Ron DeSantis responds to viral clip of him being 'attacked' by CNN reporter

here at fox, but first let's head south for just a minute by every objective measure cases deaths hospitalizations the state of florida has handled the coronavirus much more effectively than the states that new york specifically new york and new jersey and it they have done without destroying all the small businesses in the state and that is why those states are emptying out and moving to florida, by the way, florida is also leading new york in vaccine distribution and at the same time, as we just noted, People are abandoning those two states and moving to the state of Florida, which by the way is controlled by a Republican and maybe that's why CNN is infuriated by all of this.

They don't want you to know that Chris Cuomo's brother runs New York, so they attack the state of Florida. and that is why on Monday of this week, which would be yesterday, let's see, one of the CNN activists posing as a

reporter

went after the governor of Florida to give him this little speech that you will hear directly from the governor of Florida in just a minute, but first Fox Tampa. The Bay's chief political

reporter

, Craig Patrick, is following this exchange for us and the broader story. He joins us tonight. Hello, Craig. Hi, Tucker, how are you?

Great, thanks, so the state of Florida seems to have been the focus of a lot of media. hostility recently, have you noticed that the governor certainly faced many difficult questions regarding the most recent controversies? We're hearing a lot of that, but one of the main reasons is that the governor has prioritized moving all senior citizens 65 and older to the front of the line. There are 4.3 million seniors in the state of Florida, a byproduct of doing so. In fact, there will be long waits in the early stages of vaccine distribution, but the way the governor sees it, he's saying, look, the choice is, let's say, inoculating someone who is 20 years old versus someone who is an older person.

He's looking at the case fatality rates of those most likely to become seriously ill or, in some cases, die and he's thinking about the interest of saving lives, that's the direction he's going to take and also yes there has been controversy, many of us We have seen the video of seniors camped overnight outside a hospital, but the governor has also said that we are in the early stages and that he is monitoring how well each hospital is doing and that future vaccine shipments, doses will end going to the hospitals that do the best job of distributing those vaccines.

Do you have the tape of the exchange between the governor and the CNN reporter today ready to roll? I don't think I know if I've seen it. Alright. If I don't know. Yeah come on. I want to shoot it right now. so our audience gets a sense of the politics that have come into this here's what happened look at this what went wrong with the vaccine rollout we've seen phone lines jammed websites crashed a lot of demand I mean I think in the end of the day, excuse me, excuse me if I could finish my, you just said what went wrong, so I'll answer the question.

If I could complete the question, are you going to give a speech? Are you going to answer the question? one question: we have seen websites crash and also elderly people waiting overnight to receive the vaccine. Where was it? We've seen it at Duvall Broward Orange and why there was a big line. Did you investigate? Why could you tell us? Because we distributed the vaccine to the hospitals and the hospital said first come, first served, if you show up, we will do it, yes, Tucker, the governor, yes, he is acknowledging that there are problems, but you know what problems there are throughout the country and the governor keeps saying. he's making adjustments, he made adjustments today by moving doses to public supermarkets to make them more available to people where they live.

The same applies to selecting churches, converting testing centers to vaccination centers, taking action in time, among other things, you don't know the precise numbers that arrive week after week until a few days before they arrive craig, which I really appreciate it, thank you very much for joining us today. We are now joined by the Governor of Florida, Ron Desantis, Governor, thank you very much for coming, almost never. Providing a forum for politicians and politicians to defend themselves or them, but I can't help but notice that as the entire northeast moves to your state and the numbers become clear, Florida has handled this pandemic much better than any state from the northeast. that you're

being

subjected to all this criticism from the media, why do you think that's okay?

Look, I'm totally willing to wear the criticism of a badge of honor if it means my state has a state where all parents have the right to send their children for in-person instruction, everyone has the right to work and to pursue their vocations. , all companies have the right to operate and we have done so, we have trusted the people and, as you mentioned, you know that our coveted mortality is lower than the national average per capita and on the vaccine front we were the first state in the country to begin vaccinating citizens residing in long-term care facilities and we were the first state in the country to begin vaccinating our population over 65, so I am very proud to lead those efforts and I think you will continue to see many good things that your guests mentioned before: we are partnering with supermarkets even and they are really wallpapering us all over the state, so I am happy for criticism because you know what I am not looking for validation from the media what I am looking for is to support the citizens of my state and I can tell you how worn out this pandemic is by the number of times someone has approached me with tears in their eyes.

Saying that if it weren't for you my son wouldn't be in school and I wouldn't have my job. Thank you. That's why I'm in this job. I mean, to be honest, how many department stores burned down in the state? from florida during the blm riots how many cities do you have in florida that are empty shells that are shells of ghost towns like say Camden, New Jersey or five other cities in New Jersey? Do you get a lot of that in the state of Florida? You do not know? we're, we're doing very well economically, uh, obviously, our tourism industry has been hit, that's recovering, home sales are up, I think 22 percent year over year, people have opportunities in Florida. , they are seeing that they are coming here looking for greener pastures and yes, we take law and order very seriously, we want to protect the safety of our citizens and obviously we are not going to tolerate a situation like the one in Minneapolis when that was happening this summer.

He had the national guard on alert. We were working with our localities in the state of Florida and you didn't see here what you saw there. Do you think you would receive fair treatment from CNN if your brother had a prime time show on that channel? Well, if only buts and butts were sweet and nutty every day. It's going to be Christmas, but you know, I think it's pretty clear that some of these networks obviously have agendas, they're making narratives, they're not trying to report facts anymore, it's about spinning whatever narrative they think can get ratings and that's just the reality. of the situation so that it does not affect me, we will continue to be attentive and work as hard as we can to achieve results.

I mean, the truth is always in the results, not in what people say and what they do gives us a snapshot of the influx to Florida from other states in this country recently. Well, I can tell you that we weren't going to have the final numbers for 2020 yet, for a few more weeks, but we did look. on the bill for a new home, new home construction, new home starts, if you look at the increase in home sales prices, I mean, it's pretty clear that people are looking at Florida as a landing pad, You know, Tucker, it's interesting as this was going on, I would meet people particularly in September that I was moving from parts of the country would say look, they closed our schools I want their schools to be open.

I'm coming here because you guys are doing well, so I think there have been a variety of factors, taxes have been one thing, but I really think these lockdowns have driven some people to Florida who were already fed up with these restrictions. draconian and ineffective. They think you're going to be the Republican candidate. That's why they attack you. I'm not going to ask you to answer that. I know it's an uncomfortable observation, but I think that's what's really going on, Tucker. I can tell you that I'm pretty sure I'll be the candidate for governor in 2022 here in Florida, so you know, we're hoping to get in that race.

Nice to see you. tonight thank you thank you