The Patriot Post® · Mainstream Media Smears DeSantis

Let this be a lesson to Republicans: Ron DeSantis did everything right, and still they smeared him.

On Saturday afternoon in Jacksonville, Florida, a sick individual carried out a racially motivated shooting spree at a Dollar General store, murdering three people before turning the weapon on himself. The cold-blooded killer was a white male, and his three victims were black. Moreover, reports Fox News, Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters “said the shooter had authored ‘several manifestos,’ with one to his parents, another to media, and a separate one to federal agents, adding that portions described the suspect’s ‘disgusting ideology of hate.’”

Immediately upon learning all this, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis suspended his presidential campaign and sprang into action. No, he didn’t fumble and dodder and take a vacation and say “No comment” like Joe Biden. As National Review reports, DeSantis did everything a good leader does:

He recorded that the shooter, whom he called a “racially motivated” “scumbag” and a “coward,” had been “targeting people based on their race.” He confirmed that the killer had penned a “manifesto.” He made it clear such behavior was — and would always be — “totally unacceptable.” Next, DeSantis announced plans to suspend his presidential campaign and return to Florida, he pledged funds to protect a historically black college in North Florida, and he resolved to visit the community where it had happened — despite activists’ promises to shout him down if he did.

And yet for all this, for doing everything right, the mainstream media still insinuated that he’s somehow responsible for the deranged killer’s actions.

Check out this headline of NBC News’s coverage of the shooting: “Florida Black community’s anger at Ron DeSantis spills out after the racist Jacksonville shooting.”

And the subhead: “State Sen. Shevrin Jones, a Black Democrat from Miami, told NBC News, ‘How much can we allow the governor to keep his foot on our neck and not say anything?’”

And the first paragraph: “Ron DeSantis’ policies toward the Black community are coming under fresh scrutiny after an avowed racist gunman killed three Black people over the weekend at a Jacksonville Dollar General store, an attack the Justice Department is investigating as a hate crime.”

Furthermore, DeSantis was “loudly booed” when he attended and spoke at a Sunday evening vigil near the Dollar General store. As the AP helpfully reminds us, DeSantis “has loosened gun laws in Florida and … has antagonized civil rights leaders by deriding ‘wokeness.’”

Check out this sneering tweet from the AP’s Steve Peoples: “Ron DeSantis scoffed when the NAACP issued a travel advisory this spring warning Black people to use ‘extreme care’ if traveling to Florida. Just three months later, DeSantis is leading his state through the aftermath of a racist attack that left three African Americans dead. Black leaders in Florida — and across the nation — say they’re outraged by his actions and rhetoric ahead of the shooting.”

A bit of perspective here: Florida is a state of nearly 22 million people. The murder of three blacks by a racially motivated white man is indeed an awful, horrible thing, but it isn’t tantamount to a white-on-black killing field. And yet in Chicago’s South Side, which has a population of roughly 220,000, there have been hundreds of black-on-black shootings this year, just as there were last year, and the year before, and the year before.

Where’s the outrage, NBC News? Where’s the outrage, AP? Where’s even the hint of finger-pointing at the Democrat politicians who run Chicago and have for decades?

Columnist David Harsanyi gets to the point of all this: “Because it’s become so common for the left to insinuate (or blame) conservatives for inciting violence, we might forget how vile those accusations can be. But they’re not only contemptible for the obvious reasons. They are meant to shut you up.”

In the end, these are racial arsonists masquerading as journalists. And yet, weirdly, they do a service to those of us on the Right: Through their biased reporting, they remind us that if our duly elected representatives threaten the Left’s grip on power, they’ll try to destroy them by any means necessary.