As a parent of an 11 year-old boy who has to decide how best to keep him safe until he can be vaccinated against COVID-19, I’m especially sensitive to anything that makes my job more difficult. I don’t live in Florida, but if I did I would be seething with anger at Governor Ron DeSantis for barring school districts from following CDC guidance and requiring indoor masking as schools.
DeSantis has gone so far as to threaten not to pay superintendents and school board members who implement mask requirements. He claims he’s doing this to protect parents’ right to decide if their children should wear masks, but he’s definitely not doing this to help parents. It’s his cynical calculation of what the Republican base wants and will reward in the 2024 Republican presidential primaries.
Here’s how that’s working out so far.
Four educators in Broward County, Florida, died from COVID-19 in a span of 24 hours, as school officials continue to push back against Governor Ron DeSantis’ ban on mask mandates in schools. At least three of the teachers who died were unvaccinated, CBS Miami reports.
“Within a 24-hour span, we had an assistant teacher pass away, a teacher at her school pass away, an elementary teacher pass away and another teacher at a high school,” Broward Teachers Union president Anna Fusco told CBS Miami.
In response, the White House is stepping up. The Department of Education is offering to use funds from the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 to make up any lost pay for to superintendents and school board members who are punished for putting safety first.
It’s the right thing to do, but it’s also good politics. As a parent, I know that countless Floridians feel the same way that I do about DeSantis, and this draws a very sharp and clarifying line about who wants to help me protect my child and my child’s educators.
I agree that this is good politics. I don’t expect that this performance from Desantis will serve him well, ultimately (but who knows?). That said, those teachers didn’t die from a lack of mask mandate. They died because they were unvaccinated. It is appropriate to apportion some blame to Republicans and right-wing media for presumably convincing them to remain unvaccinated, but those individuals are also responsible for their fate.
It’s a combo. Lack of masks and lack of vaccination. The outcome is fairly predictable in any Southern US state. I’m pretty much at the “your pain is your own” mindset. I and mine have done our best – not only to make sure we were fully vaccinated but also to do our part to keep ourselves and the public safe. We start public schools within hours and college life within a week. We’ve been told that is our duty to be the equivalent of Red Shirts (for those who might remember a very early Star Trek reference) in the name of whatever kickbacks these idiots expect to receive.
Cute move, politically. I’m interested in how Trump will respond. On the one hand, an indirect but accurate attack on Trump, on the other hand his number one potential usurper. What’s a psychopath to do?
DeSantis can’t legally withhold funds and so he has backed off this whacko notion.
https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2021/08/12/desantis-backpedals-on-threat-to-withhold-salaries-of-defiant-school-officials-1389870#