Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) talked to FOX News host Laura Ingraham about a roundtable he held on the effects of COVID lockdowns and the mRNA vaccines in an interview on her show 'The Ingraham Angle.' DeSantis also responded to criticism that his anti-vaccine mandates were authoritarian.
"You take an mRNA shot and the way to view it is, okay, what are the benefits and what are the drawbacks? And it seems like our medical establishment never wanted to be honest with people about the potential drawbacks," DeSantis told Ingraham.
"So you showed a clip from [Surgeon General of Florida] Dr. Ladapo down here in Florida and the analysis that he's done with people, particularly young men who have taken the mRNA shots," DeSantis continued. "We, of course, had witnesses talk about their experience. And how are we in a situation, yes, Florida, we banned vaccine passports almost two years ago. We banned the shot mandates for jobs and saved a lot of people's jobs."
"Nevertheless, throughout our country, you still have hundreds of universities in other states that are still mandating these boosters on these college kids," he said. "When any type of cost-benefit analysis would say the benefit for them taking the shot, as you alluded to, it doesn't prevent them from getting infected or spreading it anyways. The benefit is minuscule. But, as Joe Ladapo and other studies have shown there is a risk for doing it."
"So why can't our medical establishment acknowledge that? Why the deception? Why have they continued to do this for two years?" DeSantis asked.
DeSantis responds to criticism:
LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS HOST: New York Magazine's Jonathan Chait said, 'It's been very, very obvious that Ron Desantis is courting the anti vaccine movement. It's a case study in the conservative movement's intellectual dysfunction.' And similar nastiness from 'Vanity Fair' -- 'Taking your authoritarian ambitions to the next level. He demonizes the health and safety measures to score political points.' Governor, is your goal with this roundtable to demonize public health and safety officials?
DESANTIS: Let me tell you this, Laura. The authoritarians were the ones that wanted to mandate the vax on people. I protected people from having that happen and made sure Floridians could make their own choice.
The authoritarians wanted to institute a vaccine passport system, almost like a social credit system, so that people who dissented from this would be marginalized from society entirely. We rejected that and we banned it. So we were, from the very beginning, you know, helping people make their own decisions, but not using either the coercive power of the state or allowing big corporations to condition those choices.
And so, look, at the end of the day, what we're looking for is to provide truth, to provide accurate data, and to provide accurate analysis. And we had a great researcher from Denmark. You know, Laura, Denmark does not allow people under 50, unless they have pre-existing conditions, to get the mRNA shots because they've analyzed it and said that the drawbacks outweigh the benefits.
They've also looked at all-cause mortality and the researcher found that yes, in some age groups there was a decline in COVID mortality after taking these but then there was an increase in other types of mortality. So why have we not seen big declines in excess mortality since these things have been introduced? So we have now a panel that we've created in Florida that is effectively going to function the way a CDC should function and basically do evidence-based medicine, take studies seriously that counteract the narrative, and be willing to ask questions and go where the data leads.
