Florida Governor Ron DeSantis overturned the will of the majority of Hillsborough County voters (Tampa, etc.) this morning, suspending the twice-elected Democratic State Attorney Andrew Warren. Not coincidentally, Warren has criticized DeSantis’s many power grabs, including a so-called anti-riot law enacted in the wake of the largely peaceful protests of George Floyd’s murder. Warren called the anti-riot law an infringement on the right to peaceful protest and “a solution in search of a problem.”
Warren also criticized the “Don’t Say Gay” law and has said that the new abortion restrictions DeSantis signed into law run afoul of the state constitution’s privacy provision, which has been successfully used to defend abortion rights in the past. So, obviously, Warren had to go.
How seriously does the DeSantis administration take the governor’s obligation to all Floridians, not just the 49.6% who voted for him in 2018? The governor’s press secretary, who functions as DeSantis’s taxpayer-funded internet troll to the tune of $120K per year, teased the announcement last night as if it were a Fox Nation segment from Dollar Store-brand Tucker Carlson:
They kind of give it away when they say ahead of time that the whole purpose of whatever nutty new policy or declaration is solely designed to trigger or own the libs. Governance by trolls. Desantis’s Troll Secretary … pic.twitter.com/TV0XtSIOwB
— Ron Filipkowski 🇺🇦 (@RonFilipkowski) August 4, 2022
DeSantis announced Warren’s suspension after some warm-up acts by local yahoo sheriffs. They and DeSantis went heavy on the ooga-booga. From The Tampa Bay Times:
DeSantis said Thursday that the decision to suspend Warren began when he noticed prosecutors in Los Angeles and San Francisco selectively enforcing crimes. He said he asked his staff to look around Florida “to make sure that that was not going to happen here.”
After his staff spoke with police and prosecutors, Warren’s name repeatedly came up, DeSantis said.
“It all came back to this area here, in the 13th Judicial Circuit in Hillsborough County,” DeSantis said. “And the response that we got was a lot of frustration on the part of law enforcement for criminals being let go and crimes not being prosecuted.”
DeSantis’ order does 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.
So, corrupt Republican (but I repeat myself) sheriffs complained about Warren, and DeSantis pounced. He’s following the authoritarian playbook, making an example of a state official to intimidate the others, just as he persecuted Walt Disney World to cow other businesses, suspended a public health official who urged his staff to get a COVID vax and withheld funding from school districts for enforcing mask mandates.
Why did DeSantis and the dirty cops who spoke on his behalf decide today was the day to bring the hammer down on Warren? Maybe it was this:
In 2018, Warren established a conviction review unit in the Hillsborough State Attorney’s Office. Not long after, evidence submitted to the unit by the Innocence Project led a judge to throw out the conviction of Robert DuBoise, a man who had been wrongfully imprisoned for 37 years… Warren was poised to make a major announcement related to the case on Thursday, but DeSantis’ announcement scuttled those plans.
DeSantis and his comms staff described Warren as “Soros-backed,” a shopworn anti-Semitic dog-whistle that the aforementioned Pushaw has been widely criticized for using. That must have thrilled the Nazi supporters and assorted other fascist DeSantis fans who are increasingly emboldened to march around the state. Here’s Warren’s statement:
Today’s political stunt is an illegal overreach that continues a dangerous pattern by Ron DeSantis of using his office to further his own political ambition. It spits in the face of the voters of Hillsborough County who have twice elected me to serve them, not Ron DeSantis.
In our community, crime is low, our Constitutional rights—including the right to privacy—are being upheld, and the people have the right to elect their own leaders—not have them dictated by an aspiring presidential candidate who has shown time and again he feels accountable to no one.
Just because the governor violates your rights, it doesn’t mean they don’t exist.
Amen to that.
I hope Pushaw’s wishes come true and that this does attract widespread media coverage, especially on the choice issue. DeSantis is cross-wise with Florida voters on abortion, which is probably why he nonsensically mentioned crime rates on the West Coast and surrounded himself with sycophantic sheriffs to justify the latest authoritarian stunt. Voters better wake the fuck up before it’s too late.
Open thread.
Tom Levenson
Is there a next step? Can Warren refuse the suspension–as in, can he assert or litigate that the gov. doesn’t have this power?
WaterGirl
@Tom Levenson: That’s a lot more constructive than my first reactions, which were:
Wow. And then.. Fuck.
No respect for rule of law.
OzarkHillbilly
I can’t say what I want to say.
Betty Cracker
@Tom Levenson: I assume he can appeal it, but I don’t know how that works.
Old School
Not sure why The Tampa Bay Times article makes a point of saying that murders in Tampa during 2021 are the highest since 1994.
What does that have to do with Andrew Warren? Is he a serial killer?
HinTN
November is your “wake the fuck up” opportunity. As you say, DeSantis didn’t win by much the last time. Maybe sailing against the tide wil get him, that and Val Demings’ run at Liddle Marco. Good Luck! We’re just screwed here in Tennessee.
Roger Moore
@Betty Cracker:
I’m not sure the exact process, but I assume it ends with the Florida Supreme Court kissing DeSantis’s ass and proclaiming him supreme dictator for life. At least that’s the impression I’ve gotten of the state Supreme Court’s degree of independence.
Betty Cracker
Back when DeSantis was fighting to ensure every Floridian had the opportunity to catch COVID, Pushaw put out a weird tweet criticizing the Republic of Georgia for allowing restaurants, etc., to use “green passes” to screen for COVID:
The Rothschilds. Soros. Hmmm.
trollhattan
Post doesn’t include this DeSantis gem, which kind of ties the whole
roomshitshow together in an ironic bow.“Not a government of men, except for this guy” [thumbs aimed back at the Gov]
trollhattan
@HinTN: I’m just flabbergasted they can’t come up with somebody besides Crist.
ColoradoGuy
So he’s openly going for the fascist vote, with unsubtle dog-whistles for racist, anti-semitic, and QAnon voters. He certainly knows the T**** demographic.
Kind of surprised he doesn’t have an arm-band with a logo on it by now.
Alce_e_ardillo
@trollhattan: My impression of the Florida State Democratic Party is that they are one cut above comatose.
eclare
What a fucking dictator. He obviously doesn’t care what voters think. Wonder why?
FelonyGovt
Aren’t there a lot of Jews in Florida? Seems odd that anti-semitic dogwhistles would be quite so effective.
Dorothy A. Winsor
I don’t get how an elected official can just be removed like that.
trollhattan
@eclare: From three time zones away it seems like that. I wonder if they could consult with/steal ideas from Georgia and Virginia on how to kick Republicans to the curb?
Kropacetic
So they’re elected. Does Florida law provide for DeSantis to remove Warren in this way?
This is terrible for the notion of independent enforcement of the law. I’m sure this will be litigated; but if it stands, be ready for a whole lot more.
Danielx
@OzarkHillbilly:
Why would that be? Nothing has ever stopped you before.
sab
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Probably alegacy of Jim Crow. Old habits die hard.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@sab: It seems like an open invitation to abuse
Old School
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
According to the Executive Order, the Governor can suspend any state officer not subject to impeachment. The suspension is for “neglect of duty.”
Scout211
Posted downstairs in the previous discussion of this mess:
The actual executive order from the “State’s supreme executive:”
Executive Order
Unitary executive power in all things
ETA: Also posted by Old School
Danielx
DeSantis is a fucking Nazi.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Old School: Well, I guess that’s true. The guy did refuse to enforce the law. And good for him.
Scott
I think the real answer is this: “I don’t recognize the authority of the Governor to take this action”. Your move.
Kropacetic
So the governor can claim whatever power they want as long as it isn’t ascribed to any of Florida’s constitutional officers. Good to know.
Eta: Oh, they probably have to be Republican, huh?
Elizabelle
This is a real escalation. And Pushaw is an internet troll, paid by Florida citizens. Pushitbird.
About time for posters to appear, with photos of DeSantis with an Adolph mustache. Having him fold his arms like Mussolini is too subtle.
I hope DeSantis gets bounced out on his ass. Florida is full of whack job retirees and tax evaders (but I repeat myself), but people in Florida might also be watching what happened in Kansas. Both last night’s results, and — if they’re really attentive — what happened with Sam Brownback.
Brownback was bad; he was a true believer. But DeSantis is worse. He is a thug.
Matt McIrvin
As with Trump, what strikes me is the open advertising that his administration intends to hurt millions of its constituents.
Before Trump, politicians usually pretended that they were in it to make everyone’s lives better, even if they didn’t agree about how. Now it’s “LOL this is gonna make people cry”.
Immanentize
@Dorothy A. Winsor: from what I read — he did not refuse to enforce the law, yet. He has had no case come before him that would test his resolve. So he is being “suspended” because he says he will use his discretion in the future to not prosecute. Prosecutors do this every day. But Warren might have said it too strongly?
In one of my earlier articles (about the race and gender of prosecuting officials who get to decide whether to seek death — which I called the Ivory Snow study), I wrote about the Bronx D.A. Robert Johnson*, who ran on an anti-Death Penalty platform in his majority-minority district (Bronx). A fellow named Cruz was involved in a police shooting in which an officer died. Then Gov. Pataki took Johnson off the case and appointed a special prosecutor (white dude) to handle it. Which means that a black guy from a minority majority district was removed by a white guy elected in a majority majority district (the State) who appointed a white guy just to prosecute one poor person of color and try to execute him. Back then, Pataki wanted to be President.
All this makes me wonder if there is a reconstruction era law against such executive powers.
*NOT crossroads Robert Johnson.
Betty Cracker
@Danielx: A full-blown fascist. Speaking of authoritarian pricks, I heard Hungary’s Orbán gave a CPAC speech in Texas today in which he called for the American right and European right to unite and defeat political opponents in two years. He got a standing-O when talking about his anti-gay policies.
germy shoemangler
Gin & Tonic
@Immanentize: Although it would have been pretty cool for the other Robert Johnson to have been a DA.
VOR
@Old School:
It’s an article of faith on the Right that crime is skyrocketing since BLM started suggesting our thin blue line was less than perfect. And left-leaning prosecutors are letting the criminals back onto the street to attack the humble god-fearing Republican voters. It’s part of a scare tactic where DeSantis positions himself as the no-nonsense, law and order candidate.
germy shoemangler
germy shoemangler
Princess
Does the Governor have the power to suspend an elected states attorney? Everyone is assuming he does, including this post. Maybe he does, I dunno, but it seems unlikely on the face of it.
Baud
@Princess:
My question. Although one would think the fired elected prosecutor would say something if the governor didn’t have the authority.
JML
@Immanentize:
Sometimes these things were put in place post-reconstruction to prevent runaway local officials too. Hopefully there’s a way for this prosecutor to throw it back in DeSatan’s face and get reinstated.
germy shoemangler
DeSantis/DeJoy 2024
Timill
@Princess: Apparently he does: https://reason.com/volokh/2022/08/04/how-can-florida-gov-desantis-suspend-elected-prosecutor-for-refusing-to-enforce-certain-criminal-laws/
Dan B
@Betty Cracker: Mr. Peter Thiel and Mr. Richard Grennell: (VERY) White courtesy phone. Mr. Orban requests your presence in the lobby with the burly men in dark suits. Repeat: Mr. Thiel and Mr. Grennell…..
Immanentize
@Gin & Tonic: He would have promised to prosecute NO alcohol or adultery related cases!
Origuy
@Betty Cracker: The Washington Post has the details.
Immanentize
@Princess: There is a statute that I have read which may allow DeSantis to “suspend” in some circumstances state officials not subject to impeachment (ones that are pretty obvious and/or dire). So he has some basis. Whether he actually has that authority is a secondary Q and from what my friends in FL tell me, Warren is smart enough to make the right challenge if there is one to make.
Dan B
@Princess: Suspended prior to any cases. Death Santa is fighting speech crimes and (bad) thought crimes. Give him his transparent superhero outfit.
Immanentize
@Timill: under that statute, the question is “Has Warren actually refused to follow State law?”
I don’t think so. He has pledged not to prosecute in certain cases, but who knows?
Immanentize
@Dan B: good point, he is just trying to cancel Warren.
Eta, where on those douche canoes at Fire when real speech rights are being attacked?
Kropacetic
We have to account for relative power disparities, though. Using your elected power, to (R)ight thinking people, isn’t an abuse in the same way that disparaging someone on twitter is.
trollhattan
@Betty Cracker: Attention Andy Sullivan: Yes, they are coming for you. Do you understand this? Hillary is not, every Republican is.
Captain C
@Origuy:
We’re going to find out Orban secretly qualifies for his own definition of mixed race, like those Klansmen who do an ancestry test and find out they’re 12% Black, aren’t we?
trollhattan
@Dan B: I miss airport public paging. Kuwaiti buddies of mine in college would amuse themselves during layovers requesting pages for names that were actually Arabic curses. Fun for the family!
I also miss complementary coffee service at the departure gates. Yes, I am old.
pat
So DeathSantis is practicing to remove TFG from the top of the Worst President in History list.
Scary SOB, that’s for sure.
Immanentize
@Kropacetic: Ha! The first actually violates the first, the second is school yard taunting.
raven
Dangerman
@pat: Not possible. Well, maybe if his Inauguration speech is him singing the “I wish I were an Oscar Meyer weiner” song.
Gin & Tonic
@trollhattan: I miss the days when people would know the difference between complimentary and complementary.
trollhattan
@Gin & Tonic: “My, those are lovely pearls.”
“Thank you, coffee.”
prostratedragon
@Captain C: Was just thinking that so far as Europe as a whole is concerned, that horse is likely well down the road. “Well, any more mixed.”
CaseyL
OT: Alex Jones found guilty of defaming the Sandy Hooks parents who sued him, ordered to pay $4.1M.
That’s not much – their attorney wanted $150M. But this is the compensatory damages phase. Maybe the really big money will come in the punitive damages phase. I think the jury starts deliberating that tomorrow.
Scout211
In other legal news, the jury finds Alex Jones caused $4million in damages.
Punitive damages are still to be determined.
ETA: CaseyL got there first.
Ben Cisco
@CaseyL: GOOD.
Bury his punk ass.
Alison Rose 💙🌻💛
@CaseyL: Punitive ought to be 500 billion, just to make it crystal clear. But basically, every damn cent he has and then some.
Villago Delenda Est
DeathSantis has earned a Mussolini ending.
Villago Delenda Est
@Alison Rose 💙🌻💛: All his future income from any source should be 50% awarded to a trust fund for the families and to provide for his own children and his ex-wife.
CaseyL
@Scout211:
Yes, but you included the line about “Punitive damages are awarded when the court finds the defendant’s behavior to be especially offensive.”
Anyone who isn’t an InfoWars numbnuts has to see Jones’ conduct as lightyears beyond “especially offensive.”
Omnes Omnibus
@CaseyL: @Scout211: This only one family. Also, over 4 million in compensatory damages for emotion distress is pretty high. Punitives are likely to be far higher.
This will not stop the freak out about the verdict online.
prostratedragon
@CaseyL: Good! As I understand it, there are some parameters in this phase that don’t apply in the punitive phase upcoming. And this is just one set of parents, with more in the system who will also have the benefit of the lawyer’s pratfall.
gene108
@Omnes Omnibus:
Nothing can stop a freak out online.
Scout211
@Alison Rose 💙🌻💛:
He and his attorneys have already started to play games with bankruptcy filings.
Several of his companies, including the InfoWars one have already declared bankruptcy. And the hundreds of thousands of dollars he paid himself per month, where is that money now?
Benw
That damn cancel culture strikes again! Look what you’ve done, libs!
Baud
@gene108:
Nominated
Ceci n est pas mon nym
Totally gone. Turns out he suddenly had a huge debt he’d forgotten about to a company which just happens to be owned by himself and his parents. So I guess that money is just… poof!
Lacuna Synecdoche
@Immanentize:
Not just Warren. Since Warren is an elected official, DeSantis is cancelling voters too.
Litlebritdifrnt
My adding up skills must suck because when I read the list it was 5.1 million anyhoo punitives can be 10 x the damages so let us hope.
trollhattan
@Alison Rose 💙🌻💛:
Yes, and I want Doctor Evil to stand in for the judge to intone: “five-hundred billyun dollars!”
Dorothy A. Winsor
prostratedragon
@Scout211: Wonder if anything in those texts might be relevant.
Roger Moore
@prostratedragon:
Yeah, someone from Hungary might want to think about the non-European group that gave their country its name, and the reason they speak a non-Indoeuropean language. Somehow, I don’t think it’s going to happen.
Ken
Aha! The law doesn’t even cover his behavior, so he’s totally exempt from punitive damages.
I will be sending him my bill for this outstanding legal advice, which, you will notice, I managed to provide without sending opposing counsel the entire contents of Mr. Jones’ phone.
Ken
@Roger Moore: Surely (checks google) a thousand years is long en– Wait a minute, only a thousand years? Most of Europe has houses twice that old. There are tapestries that have been in Europe longer than that.
Kent
That won’t stop the courts. They found him PERSONALLY liable, not just his company. That means they can search out and attach any assets he has hidden anywhere, and they can unwind any transfer of assets that he may have made to family in an attempt to put them out of reach.
Unless all of his wealth is in the form of gold bars that he buried in Belize they will find it. And what they don’t find they will seize from any future earnings he ever has.
Alison Rose 💙🌻💛
@Scout211: From his mannerisms and general appearance, I’d say up his nose
Mike in NC
Ron DeSatan dreams at night of lifelong tenure in the White House, with Christian Pushaw his bargain basement Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
zhena gogolia
Cameron
If LOML didn’t live here, I would already have moved back to Pennsylvania. Christ, what a shame. This is a
beautiful, beautiful state.
jonas
@Scout211:
As the judge admonished him the other day, *filing* for bankruptcy =/= getting to declare bankruptcy. You have to prove you’re really broke and god help you if you get caught hiding assets.
West of the Rockies
So this fucktard, hoping to become president, goes full Trumpian Qanon shitface until about July ’24, at which time (in order to draw voters in the general presidential election) somehow tries to appear a bit more moderate and rational, and trues to address the larger electorate… And says what exactly?
Seems a bit like an abusive spouse who physically and verbally abuses you for weeks but then on your anniversary says, “How ’bout you sit down, honey, and I’ll make you a sammich…”
DeSantis is so damn repellant and phony.
jonas
@Roger Moore: That’s technically true of Finland as well, but their leaders aren’t running around claiming they’re pure-blood European Übermenschen, either.
raven
Dick Cheney all up in Trumps grill!
Baud
@raven:
?
Scout211
@Baud:
Dick Cheney calls Trump a coward in TV ad for Liz
Baud
@Scout211:
Thanks. I hope they share the same cell in hell one day. In the meantime, I’ll enjoy it.
raven
@Scout211: tanks
Lacuna Synecdoche
via Betty Cracker @ Top:
When they talked about criminals being let go and crimes not being prosecuted, Ron, they were talking about you.
Scout211
Plaintiffs’ attorney will turn over a copy of Alex Jones’ cell phone immediately to the Jan6 committee and other law enforcement agencies.
Baud
@Lacuna Synecdoche:
👍
jonas
Can you even imagine the amount of shit that would be lost on Fox and in the rest of the wingnuttosphere if, say, Gavin Newsom sacked some AG in a rural northern CA county for refusing to prosecute people open-carrying or something? JFC, the country would be in flames.
Denali
Orban has discovered the power of the culture wars. Do people realize the poor state of the economy and the fall of the currency(forint) in Hungary? The tax rate is very high and medical care is free(oh no, socialism!).
MomSense
@Immanentize:
And hot tamales for everyone!
cain
@jonas: Looks like he can do it now ! He’ll just say “I didnt know that was an option until De Santis did it!” All the other blue states do it as well.
MisterForkbeard
@Lacuna Synecdoche: If DeSantis can’t actually name the crimes and criminals that were being “let go”, they’re all imaginary. Or wanting to prosecute business owners for allowing masks in the store or somesuch.
It’s scary how much of a fascist this asshole is.
Bill Arnold
@jonas:
Face covering requirements in indoor public places as part of a pandemic mitigation response, say.
Kathleen
@germy shoemangler: Duggar/Gaetz/2036. I think Josh will be out of prison by then.
Dan B
@zhena gogolia: Har! Already sent to friends. Thanks!!
Redshift
@VOR:
“Crime is skyrocketing because librul prosecutors are letting criminals out and won’t arrest anyone!” is the new “BLM protesters are burning cities to the ground across the country.” You’re going to be hearing it a lot, we should be ready.
We were visiting not-overtly-political relatives in Salt Lake City, and we heard from multiple unconnected people that it’s “not safe” to visit San Francisco any more – crime is rampant, they don’t arrest anyone for stealing less than $1000, so they just steal whatever they want, etc.
It’s as ludicrous as “cities in flames,” but we should think so we’re not just reacting.
prostratedragon
@Roger Moore: A friend from years ago who had an academic interest in Swedish history found a lot of contact with Islamic countries all around the Mediterranean basin. It is certain that some Swedes became Muslims –burial artifacts are not uncommon– which almost guarantees some intermarriage.
Ladyraxterinok
@Kropacetic:
Clearly shows what he would do if heaven forbid he got elected president!!
Trump wanted to do this,
-DeSantis is “better”–he flat out does it
Gin & Tonic
@Roger Moore: Someone once proposed a theory that the Hungarians came from Mars
ETA: Here’s what I was thinking of.
Gin & Tonic
@prostratedragon: Have you ever read of the travels of Ibn Fadlan? Between roughly the 8th to 10th centuries, there were a lot of contacts between Muslims and Vikings.
Another Scott
@Redshift: Yeah. But that’s always been the case. 30 years ago my J would get funny looks from her relatives in Reston, VA when she told them she would go from Alexandria to DC to hear live music at the 930 Club.
“It’s not safe!!”
She never had a problem, (other than once her car got broken into maybe 25 years ago (back window broken – nothing was taken)), and has been to dozens and dozens of shows in DC over the years…
(There have been more car-breakins in our “safe” extended neighborhood than that!)
It’s tribal and not based on reality, and the GQP has pushed fear of crime since Nixon’s days…
Cheers,
Scott.
West of the Rockies
@Another Scott:
Conservatives are undistilled fear, anger, and bigotry.
SFAW
@Gin & Tonic:
I never knew (until now) that John von Neumann was born in Hungary. I always figured he was German.