOP presidential sweepstakes, including South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu and former President Donald Trump.

Noem said she wanted DeSantis and other governors to do more about restricting abortion, a day after one of her top aides accused the Florida governor of hiding behind the state’s newly approved 15-week ban. Sununu said DeSantis’s attack on “wokeism” went too far in attacking private corporations.

When conservative podcast host David Brody asked about DeSantis as a potential competitor in 2024, Trump said, “So, you know, now I hear he might want to run against me. So we’ll handle that the way I handle things.”

Other critics argue he is failing to address the real issues facing Floridians, including their being priced out of the housing market to having their insurance canceled.

“When did ‘woke’ become part of our conversation, part of our lexicon? What does it even mean?” asked Barbara Petersen, executive director of the Florida Center for Governmental Accountability, a nonpartisan open government watchdog. “There are big problems in the state he is not dealing with.”

DeSantis is using the hot-button issues to fire up his base, Petersen said. But many of the laws passed by the Legislature at DeSantis’ prompting are being litigated in court at a cost of millions of taxpayer dollars, she added.

And he’s usurping the Legislature’s authority, she said, as he did with redistricting last year when he inserted himself into the map-drawing process.

“He’s demonstrating his authoritarian power,” Petersen said. “This isn’t normal executive power.”

Aubrey Jewett, a political science professor at the University of Central Florida, said DeSantis may truly believe these are important issues as a social conservative. But he probably also thinks that pushing the same policies that helped him win re-election by a landslide and raise a record amount of campaign contributions will help him win the Republican primary for president.

The agenda helps him “make national headlines and prepare for a possible presidential run,” Jewett said. “It keeps him in the mind of the voters.”

In recent weeks, DeSantis has proposed legislation to have the state take over the Reedy Creek Improvement District from the Walt Disney Co., following the Legislature’s action in a special session last year to dissolve the district after its former CEO said he’d fight the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” law.

He recommended legislation to make his executive orders banning mask and vaccine mandates permanent, and in December asked the Florida Supreme Court to impanel a grand jury to investigate “crimes and wrongdoing committed against Floridians related to the COVID-19 vaccine.”

He promised legislation to protect doctors from disciplinary action for spreading what the mainstream medical community calls misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines and masks.

He and the State Board of Administration also approved rules prohibiting managers of the state’s $180 billion pension fund and other investments from buying into funds that have adopted ESG policies, which take into account environmental, social and governance factors of the companies within them.

The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration, which reports to DeSantis, sent a memo to pharmacists warning them not to distribute an abortion pill, even after the federal Food and Drug Administration ruled they could. Florida law requires a patient to visit a physician at least 24 hours before any abortion procedure, and then schedule a second appointment to take the pill in the presence of a doctor.

But his biggest focus in the past few weeks has been on education. Right before the new year began, DeSantis’ budget director Chris Spencer asked all state colleges and universities to account for all the money they are spending on diversity and CRT, a theory that suggests systemic racism still exists in America.

Florida’s 12 universities complied, saying they spent a combined $34.5 million on diversity, equity and inclusion programs, almost $21 million of which came from the state. Several universities noted that some of those expenditures were to meet federal affirmative action mandates.

Spencer later asked the state’s 12 universities for an audit of the services universities provide “to persons suffering from gender dysphoria” by Feb. 10.

“This is an attempt to intimidate them from supporting trans students and shutting down research related to gender-affirming care without passing a single law,” tweeted Carlos Guillermo Smith, a former state representative from Orlando and LGBTQ advocate.

DeSantis also loaded the liberal arts New College of Florida Board of Trustees with six new members with sharply conservative views on education. Among them is Christopher Rufo, a right-wing activist who has led the charge against CRT and LGBTQ issues.

Rufo was present with DeSantis when he signed the Parental Bill of Rights last year, which opponents dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill.

“My ambition is to help the new board majority transform New College into a classical liberal arts institution,” Rufo said. “We are recapturing higher education.”

The governor’s most recent action against “wokeism” was to ban an Advanced Placement African American studies high school curriculum the College Board is testing out in several states because it violated the state’s anti-CRT law.

The state Board of Education said in a letter to the College Board that “as presented, the content of this course is inexplicably contrary to Florida law and significantly lacks educational value.”

Jewett noted that Larry Hogan, the Republican governor of the largely Democratic state of Maryland, said DeSantis might have trouble attracting moderate voters if he runs for president because he appears unwilling to reach out to them.

Even so, “it doesn’t appear he will be modifying his policies any time soon,” Jewett said.