Morning Joe Crew Melts Down Over Ron DeSantis Suspending Prosecutor: ‘Strongman Tactic’
MSNBC’s Morning Joe blasted Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Friday over his suspension of a prosecutor who said he wouldn’t enforce Florida’s laws against abortion and gender-affirming care for minors.
Co-host Joe Scarborough called Thursday’s move to suspend Hillsborough County State Attorney Andrew Warren a “strongman tactic.”
“For those of you that don’t know, the people elect them. Why did he suspend this guy?” said Scarborough. “Because of what he was thinking. Because of what he said. Not because of any actions he took.”
“For even thinking something and expressing those thoughts. Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, suspended an elected official, a state attorney from another party,” he added. “It is — it’s really — the strongman trend in the Republican party is so frightening.”
National affairs analyst John Heilemann, who referenced DeSantis enacting a parental bill of rights surrounding schools – what critics call the “Don’t Say Gay” law – called the announcement “the kind of thing … you would have seen in the Eastern bloc before the fall of the Berlin wall.”
Scarborough noted that DeSantis blocked taxpayer funds toward a new training facility for the Tampa Bay Rays due to the MLB team speaking out against gun violence in the wake of a spate of recent mass shootings and announcing a $50,000 contribution to the pro-gun control group Everytown for Gun Safety.
“Two things can be true at the same time. You can be attacked by rational people in the media,” he said. “And at the same time, you can do something that’s very bad for the state of Florida, very bad for American democracy and, ultimately, hold on, wait for it, ‘cause you guys aren’t getting it, I keep warning you, Republicans, let me tell you as well, it can be bad for American democracy and bad for your own future political careers.”
“Could be,” snickered co-host Mika Brzezinski.
“This is the sort of — I really want to say the word, I won’t say it — this is the sort of stuff that always circles back around and gets you in voting booths,” said Scarborough. “So good luck with that.”
After playing soundbites of DeSantis’ announcement and Warren’s reaction to it, Scarborough called DeSantis “a dope.”
“He didn’t even wait for any action to take place. And he’s doing the same thing that these freaks and insurrectionists and weirdos are doing, that are putting the lives of 10-year-old girls who have been raped at risk. Who are saying that uncle that raped 14-year-old girls, that’s a perfect example of why they have to force the 14-year-old to have the baby,” said Scarborough, referring to the Jan. 6 attack at the U.S. Capitol and the recent case of a girl in Ohio who was pregnant as a result of rape, and had to go to Indiana to get an abortion since there’s no abortion exception for rape in Ohio.
Scarborough said:
Ron DeSantis is doing all of this crazy stuff in a state that, not so long ago, was a swing state, and he is doing it hurting Florida, going to war with Mickey Mouse, going to war with the Tampa Bay Rays, going to war with the voters of the state of Florida, nullifying their votes for a guy who’s been elected twice now, all to appeal to, like, 20 percent of Americans who may be voting in Republican primaries in presidential elections.
Brzezinski quoted a Tampa Bay Times editorial slamming DeSantis’ suspension, calling it “politically craven, legally suspect, suspiciously timed, and odorously soaked in autocracy, partisanship, and bad faith — in other words, completely in keeping with this governor’s behavior. The governor’s 10-page order is a political smear job, full of what-ifs and supposition that would be laughed out of court.”
Watch above, via MSNBC.
