DeSantis Begins His Campaign By Lying About Florida's Book Bans

Ron DeSantis' disaster of a campaign launch has grabbed the headlines for the past two days, but in spite of the technical difficulties they had with the dying Twitter platform, one statement made by DeSantis raised some eyebrows. DeSantis actually claimed that NO books have been "banned" in Florida schools, which is a blatant lie. In fact, in his next breath DeSantis even admitted that SOME books had, in fact, been banned, and journalists have pointed out that he's really just arguing semantics. Ring of Fire's Farron Cousins explains what's happening.

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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is obviously not off to a good start with his 2024 presidential campaign. And in addition to all of the technical problems that his little Twitter event had on Wednesday evening, he also began his campaign, essentially launched it on a lie because during that horrendous launch on Twitter, which most people were focused on the glitches and how stupid it was, he said something that kind of flew under the radar and that something was that the state of Florida has actually not banned any books, and that all of this media talk about book bands in Florida that's been going on for two years now is a hoax. That's the word he used, says all the hoax. So apparently we've just been living in an alternative reality down here in Florida, and all those books that have actually been banned from our school libraries weren't actually banned according to Ron DeSantis.

And what DeSantis is actually doing is just employing a simple, uh, verbal trick, if you will. He's using semantics to create a lie, because when he says no books have been banned, you could construe that to technically be true if you're an idiot, because what's happened is that books are not actually banned, but they're banned for certain ages. You know, I saw, uh, uh, an idiot on Twitter try to make this argument the other day. Uh, he works at News Nation and he said, well, the books are still, we're just talking about a matter of switching it to a different shelf. He says, ZAE Gani, by the way, is who, who said that? Like, who just moved it to a different shelf? Do you know why they moved it to a different shelf idiot? Because it's banned for seventh graders and below, and it's only available to eighth graders at a pre-K through eight school.

So yes, it is banned for certain students, so you can quibble over what to call it, which is what Ron DeSantis and his little minions out there on social media are doing. But it is a book ban. If certain books are unavailable for certain students based on a policy put in place by the state, then that qualifies as a ban. And that is exactly what's happening here in Florida. Not to mention, as Judd Legum pointed out, a lot of books have actually been pulled off the shelves and are not available to any students because they're still undergoing that lengthy review process. So until they get approved by the state, they aren't available for anyone making that a defacto ban. Oh, and let's also not forget the fact that here in the state of Florida, one single parent can launch a complaint against a book, and then that book immediately becomes available

For everybody until that lengthy review process is finished. And that review process has been going on this entire school year, which for most districts in Florida actually ends today a a and plenty of books haven't even been gotten to yet. So we're on the last day of school and we still have books that aren't even available because they haven't even been reviewed yet. So yes, there is a book ban. Yes, Ron DeSantis and his friends and allies across the media are lying to you. And I know this because unlike a lot of you, a holes out there, I actually happen to live in Florida. Not only that, I have the pleasure of talking to somebody who serves as an educator in the state of Florida every single day.