California Governor Gavin Newsom went on the attack at his primetime Fox News debate against Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, slamming the Sunshine State for purportedly having “the equivalent of ten 9/11’s” due to its management of the Covid pandemic response.
The crux of the debate, for those who fortunately missed out on the Covid pandemic, was that Governor Ron DeSantis purportedly put the state’s population at risk by shunning Covid vaccine mandates, mask mandates, and lockdowns before many of the other state governors in the United States.
Newsom, famously, continued to declare emergency powers throughout the pandemic and presided over a number of controversial policies, even allowing localities like San Francisco to pass constitutionally dubious policies like Covid vaccine passports.
On Thursday, Newsom unloaded on DeSantis with a doozy of an accusation.
“Let’s talk about Covid. Let’s talk about your record on Covid,” Newsom said heatedly.
“You passed an emergency declaration before the State of California did. You closed down your beaches, your bars, your restaurants…”
“False,” DeSantis interjected.
“It’s a fact,” Newsom insisted. “You had quarantines…”
“False,” DeSantis again rebutted.
“You had checkpoints all over the State of Florida. By the way, I didn’t say that Donald Trump laid you out on this dead to right. You did that,” the California Governor claimed.
“Not true,” DeSantis coolly retorted.
“You followed science. You followed Fauci,” Newsom argued.
“That’s not true…”
“You were promoting vaccines,” Newsom continued on.
The crosstalk was interrupted by the host Sean Hannity, before Newsom carried on.
“He did all of that until he decided to fall prey to the fringe of his party,” Newsom argued. “And as a consequence of that, Ron, tens of thousands of people lost their lives.”
“Not true,” DeSantis shot back.
“The equivalent, if I had your policies, the equivalent of ten 9/11s, tens of thousands of people lost their lives. And for what, Ron?” Newsom scolded, apparently proud of his duplicitous attacks.
But his smug moralizing was short-lived, since he was soon to get an embarrassing fact-check.
“Those are more lies,” DeSantis replied. “In fact, the Lancet just did a study. Florida had a lower standardized Covid death rate than California did. That’s a Lancet study.”
In a recent L.A. Times article, it gave the “surprising” answer about what state did better in managing the Covid pandemic response.
A third analysis, published in the medical journal the Lancet earlier this year, looked at COVID-19 death rates through the end of July 2022 and calculated Florida as having a 43% worse unadjusted death rate than California. But when adjusted for differences in age, the gap was narrower — with a 12% worse death rate in Florida. When also factoring in how Florida’s population as a whole is unhealthier than California, in addition to the age adjustment, the roles reversed and California had a 34% worse adjusted death rate.
“Got one more thing,” he continued. “One more thing.”
“The other thing, California had, California had higher excess mortality,” DeSantis said.
This is the rhetorical equivalent of throwing down “black jack” at a poker game. Excess mortality over time is the single best metric for judging pandemic policies, because it captures so many different factors that can be extrapolated into valuable insights.
DeSantis then laid down the hammer with the critical point: How Florida endeavored to retain the maximum amount of freedom under the challenging conditions and strived to preserve constitutional rights.
“The stats are very clear. On a per capita age adjusted basis, California and Florida, basically the same. Now, why is that important?” he asked rhetorically.
“Because Gavin Newsom did huge damage to people in California. He ruined livelihoods. We reopened the state very quickly. We saved thousands of jobs. We saved hundreds, hundreds of thousands of jobs, thousands of businesses. We had our kids in school,” he continued.
“He had the kids locked out of school because of the teacher’s union. That is having a generational impact. California has one of the lowest literacy rates in the country. And the most recent Nape exam, Florida came in number three for fourth grade reading. California was far, far behind. So you should apologize for not getting your kids in school.”
That would be game, set, and match. Newsom went on offense against DeSantis, but wound up getting burned.
This primetime debate moment between DeSantis and Newsom provided a much-needed illumination of the nation’s disastrous Covid policies. It comes in the aftermath of a tyrannical pandemic response whose lessons Americans are still struggling to understand.
So, newsome still believes 9/11 was caused by terrorists using box cutters and planes? tens of thousands? Really? These statements are being pulled out of his ass because he has nothing of substance to attack DeSantis with. He’s an ignorant shell of a human being born into money but no brains. He’s an embarrassment every time he opens his mouth.