Gov. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., has positioned himself as the face of ideological defiance to the COVID-19 policies supported by the overwhelming majority of public health experts and scientists. DeSantis sued Joe Biden's administration over the president's vaccine mandates, has been accused of intimidating state officials into destroying COVID-19 data from his state and even scolded high school students for following scientific wisdom and wearing masks.
Now, Florida Surgeon General Joseph A. Ladapo — a staunch DeSantis supporter appointed by him to replace Scott Rivkees, who DeSantis famously pulled from a press conference in 2020 for refusing to downplay the pandemic — is facing his own firestorm of controversy for seeming to politicize the pandemic.
