‘Death by DeSantis’: Wasserman Schultz blames governor for Florida’s COVID surge

U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz says two factors help explain the dramatic increase in Florida’s COVID-19 cases: Gov. Ron DeSantis’ cavalier attitude and the spread of vaccine misinformation on Facebook.

Mainly, Wasserman Schultz told a national CNN audience, “the blame lies at [DeSantis’] feet.”

Christina Pushaw, the governor’s press secretary, said the “claims by Congresswoman Wasserman Schultz are shockingly misinformed.”

Coronavirus cases in Florida have recently soared. As of July 14, the state leads the country with 21.4% of all new COVID cases. The state is home to 6.5% of the U.S. population.

DeSantis

Wasserman Schultz, appearing Sunday on “CNN Newsroom With Pamela Brown,” placed blame on DeSantis: “What I think explains the high infection rate is that we have a governor who has not taken COVID seriously from the very beginning. You know, he is essentially right now treating it like a joke. He’s got campaign merchandise on his Web site saying ‘Don’t Fauci My Florida.’ And we’ve had nearly 40,000 Floridians die of COVID.

“And look, I would rather see us ‘Fauci our Florida’ than have people go through death by DeSantis. And that’s what we’re facing right now,” Wasserman Schultz said.

The Broward/Miami-Dade County congresswoman has been a consistent critic of DeSantis’ handling of the pandemic. The governor, up for re-election in 2022 and expected to run for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024, has sought to brand himself as the potential candidate most closely aligned with former President Donald Trump — in both style and substance — with priorities that appeal to the Republican base in Florida and the rest of the country.

He has touted Florida as an “oasis of freedom” from coronavirus restrictions.

Wasserman Schultz faulted DeSantis for banning local governments from implementing mask mandates and social distancing requirements as they did in the early days of the pandemic to curb the spread of the virus.

“You just can’t make this up. So that’s where the blame lies. At his feet,” she said.

Pushaw said DeSantis has predicted for months that cases would rise in the summer in Florida and other southern states. “I told people months ago, we would see higher prevalence because it’s a seasonal virus and this is the seasonal pattern that it, that it follows in the Sunbelt states, particularly in Florida,” DeSantis said Monday.

Still, he said, the state is in a better place than it was last summer.

Facebook and FOX

Wasserman Schultz didn’t go as far as President Joe Biden, who said Friday about platforms like Facebook where false or misleading vaccine information spreads: “They’re killing people.” Facebook said Saturday that the Biden Administration should stop “finger pointing” and said it’s done a lot to spread accurate information about the benefits of vaccination.

Wasserman Schultz said “the spread of disinformation like it’s spreading rampant on Facebook” needs to stop.

“Facebook needs to do a lot more, and our social media companies need to do a lot more, to take down these disinformation websites, take down the false information that their own algorithms allow to spread” because anti-vaccine “disinformation spreads much faster” than accurate information, she said.

But she didn’t directly answer host Brown’s questions about whether she agrees with the president that Facebook is killing people.

“I agree that Facebook has a responsibility to much more aggressively change their algorithms, so that disinformation about COVID does not spread faster than the truth spreads, and they need to have a much more aggressive takedown policy than they do, and they need to be held accountable for the damage that their algorithm does when it comes to disinformation,” she said. “So yes, I think there is a line that is drawn directly from their spread — their allowing the spread of disinformation on COVID to people losing their lives.”

Vaccination

Wasserman Schultz said DeSantis “likes to take credit for things. And so, you know, you can’t take credit for the good things and then not be accountable for the things that aren’t going so well.” Consequently, she said, DeSantis needs to take responsibility for his decisions, such as his signing a law banning requiring proof of vaccinations.

“When we’re now facing the largest rise in the country, then, you know, the responsibility lies with you,” she said.

Wasserman Schultz called on DeSantis to “exercise his leadership and use his bully pulpit to encourage people to get vaccinated.” DeSantis has touted vaccination, especially when the vaccines first came out and he was the public face of efforts to get older Florida residents vaccinated if they desired. Like Trump, DeSantis didn’t receive his own shot publicly, and his office hasn’t released an image of him receiving the vaccine.

Florida is one of many states where counties that had the strongest support for Biden in the 2020 election generally have the highest vaccination rates and where counties with the strongest support for former President Donald Trump have the lowest vaccination rates.

DeSantis was first elected on the strength of strong support from Trump and is billing himself as a Trump-like figure as he looks to the 2022 and 2024 elections.

Wasserman Schultz didn’t answer a question about whether vaccines should be mandated. She said people need to be educated about the benefits of vaccines.

Pushaw said by email that Wasserman Schultz is ignoring extensive state efforts to promote vaccination and comments from the governor. “If she were focused on Florida,” Pushaw said, she would be aware of what the state has done.

• First in the nation large-scale canvassing campaigns in which state teams knocked on nearly 1.1 million doors in March, April, and May to answer questions about COVID-19 vaccine, help people identify nearby vaccination sites and pre-register them for appointments.

• Promotional messaging through billboards, radio, social media and TV in several languages.

• Coordination with trusted local leaders to promote vaccination in Black and Hispanic communities.

“Since early 2020, Governor DeSantis has spoken positively about the COVID vaccines at nearly 100 separate public engagements ranging from press conferences to vaccine drives to keynote addresses to television interviews. Over the course of these nearly 100 events or interviews, the Governor has mentioned the vaccines in a positive light hundreds of times,” Pushaw said.

He said on Monday that vaccines are effective but wouldn’t commit to holding more events to promote vaccination.

Anthony Man can be reached at aman@sunsentinel.com or on Twitter @browardpolitics