Brodeur: 'Solo Moron' -- or Fall Guy?

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has publicly stated that he does not support a law on blogging proposed by Republican state senator Jason Brodeur. Said proposal would force bloggers to register with the state and make monthly reports if they have the temerity to discuss certain government officials.

The bill has been rightly slammed by Republicans like Newt Gingrich and in conservative media, with a writer at National Review memorably calling Brodeur a "solo moron."

DeSantis briefly discussed the bill yesterday:

Florida State Senator Jason Brodeur (Image by Florida Senate, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.)

In a press conference shortly after delivering the 2023 State of the State address before the Florida Legislature, Gov. DeSantis said he has never supported such an idea and doesn't support the bill.

"Every person in the legislature can file bills. I see these people filing bills and there are these articles with my face on the article," bloggers are going to have to register with the state," attributing it to me," said Gov. DeSantis. "That's not anything I've ever supported, I don't support. I've been very clear on what we are doing."

My first reaction, on hearing about this from a friend was relief, but he volunteered that he wondered if DeSantis waited a few days beforehand "just to see the reaction."

That thought crossed my mind, too: No matter how much I yearn for the Republicans to move on from Donald Trump and wish that DeSantis might be the one to help them do it, the fact remains he is a politician, and -- like any other politician -- his remarks should be considered with great caution and informed by his past record.

Unfortunately, part of that past record is the fact that he signed into law a bill that forbids social media companies from banning politicians. This was well before the release of the Twitter Files, which indicated government jawboning of social media companies affected their moderation policies. Thus, at least on that evidence, the governor does not fully understand or respect the rights of businesses to speech or property.

So, the good news is that DeSantis says he opposes this bill, but the bad news is that he does not seem to oppose it on principle, as evidenced by the fact that he has already acted against the principle of freedom of speech in a nontrivial way.

So color me relieved in the short term, because the bill won't become law -- but wary in the long term of the Governor as well as the fans of this proposal within the right.

-- CAV