Category Archives: Ron DeSantis

Aviation company used for migrant flights contributed to DeSantis allies

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Vertol Systems Inc also has connections to a Florida official in charge of its current immigration policy

The transportation service company that the Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, used to arrange flights for migrants to Martha’s Vineyard has contributed money to the governor’s top allies and has connections to a Florida official in charge of its immigration policy.

Vertol Systems Inc, an Oregon-based aviation company that DeSantis used to fly asylum seekers to the affluent, liberal-leaning Massachusetts island, has connections to DeSantis’s political allies and has donated money to various campaigns, NBC News reported.

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Advocates for migrants who were sent to Martha’s Vineyard sue Ron DeSantis

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Suit says Venezuelans were ‘used as political pawns’ in a ‘fraudulent and discriminatory’ scheme

Attorneys representing the Venezuelan migrants and refugees allegedly duped into flying to the wealthy island of Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts have filed a class-action civil rights lawsuit against the Florida governor and other state officials.

Lawyers for Civil Rights (LCR), a Boston-based legal advocacy group, filed the lawsuit on Tuesday challenging what it called the “fraudulent and discriminatory” scheme to charter private planes to transport almost 50 vulnerable people, including children as young as two, from San Antonio, Texas, via Florida, to Martha’s Vineyard last week without liaising to arrange shelter and other resources.

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Florida governor suspends school board quartet over Parkland shooting report

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Ron DeSantis acts on recommendation in report from grand jury investigating 2018 shooting in which 17 people were killed

The governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, on Friday suspended four members of the Broward county school board, acting on a recommendation in a report from a grand jury investigating the 2018 Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school shooting in which 17 people were killed.

In a statement accompanying his executive order, DeSantis said: “It is my duty to suspend people from office when there is clear evidence of incompetence, neglect of duty, misfeasance or malfeasance.”

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Florida: Charlie Crist wins Democratic primary to challenge Ron DeSantis

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Former Republican governor who became a Democratic congressman edges out Nikki Fried to face the Donald Trump protégé in November

Charlie Crist will challenge Florida’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, in November after trouncing Nikki Fried, the state agriculture commissioner, in Tuesday’s Democratic primary.

Crist, a former Republican governor of Florida who switched parties and became a Democratic congressman, fought a campaign touting his experience in office and opposition to the 15-week abortion ban signed by DeSantis.

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Florida officials arrest and charge 20 people with illegal voting, DeSantis says

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Move designed to show muscle of a new office tasked with policing voting in the state and comes days before primary election

Florida officials have arrested and charged 20 people with felony convictions and charged them with illegal voting, Florida governor Ron DeSantis said on Thursday, a move designed to show the muscle of a new office tasked with policing voting in the state.

The announcement came just days before the state’s primary election and as early voting is under way. DeSantis, flanked by law enforcement, said the 20 people were charged with voting in Broward, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties, some of the most Democratic in the state.

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Newsom airs Florida ad urging people to fight for freedom – or move to California

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‘Freedom is under attack in your state,’ California governor says in ad paid for by his re-election campaign that aired on Fox News

Governor Gavin Newsom of California has aired a commercial in Florida over the Fourth of July holiday weekend urging residents there to fight for freedom, or move to his state in order to find it.

The ad – which pits blue state California against currently red state Florida – exemplified the growing divides in the US as Republican-led state legislatures have pursued rightwing policies on a slew of issues from banning abortion to attacking LGBTQ+ rights and voting issues.

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Ron DeSantis blocks funds for Tampa Bay Rays after team’s gun safety tweets

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  • Florida governor defends vetoing funds for training facility
  • Rays had joined Yankees in tweeting about gun safety

The governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, has defended his veto of $35m in funding for a potential spring training site for the Tampa Bay Rays, after the Major League Baseball team used social media to raise awareness about gun violence after mass shootings in Buffalo, New York and Uvalde, Texas.

“I don’t support giving taxpayer dollars to professional sports stadiums,” DeSantis said on Friday, when asked about the veto of the sports complex funding.

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Florida supreme court declines to rule gerrymandered voting map unconstitutional

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Governor Ron DeSantis’ map dismantles the state’s largely Black fifth congressional district into four new ones

Florida’s supreme court has declined to hear a request to rule on whether the state’s new congressional map was unconstitutional, a decision that means it will probably be more difficult for Black voters in north Florida to elect their preferred candidates to represent them.

The state’s congressional map, drawn by Governor Ron DeSantis, dismantles the state’s fifth congressional district, which stretches from Jacksonville to Tallahassee and is 46% Black.

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Ron DeSantis signs bill to create Florida voter-fraud police force

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Republican governor embraces top priority of his party, following Donald Trump’s false claims that his 2020 re-election was stolen

Florida governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill Monday to create a police force dedicated to pursuing voter fraud and other election crimes, embracing a top priority of Republicans after Donald Trump’s false claims that his reelection was stolen.

DeSantis, who is running for reelection and considered a potential 2024 Republican presidential candidate, made voting legislation a focus this year, pushing the Republican-controlled Legislature to create the policing unit in a speech where he referenced unspecified cases of voter fraud, which have become popular talking points in his party.

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‘Democracy in Florida is not functioning.’ Governor’s rigged maps rob Black voters of power

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Governor Ron DeSantis’s redistricting gambit means ‘for all intents and purposes, there’s currently … one-man rule’, says one former GOP strategist

As Florida Republicans gave final approval to new congressional districts on Thursday, Black lawmakers staged a sit-in on the floor of the legislature, praying, chanting and singing that Black voters were under attack in the state.

The extraordinary moment served as a remarkable endpoint to a brazen attack by the Republican governor, Ron DeSantis.

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Biden: Republicans’ Disney law shows ‘far right has taken over party’

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Florida strips company of self-governing power for opposing Governor Ron DeSantis’s ‘don’t say gay’ law

For Joe Biden, the vote by Florida Republicans on Thursday to strip Disney of its self-governing powers was a step too far.

“Christ, they’re going after Mickey Mouse,” the president exclaimed at a fundraiser in Oregon, in apparent disbelief that state governor Ron DeSantis’s culture wars had reached the gates of the Magic Kingdom.

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Disney to lose special tax status for opposing Florida’s ‘don’t say gay’ bill

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Governor Ron DeSantis is set to sign bill revoking 1967 law allowing Disney to self-govern a roughly 25,000-acre Orlando area

Florida legislators passed a bill on Thursday that would revoke Walt Disney Co’s special tax status in a move widely seen as tit-for-tat for the company’s opposition to a new “don’t say gay” state law limiting discussion of LGBTQ+ issues in schools.

The bill now heads to the desk of Governor Ron DeSantis, who is all but guaranteed to sign it.

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Florida Republicans pass congressional map severely limiting Black voter power

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Plan drawn by Ron DeSantis gives Republicans a significant boost and is one of the most aggressively gerrymandered maps in US

Florida Republicans approved a new congressional map that severely curtails Black voting power in the state on Thursday, taking a final vote as Black lawmakers staged a sit-in on the floor of the legislature.

The new plan, which was drawn by Governor Ron DeSantis, gives Republicans a significant boost in the state and is one of the most aggressively gerrymandered maps passed in recent months. Republicans would be expected to win 20 of the state’s 28 congressional districts, a four seat increase from the 16 they hold now. It also eliminates two of four districts where Black voters have been able to elect the candidate of their choice.

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Florida rejects 54 math textbooks over ‘prohibited topics’ including critical race theory

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Move follows a series of hardline measures by Republicans in the state to alter teaching in schools as governor welcomes news

Florida’s education department has rejected 54 mathematics textbooks from next year’s school curriculum, citing alleged references to critical race theory among a range of reasoning for some of the rejections, officials announced.

The department said in a news release Friday that some of the books had been rejected for failure to comply with the state’s content standards, Benchmarks for Excellent Student Thinking [Best], but that 21% of the books were disallowed “because they incorporate prohibited topics or unsolicited strategies, including CRT”.

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DeSantis takes on Disney in latest battle in the Republican culture war

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Florida’s governor is unhappy that Disney has opposed his ‘don’t say gay’ bill –and is threatening to revoke its privileges

It took a single stroke of Ron DeSantis’s pen, passing Florida’s so-called “don’t say gay” bill into law, to transform the self-proclaimed happiest place on earth into a scene of bitter conflict.

Disney’s theme parks have become the latest battlefront in the pugnacious rightwing Republican governor’s culture war on what he calls “wokeness”, and on the state’s LBGTQ+ community. DeSantis, a close Trump ally, and perhaps rival, is threatening sanctions on the corporate behemoth after it dared to challenge the controversial law banning discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity in classrooms.

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Florida governor Ron DeSantis signs ‘don’t say gay’ bill into law

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Measure bars teaching about sexual orientation and gender identity from kindergarten through third grade

The Republican governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, has signed into law a bill that forbids instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade, a policy that has drawn intense national scrutiny from critics who argue it risks marginalizing LGBTQ+ people.

LGBTQ+ advocates, students, Democrats, the entertainment industry and the White House have denounced what critics have called the “don’t say gay” bill. The issue has led to a clash between DeSantis and Disney, a major player in the Florida tourism industry.

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‘Don’t Say Gay’: Disney clashes with DeSantis over Florida bill

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Entertainment giant suspends political donations as CEO apologises for silence and governor hits back with ‘communist’ barb

The Walt Disney Company is suspending political donations in Florida after its chief executive suffered huge blowback for not using the company’s vast influence in the state to try to quash a Republican bill that would stop teachers instructing early grades on LGBTQ+ issues.

The bill has sparked a spat between the tourism giant and the Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, who accused the company of being friendly with communist China.

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Florida governor Ron DeSantis scolds students for wearing masks – video

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Ron DeSantis had strong words for a group of students at the University of South Florida who were wearing face masks before a press conference. The Republican governor for Florida asked them to take their masks off, saying it was 'Covid theater'

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Trump ignores Farage – and risks midterm elections farrago – with insistence on big lie

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Analysis: His British friend tried to help but the former president did not want to forget his voter fraud obsession and focus on the future. CPAC loved it but Republicans hoping to take Congress know they are courting disaster

The sagest advice given to Donald Trump all week came from a man who is neither a Republican nor an American.

Nigel Farage, the British politician, broadcaster and demagogue whose Brexit campaign coincided with Trump’s rise to power, warned his old pal against endlessly fixating on the 2020 election.

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Republicans who opposed racial justice protests hope truckers ‘clog up’ US cities

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Lawmakers including Ron Paul and Ron DeSantis say they would back disruption of a Canadian-style trucker convoy

In the wake of racial justice protests following the murder of George Floyd, a wave of Republican lawmakers supported legislation to punish protesters who blocked roads. Now some of those same Republicans are supporting similar tactics from conservative trucker convoys protesting against vaccine mandates.

Last year, the Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, signed an anti-rioting law that stiffened penalties for protesters who blocked roads and even gave some legal protection to drivers who ran them over. It went so far that in September a federal judge struck down the law, ruling it unconstitutional.

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