For all the talk about Gov. Ron DeSantis “rebooting” his struggling presidential campaign, it’s tough not to notice that the new version of the Florida Republican looks an awful lot like the old version. NBC News reported on the governor’s latest provocative move:
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has once again suspended an elected local prosecutor, a move that comes as his presidential campaign struggles amid a continued reset. DeSantis on Tuesday suspended Orlando-area State Attorney Monique Worrell, a Democrat who is the only Black woman serving as a local prosecutor in Florida.
If this sounds at all familiar, it’s not your imagination. It was a year ago this week when the Republican governor suspended Hillsborough County State Attorney Andrew Warren, complaining that the local prosecutor wasn’t prosecuting the kind of culture war cases DeSantis wanted to see.
A Tampa Bay Times report noted at the time that DeSantis’ order suspending the state attorney did not cite “any specific examples of Warren not prosecuting individual cases, pointing instead to Warren’s public comments on abortion, transgender issues and office policies Warren has adopted.”
The newspaper’s editorial board added that the governor’s move was “politically craven, legally suspect, suspiciously timed and odorously soaked in autocracy, partisanship and bad faith.” Under a headline that reminded DeSantis that he isn’t “the king of Florida,” the Times went on to characterize the suspension as a “gross abuse of power.”
The criticisms were well grounded. DeSantis had already been accused of authoritarian pursuits, and this didn’t help matters. The people of Hillsborough County elected Warren more than once. The governor could’ve tried to help elect a rival candidate in the next election, but instead, DeSantis took it up on himself to suspend the prosecutor and install someone else that he preferred.
In effect, the governor told Hillsborough County voters, “Sure, you may have chosen a state attorney through the democratic process, but I think I know better.”
Making matters worse, a New York Times report noted while DeSantis said his move against Warren was necessary in the interests of “public safety,” the claim was completely baseless: “Mr. DeSantis and his advisers had failed to find a connection between Mr. Warren’s policies and public safety in his community.”
In fact, the Times added that the Republican’s lawyers lamented the fact that they couldn’t find anything in the local crime statistics to justify the local prosecutor’s suspension.
DeSantis suspended the state attorney anyway.
Almost exactly a year later, DeSantis has now done it again, suspending Worrell, the state attorney of Florida’s Ninth Judicial Circuit, which includes Orange and Osceola counties.
Worrell, like Warren, was elected to her position. Evidently, the governor doesn’t much care.
There’s no great mystery surrounding the Republican’s motivations. The governor’s presidential campaign is clearly struggling, leading DeSantis to introduce his new campaign manager yesterday. A day later, Team DeSantis threw together a hastily arranged press conference, and announced the suspension of a Democratic state attorney — who also happens to be Florida’s only Black woman serving as a local prosecutor.
Coming soon to a campaign stump speech near you.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.
