A Florida judge is upholding DeSantis’ decision to suspend a woke state prosecutor, one whom the governor said had neglected his duty and was effectively trying to nullify state criminal laws by not locking up criminals.
As background, Team DeSantis announced the suspension of the woke prosecutor, State Attorney Andrew Warren, when conservative fury at woke prosecutors around the country was hitting a fever pitch. Many saw that woke prosecutors were slapping criminals on the wrist for serious crimes, if they even did anything at all, and were furious that soft-on-crime prosecutors were making the crime problem worse by letting criminals off the hook.
DeSantis, who was furious about the ability of woke prosecutors to nullify criminal law with selective enforcement of it, decided to stop that from happening in Florida and so ordered a review of the trend in his state.
After conducting an examination of the situation, the DeSantis Administration zeroed in on one woke prosecutor in particular, That was a prosecutor in the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit in Hillsborough County, State Attorney Andrew Warren.
DeSantis announced that Warren was fired for refusing to enforce the law, saying that Warren’s failures to enforce the law included everything “from refusing to enforce any prohibitions on sex change operations for minors, regardless of action from the legislature, to asserting that he would not enforce any laws relating to protecting the right to life in the Sunshine State.”
Continuing, DeSantis said, “The constitution of Florida has vested the veto power in the governor, not in individual state attorneys, and so when you flagrantly violate your oath of office, when you make yourself above the law, you have violated your duty.”
He then added “We don’t elect people in one part of the state to have veto power over what the entire state decides on these important issues. And, continuing, DeSantis also said “You have neglected your duty and you are displaying a lack of competence to be able to perform those duties and so today, we are suspending State Attorney Andrew Warren.”
Watch DeSantis here:
#BREAKING: Gov. Ron DeSantis is suspending State Attorney Andrew Warren, a Democrat, for vowing to not enforce prohibitions on sex changes for minors or restrictions on abortion
"When you make yourself above the law, you have violated your duty." pic.twitter.com/BegsmOXqWR
— Florida’s Voice (@FLVoiceNews) August 4, 2022
Breitbart, reporting on the courts allowing DeSantis to fire the woke prosecutor, said:
Judge Robert Hinkle said DeSantis “violated the First Amendment by considering Mr. Warren’s speech on matters of public concern—the four FJP policies save one sentence—as motivating factors in the decision to suspend him” and “violated the First Amendment by considering Mr. Warren’s association with the Democratic Party and alleged association with Mr. Soros as motivating factors in the decision.”
“But the Governor would have made the same decision anyway, even without considering these things,” he continued, concluding that the First Amendment violations “were not essential to the outcome and so do not entitle Mr. Warren to relief in this action.”
“The suspension also violated the Florida Constitution, and that violation did affect the outcome. But the Eleventh Amendment prohibits a federal court from awarding declaratory or injunctive relief of the kind at issue against a state official based only on a violation of state law,”
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