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.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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”.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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'
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...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.
Continue reading...A rigid anti-vaccine stance among Trump’s supporters means Republicans can’t reap the benefits of Operation Warp Speed
She is fiercely loyal to Donald Trump. But when the former US president came to her home city and praised coronavirus vaccines, Flora Moore did something she never thought possible. She booed him.
“He said take the vaccine but we all booed and said no,” she recalled of Trump’s event with broadcaster Bill O’Reilly in Orlando, Florida. “He heard us loud and clear because the Amway Center was packed. We let him know ‘no’ and a couple of us even hollered out, ‘It’s killing people!’”
Continue reading...Opponents say the governor leans on ‘wokeness’ and culture war issues that are irrelevant to the real needs of Floridians
There are still almost 10 months until Florida’s voters elect their next governor, but the campaign of the Republican incumbent, Ron DeSantis, appears well under way.
In a red-meat-for-the-base address at the opening of Florida’s legislature last week, themed around the concept of “freedom” but described by critics as a fanfare of authoritarianism, DeSantis gave a clear indication of the issues he believes are on voters’ minds. They include fighting the White House over Covid-19, ballot box fraud, critical race theory in schools and defunding law enforcement.
Continue reading...Governor DeSantis’s ‘soft-on-Covid approach’ makes the classroom too dangerous for immuno-compromised children
The only place nine-year-old Reefy Kinder wants to be is in school with her friends. She has missed so many lessons in six years battling a long-term gastro-intestinal condition, including more than 30 surgeries during many months as an inpatient at Orlando’s Arnold Palmer children’s hospital, that she figures she has a lot to catch up on.
Standing in her way, according to Reefy and her mother, Jamie, are Florida’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, and his handpicked new state surgeon general Joseph Ladapo, an opponent of mask mandates who believes vaccines are no more effective than eating healthily and losing weight in the fight against Covid-19.
Continue reading...Dr Joseph Ladapo attacked concern over the pandemic as ‘Covid mania’
A medical professor who is opposed to mask and vaccine mandates, attacked concern over the pandemic as “Covid mania” and likened the eating of fruit and vegetables to the benefits of vaccination has been named as Florida’s new surgeon general.
Dr Joseph Ladapo has been appointed to the role by Ron DeSantis, Florida’s Republican governor who has railed against restrictions placed upon day-to-day life to dampen the Covid-19 pandemic and has sought to block funding for schools in the state that have attempted to make students wear masks to stop the spread of the virus that has killed more than 675,000 people in the US since the pandemic began.
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