Scott Maxwell: Power grab. DeSantis got a militia and now wants to control sports, schools, more

Ron DeSantis’ lust for power isn’t any secret. It’s one of the things his fans like most about him.

He created an election-crimes police force. He has removed public officials from local office — even if they were duly elected and not accused of any crimes — so he could replace them with own hand-picked associates. He created his own state militia.

But apparently that’s just the tip of DeSantis’ power-grab desires.

New records obtained by the Sentinel and other watchdog outlets in Florida show the DeSantis administration has also drafted plans to take control of everything from state universities to the association that controls high school sports.

Some people say Ron DeSantis wants to be president if his political godfather, Donald Trump, allows him to run. Really, though, it looks like he wants to be king.

In one of the more brazen schemes, which the Sentinel reported on last week, DeSantis wants to seize the power to hire faculty members away from university presidents and give it to trustee boards controlled by the governor’s personal, political appointees.

The drafted bill says trustees would become “responsible for hiring faculty;” that the president can make recommendations but that “the board shall approve or deny any selection by the president.”

Think about what that means: Your kid’s next history professor might not be chosen by the dean of the department or by anyone who has any expertise whatsoever in history or education. Instead, that decision could rest with a developer who rounded up $100,000 in donations for the governor’s last campaign. Or some evolution-denying, QAnon-espousing quack.

You don’t need me to tell you what a mess political appointees can make. Virtually every major scandal at Orlando’s toll-road or airport authority in recent years has come from gubernatorial appointees. This plan would put that crony-empowering model on steroids.

Another one of the drafted plans, a copy of which was obtained by the Seeking Rents investigative website, would give the governor more power to remove other elected officials from office — an authoritarian dream come true.

There’s already precedent for this one. Both Rick Scott and Ron DeSantis have removed local officials from office, even when those officials weren’t accused of any crime.

In one case, DeSantis removed the Broward County sheriff from office, even though a special master retained by the Legislature concluded DeSantis had acted improperly.

I was no fan of the Broward sheriff either. But, as the special master suggested, it didn’t really matter what I or any other pundit or politician thought, because the sheriff had been legally elected. And the proper remedy for getting rid of any duly elected official is for voters to throw him or her out of office in the next election.

Yet the governor seems interested in bolstering his removal-from-office powers with a bill draft that would allow him to more easily remove elected school board members for who-knows-what ideological or political reason.

Think about how you’d react if you read about a leader in Cuba, North Korea or Russia doing something like this — deciding to simply overrule the results of a properly held election simply because he wanted the winner out of office.

Neither of the above-mentioned plans came to fruition last year. But others did. And these drafted ideas could certainly come back next year — before GOP legislators who rarely display the spine or fortitude to challenge the governor. Even when DeSantis vetoed these legislators’ priority projects, they would saunter up on stage with him and sing his praises, much like the paddled pledges in “Animal House.” (Thank you, sir. May I have another?)

Other power-grab ideas drafted or discussed by the DeSantis administration would give him more control over a toll-road authority in South Florida and less oversight from the Florida Cabinet.

Another wouldn’t necessarily give the governor more power; it would just strip power from the citizens by making it nearly impossible for voters to pass future constitutional amendments.

Yet another would give him an iron grip over the state’s high school athletic association by allowing him to appoint virtually all the board’s governing members. That way, the governor wouldn’t have to worry about the association contradicting him on things like allowing transgender athletes to play sports.

That last one is part of the theme here. DeSantis is masterful at convincing his base that boogeymen are coming after them and that he needs more power to fight off the perceived or fictionalized threat.

Somebody is trying to steal your election. Or turn your kid gay. Or riot in your neighborhood. Or make you feel guilty for being white. So he needs more power to protect you. Fear and division can be frenetic motivators.

It’s been said before that power can’t be given away; only seized. I disagree. Voters allow that power to be taken when they enable the very politicians trying to take it.

Most patriotic Americans, including true conservatives, believe in checks and balances. They’ve seen the bad things that happen in countries when one power-hungry politician has too much sway. So Floridians will have a very direct say on how much power they want to cede from themselves and give to the governor when they decide who they want to send to Tallahassee this fall.

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