Florida governor Ron DeSantis, recently re-elected in a historic landslide that saw Miami-Dade County flip red and also ushered in the most conservative state legislator in modern times, finally addressed voting concerns that plague the minds of every honest and liberty-loving American.
Speaking to a crowd and contingent of journalists, DeSantis pointed out the obvious issues facing other states. While he didn’t name any one in particular, weighing heavily on peoples’ minds is no doubt places like Arizona and certain California districts.
Take a look as the emerging face of the Republican Party calls out irregularities, problems, and other issues that continue to happen in other places, when they really shouldn’t be a challenge at all:
DESANTIS: "How is it that the state of Florida, the Monday before the election we could declare a state of emergency for Nicole, conduct an election, count like 7.7 million votes by midnight.. And these other states are still counting their votes.”
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) November 16, 2022
But you know, we actually had another hurricane come through and the other part of the state, Nicole, so you guys understand that.
And how is it that the state of Florida, the Monday before the election we could declare a state of emergency for Nicole, conduct an election, count like 7.7 million votes by midnight. Next morning, we’re at the EOC, storm hits. You have wash outs of…other parts. We repair that by the weekend, and these other states are still counting their votes from the election.
How pathetic is that?
As the Daily Wire reported a few days ago, officials in Arizona’s molasses-paced, ballot-counting Maricopa County lashed out at critics and critiques over their terrible handling of this midterm cycle.
Officials in Maricopa County are still counting votes from last Tuesday’s midterm election — and the results of several races still hang in the balance — but they took a few minutes on Saturday to lash out at everyone from the voters and the candidates to bots and “disinformation super spreaders.”
The brief Twitter thread essentially informed everyone that every vote would be counted, counted only once, and then announced when the count was determined to be accurate — and not a second before.
CANDIDATES: All legal votes will be counted, including votes for you. If you have the most votes in the final tally, you will be elected. If you do not have the most votes, you will have lost your election.
— Maricopa County (@maricopacounty) November 12, 2022
VOTERS: All legal votes will be counted. Your vote will count equally whether it is reported first, last, or somewhere in between. Thank you for participating.
The thread continued:
CANDIDATES: All legal votes will be counted, including votes for you,” it continued. “If you have the most votes in the final tally, you will be elected. If you do not have the most votes, you will have lost your election.
And it didn’t stop there.
SOCIAL MEDIA BOTS: Your disapproval is duly noted but your upvotes and retweets will not be part of this year’s totals. This is not meant as an affront to your robot overlords, it’s just not allowed for in Arizona law.
— Maricopa County (@maricopacounty) November 12, 2022
DISINFORMATION SUPER SPREADERS: Please read Arizona election law & the elections procedures manual before asking leading questions about how something seems suspicious. There are processes + checks and balances in place to make sure every legal vote is only counted once.
SOCIAL MEDIA BOTS: Your disapproval is duly noted but your upvotes and retweets will not be part of this year’s totals. This is not meant as an affront to your robot overlords, it’s just not allowed for in Arizona law.
As many comments on Twitter pointed out, this language only further convinced them that something shady was afoot. Had they simply said the process was taking time to ensure the validity and that they thanked everyone for their patience, maybe that would ameliorate at least some concerns.
But no. Officials derided anyone taking the position of questioning voting integrity and the validity of ballot counting as consuming mis- and dis-information. If they have nothing to hide, many commenters reasoned, then why the deployment of such heavy-handed language? Recent history has been replete with over-the-top pronouncements used not to reassure, but to silence, censor, or hide the truth.
As for DeSantis, he didn’t get into the so-called conspiracies that others do, but his calling it out is a first for him.
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