Tipsheet

Another Day, Another Dishonest Media Hit Job About Florida

Guy Benson
Guy Benson  |  April 28, 2023 12:05 PM

Did you hear about the story in which a Florida prosecutor stood up to right-wing fascism, and got removed in retaliation?  Hero.  Martyr.  Oh, he publicly said he'd refuse to enforce the laws he was sworn to enforce, an egregious dereliction of duty?  Never mind.  Well, did you hear about the "whistleblower" whose house was raided, then saw her child arrested because she told the truth about Florida's COVID outcomes?  Hero.  Martyr.  Oh, she lied repeatedly, broke the law, and was forced to admit guilt -- and then her child threatened to shoot up his school, multiple times, in writing?  Never mind.  Okay, how about the Florida principal who courageously exercised his First Amendment rights and criticized the state's dictatorial governor, and now could be getting fired?  We've got another hero and martyr on our hands folks.  Check out this headline:


More fascism.  Except, here's what's actually happening, from the story itself -- about a dozen paragraphs deep:

Before any punishment is meted out, Hanna can have a hearing before an administrative judge, attempt to negotiate a settlement or surrender his license. He said in his statement he has not decided what he will do. Hanna received a letter from Education Commissioner Manny Diaz Jr. earlier this month saying an investigation found probable cause that he violated a 2021 DeSantis directive barring districts from mandating that students wear COVID-19 masks. Hanna required students to wear masks after a Leon third grader died of the disease early that school year. The fight went on for several months until Leon and several other districts had their legal challenge rejected by the courts. Diaz also cited a memo Hanna issued before this school year telling teachers, “You do You!” and to teach the way they always had, allegedly giving instructors approval to ignore new laws enacted by DeSantis and the Legislature. That includes the so-called “Don’t say Gay” law, which supporters call the “Parental Rights in Education Act.”

If you only read the headline and the story's first ten grafs or so, you'd think this school superintendent was under disciplinary action because he views the world differently from Gov. Ron DeSantis. Only deep into the story do you learn that this rogue official engaged in forced masking of students for months after that anti-science action was made unlawful in the state, ultimately losing in court. And he's also suggested to teachers in the district that they may ignore duly-enacted laws from the legislature.  That's why today's phony anti-DeSantis hero/martyr is similar to the other examples cited above.  He and his media supporters are trying to frame the controversy as freedom vs authoritarianism, when in fact it's an individual facing consequences for clearly inappropriate or illegal actions.  Meanwhile, leftists -- most of whom are rooting for another opponent in 2024 -- are sharing a clip of the Florida governor hammering a reporter in Israel for citing the claims of terrorists to press him about his role as an officer at the Guantanamo Bay detention center years ago.  The detractors say DeSantis 'snaps' at the journalist and 'loses his cool,' proving that he's a 'paper tiger' who isn't 'ready for prime time,' or whatever:


Others aren't so sure about this assessment:


And some conservatives have eagerly amplified the clip because, well, they see DeSantis as winning the exchange:

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Let's examine a number of other Florida references currently in the news, further reinforcing the Left's fixation on lying about it.  This one is a doozy:


And Randi Weingarten's shameless gaslighting this week is usefully disproven by her previous anti-Florida pronouncements, driven by the same fanatical partisan hatred that is featured throughout this post:


Seems like the "fact checkers" at Democrat-aligned Politifact are busy with other things.  They haven't found the time to scrutinize a single claim from Weingarten in about a decade, even as her influence on policy hit new, harmful, unavoidable highs over the last few years.  I'll leave you with one more Florida-related point.  On Special Report last night, liberal commentator Leslie Marshall claimed that DeSantis' battle with Disney is unpopular, disagreeing with my assessment that it has significant political upside for him, especially in a Republican primary.  I'm not sure she's right about that: