Democratic members of Congress labeled Gov. Ron DeSantis a “fascist” at an unofficial hearing on the Florida leader’s alleged anti-democratic policies.
“We’re here because the third-largest state in our union, home to around 22 million people, has an extremist Governor and state Legislature that are dismantling democracy before our very eyes,” said U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost.
The Orlando Democrat, a member of the House Oversight Committee, said he had called for congressional investigations of state governments trampling on democratic ideals. But the Republican majority hasn’t answered those calls. Instead, Frost asked several Democratic politicians and activists to testify in an “Emergency Ad Hoc Hearing on Anti-Democratic Abuses in Florida.”
Importantly, that means the hearing lacked the balance of a typical congressional hearing. Held in the Capitol Visitor Center, only Democratic lawmakers participated in questioning witnesses, all of whom came at the invite of the Democratic lawmaker, whereas the majority and minority caucuses in committees normally invite slates of witnesses on hearing subjects.
The resulting event played out more like a two-hour indictment of what Democrats feel are the greatest abuses of power by Florida’s Republican Governor, who notably launched a campaign for President in May.
DeSantis’ office, for its part, largely ignored the event in Washington. “I didn’t see the event Rep. Frost held in Washington, actually,” said DeSantis Press Secretary Jeremy Redfern. “Either way, this is a stunt. We aren’t going to waste our time on stunts.”
Witnesses included suspended Hillsborough State Attorney Andrew Warren, who won a second term in 2020 but was taken off the job by the Governor last year.
Warren compared DeSantis actions to authoritarian rule in North Korea. He pointed to U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle’s opinion that Warren had been illegally removed Warren from office for political purposes, though the judge dismissed the case from federal court citing jurisdictional issues.
“DeSantis has shown remarkable disdain for the laws he has sworn to uphold,” Warren told lawmakers in Washington. “If you cross the Governor, you are at risk of political reprisal.”
The same day Warren testified, the Florida Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit in state court where Warren sought to be reinstated. Warren continues to appeal his federal case.
U.S. Rep. Dan Goldman, a New York Democrat, suggested the state Supreme Court decision was the result of the body in the last five years becoming stacked with DeSantis appointees, where five of seven justices were named by the Governor.
State Rep. Anna Eskamani, an Orlando Democrat, testified that in recent years, Republicans have effectively turned the entire state government into a single apparatus controlled by the Governor and GOP supermajorities in the Legislature.
“Actions have comprised the legislative process,” she said. “They have consolidated between the three branches of government, eroded personal freedoms, attacked public education, threatened our economy and then preempted local government authority, which has stripped our neighborhoods and our municipalities of their ability to solve everyday problems.”
U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Democratic Co-Chair of the Florida congressional delegation, said DeSantis’ tactics bear all the marks of fascism, from removing books from libraries with dissenting political views, to criminalizing protests and punishing officials who offer anything but “unquestioning obedience” to the state leader.
“Each of the Floridians on this panel can say all elements are gleefully met,” Wasserman Schultz said.
Brian Covey, a substitute teacher fired in Duval County after posting a video of empty bookshelves in a school library, said he was fired from his job a day after the Governor publicly called his video “fake.” He said policies allowing any member of the public to challenge books has led to an unreasonable vetting process for materials, denying access to materials to students for months.
And Equal Ground Founder Jasmine Burney-Clark said efforts to restrict access to voting disproportionately hurt Black communities in the state to better the political atmosphere for Republicans.
“Florida has become a breeding ground for voter suppression laws,” she said. Her group has challenged a congressional redistricting map and numerous changes to voting laws including the outlawing of early voting drop boxes.
The hearing, lacking any Republican voices, offered a platform for numerous Democrats to publicly attack DeSantis as a presidential candidate.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, nicked DeSantis and Republicans for preempting a rent control ordinance in Orlando after voters overwhelmingly approved it. U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett, a Texas Democrat, suggested that states, including her own, are following a path toward autocracy that turned governors into effective dictators. U.S. Rep. Gerry Connelly, a Virginia Democrat, simply compared DeSantis quotes to historical authoritarian leaders around the world including Chile’s Augusto Pinochet and Iraq’s Saddam Hussein.
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