Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has said his anti-lockdown policies in Florida helped prevent America from looking “like Canada or Australia”. The Telegraph has the story.
Addressing an enthusiastic crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) – a proving ground for all presidential contenders – Mr. DeSantis touted his handling of the pandemic as Florida’s Governor.
Describing his anti-vaccine [sic], anti-mask agenda, he celebrated his defiance of “health bureaucrats”.
“We led early on when the weight of the world was coming bearing down,” he said to cheers from the crowd, some of whom wore capes and carried flags reading “DeSantis Land”.
He added: “I really believe had Florida not led the way, this country could look like Canada or Australia”, referencing the two countries’ strict coronavirus restrictions during the pandemic.
At another point, he said: “People look to Florida as a citadel of freedom who are chafing under authoritarian rule all over the world.”
Senator Ted Cruz also stressed his opposition to public health authoritarianism and alarmism in his address to the conference.
Mr. Cruz, who ran against Mr. Trump in 2016, began his speech by declaring the country was at “an existential moment” with “a battle between power and liberty” playing out in conflicts across the U.S.
“We are seeing it every day: vaccine mandates versus doctors and nurses; mask mandates versus kids in school; Spotify versus Joe Rogan; GoFundMe versus Canadian truckers,” he said.
As he celebrated Canada’s trucker-led protests, Mr. Cruz railed against the country’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
At the mention of Mr. Trudeau’s name the crowd booed loudly, to which Mr. Cruz joked: “That is the first time in recorded history that any Canadian has ever elicited that response from a crowd on planet Earth.”
Ron DeSantis is indeed one of the heroes of the last two years. Despite going along with the lockdowns initially, he was unafraid to reassess them following the first wave, listening to the evidence presented by scientists outside the new pandemic orthodoxy. As a result, his state provided a control group for evaluating the effectiveness of the draconian policies being implemented elsewhere – showing them to be unnecessary and ineffective – as well as an inspiration and example to follow.
Worth reading in full.
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