Lmao! Far from a fair haired boy... But I do have a big boy for you....

All kidding aside I thought you owned a local publication... Hmmmmm I can see why you don't do it more.... you just throw shit on a wall to see if it sticks!

 

DeSantis’ travel, security cost Florida taxpayers $13 million as he runs for president
Mary Ellen Klas
August 16, 2023·5 min read
51



Joseph Cress/Iowa City Press-Citizen / USA TODAY NETWORK


Florida taxpayers have spent more than $13 million on travel and protective security for Gov. Ron DeSantis in the two years he has prepared and run a campaign to become the 2024 Republican presidential nominee, according to state records released this week.

While some of that money covers the governor’s routine security and travel for his state job, the totals for the 2021-22 and 2022-23 budget years are significantly higher than the state spent his first two years in office — and it is substantially more than what several other states report their sitting governors spent while running for president in previous election cycles.

Florida allows taxpayers to pick up all the costs for travel and security for its governors, even when they are engaged in political campaigning or personal travel. In just over four years in office, the total cost of travel and security detail for the governor and his family is more than $22 million.

“Protective operations salaries are covered under the FDLE budget,’‘ said Gretl Plessinger, spokesperson for the agency that handles the governor’s security and travel in an interview in June. “For us, it doesn’t matter whether it’s a campaign event or a vacation on the beach, for protective ops we cover him 24-7.”


In the 2022-23 budget year that ended June 30, the state spent more than $3 million on DeSantis’ travel and more than $5 million on his protective security detail, according to the agency’s Report on Transportation and Protective Services. That was a 69% increase over the expenses paid in 2021-22, when the state spent $4.7 million for the governor’s travel and security detail as he traveled the state seeking re-election.

FDLE added agents to security detail
DeSantis has spent much of the last two years traveling the country promoting his political memoir and raising money for his campaigns. Some of the additional cost can be attributed to the need for additional FDLE agents on the governor’s security detail, said Alex Lanfranconi, the governor’s deputy press secretary.

“His record as the most effective conservative governor in American history has also earned him an elevated threat profile, and FDLE has increased the number of protective agents to ensure the governor and his family remain safe,’’ Lanfranconi said.

In his first two years on the job, the cost of DeSantis’ travel and security averaged about $3.75 million, but, since the end of the pandemic and start of the governor’s national political pursuits, those numbers have increased significantly. In the 2021-22 fiscal it was $4.76 million and in ‘22-23 is $8 million.

Although DeSantis’ campaign and his political committee have raised record sums for a sitting governor — holding its latest fundraising telethon in Tampa on Wednesday — none of the more than $100 million raised has gone to reimbursing Florida taxpayers, according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

Democrats quickly criticized the spending and noted the governor’s sagging performance in the polls in the early Republican primary states, where he is trailing former President Donald Trump by double digits.

“Now, as the governor continues to flame out in his failing run for president, it is Floridians who are continuing to subsidize his trips to Iowa and New Hampshire while they struggle to pay the bills in the most unaffordable state in the nation,’’ said Anders Croy, communications director for DeSantis Watch.

DeSantis’ family is part of the expense picture
The taxpayers also pay for travel and protective services for Casey DeSantis and the governor’s three young children. According to the report, the cost of those services also rose slightly last year, to a total of $792,000, as the governor has increasingly brought his family with him to campaign events. In the 2021-22 election year, the state spent $777,000 on travel and protection for the governor’s family.

Taxpayers historically pick up the tab for the security and travel of sitting governors with presidential ambitions.

Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington cost taxpayers an estimated $660,000 for his failed presidential bid in 2019. Former Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a Republican, refused to release the details of his campaign-related travel and security in his presidential campaign in 2016, but rivals estimated it was at least $350,000. In 2011, former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican, spent an estimated $1 million of taxpayer money on transportation and security as he sought the GOP presidential nomination.

There are few examples of governors using their campaigns to reimburse state coffers. In 2015, then-Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker announced his campaign would reimburse taxpayers an estimated $125,000 for airfare, hotel and meals for his security team for campaign travel, but not for salaries and fringe benefits. The Republican’s campaign lasted just 71 days before Walker abandoned it in September 2015, after his polling numbers tanked and his campaign financing dried up.

DeSantis, who announced his campaign in late May, has had his own challenging summer.

Once positioned as the chief rival to Trump, he has watched as his commanding lead over other GOP rivals has shriveled and his fundraising has slowed. In the last month, as his campaign faced financial strains, DeSantis’ campaign laid off more than a third of its staff, named a new campaign manager and attempted to reset his campaign narrative.

The reboot, however, has not reduced his travel footprint. In the last two weeks, the governor has made numerous trips from Florida to Iowa and New Hampshire, the two early GOP primary states for the presidential nomination



https://www.yahoo.com/news/desantis-travel-security-cost-florida-181254839.html

 

Or goes to prison, or flees to Russia. That would be better. If he flees to Russia he will take some classified documents with him.

If Putin is overthrown, the new government will want to cultivate favor with us, so they will surrender Trump in handcuffs.

 

Just wait. We will see who the idiot is.

 

You should wish that you were capable of posting well reasoned comments.

 

Yeah let's add stolen valor to DeSantis' resume.

Actual SEALs Fume at DeSantis’ Navy Service Claims
Justin Rohrlich
Thu, August 24, 2023 at 3:52 PM MDT·7 min read
1.7k



Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Reuters
On Wednesday night, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis had an important message for those watching him participate in the first Republican debate of the presidential primary season.

“I learned in the military—I was assigned with the U.S. Navy SEALs in Iraq—that you focus on the mission above all else, you can’t get distracted,” DeSantis said. “So Republicans, we’ve got to look forward and we’ve got to make sure that we’re bringing the message that can win in November 2024.”

DeSantis moved on without further explanation, leaving some observers extremely impressed. Others, however, were far less moved.

“He was never a Navy SEAL,” Billy Allmon, a former member of SEAL Team 1, told The Daily Beast. “It’s a misleading statement.”


DeSantis again said during the debate that he “deployed to Iraq alongside U.S. Navy SEALs,” mirroring the backstory shared earlier this month on a podcast hosted by former Trump counsel-turned-co-defendant Jenna Ellis. During the show, DeSantis campaign surrogate Carly Atchison described her boss’ path through life in deeply inspirational terms.


DeSantis grew up blue-collar, then worked his way through Yale and Harvard Law, Atchison said. But rather than using his pair of Ivy League degrees to “make six-figures doing whatever, after 9/11 he raised his hand and said, ‘I want to serve my country.’”

So, Atchison continued, “He went out to Coronado, he trained, and was deployed, ultimately, with SEAL Team 1, in some of the most dangerous parts of the world at the time—Fallujah and others. Served his country out of this need for service. Then he went on to run for Congress. He obviously became governor, and now he’s running for president of the United States because he wants to reverse the decline of this country.”

The next day, Atchison appeared on another show, again lauding DeSantis over his decision to forsake a life of riches for a hitch with the SEALs. He “trained at Coronado with the SEALs, and he was ultimately deployed to Iraq with Navy SEAL Team 1,” Atchison told host Bill Mitchell, emphasizing that DeSantis spent time in “some of the most dangerous parts of the world.”

That’s “just the kind of person he is,” Atchison went on, before launching into a rundown of DeSantis’ poll numbers and complimenting his “bold, conservative leadership.” A day later, Atchison gave another interview, again describing the way DeSantis “went out to train in Coronado and was ultimately deployed with Navy SEAL Team 1 to Iraq… He earned a Bronze Star.”

In fact, DeSantis was a Navy lawyer, known in military parlance as a JAG. And in 2007, three years after his commission, he did serve as a legal adviser to a SEAL commander in Iraq. His role was to ensure the SEALs and Army Green Berets in the region abided by the rule of law and that captured enemy troops were treated humanely, in line with the Geneva Conventions.

“He did a phenomenal job,” Capt. Dane Thorleifson told the Miami Herald in 2018.

Nonetheless, while it may be technically true that DeSantis deployed “with” or “alongside” a SEAL team, which was based in Coronado, California, Allmon, who went through SEAL training in 1970 (BUD/S class 58), sees the governor’s narrative as something more akin to a lie by omission.

“I mean, I could go onboard the USS Constellation for a tour, and I can then go around saying, ‘I was on the USS Constellation,’ and just leave it at that,” Allmon told The Daily Beast. “And people would think, ‘Hey, he was on the Constellation.’ It just leaves an open forum, and he should have clarified it a lot better.”


Don Shipley, another former SEAL (SEAL Teams 1 and 2; BUD/S class 131), has made a second career out of exposing fakers. He told The Daily Beast that he has “verified Ron so many times, for so many people,” and that he doesn’t think DeSantis is trying to purposefully mislead anyone. Yet, like Allmon, Shipley noted the distinct lack of follow-up by DeSantis to clarify his service.

“With DeSantis, ‘I was with SEAL Team 1,’ well, it’s the truth,” said Shipley. “But without going into a lot of detail, people [naturally] think, ‘Ah, you were a SEAL.’”

Still, in certain instances, a JAG can be more valuable than additional firepower, according to Shipley.

“They deploy with SEAL teams to keep them out of trouble,” he said. “[DeSantis] wasn’t a shooter, he wasn’t a door-kicker—but they do get some weapons training… [H]e deployed with Team 1 to keep them out of trouble… There’s a saying, ‘If you can take an extra shooter with you, or you can take a lawyer, take the lawyer.’”

DeSantis’ squishy descriptions of his “SEAL” service can be equally irritating for American vets who served in other branches of the service. Former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL), a onetime Air Force pilot who continues to serve as a lieutenant colonel in the Air National Guard, said on Thursday that he has “had people tell me that DeSantis was a Navy SEAL.”

“It bothers me,” Kinzinger told The Daily Beast. “I deployed to support SEALs, Delta, etc, and never once have tried to pretend I was one. And never once said I ‘deployed with the SEALs.’”

Reaction online to DeSantis’ SEAL story was swift, with radio host and former Navy pilot Kai Ryssdal tweeting, “I was on the Navy Staff at the Pentagon with a Navy SEAL. So I, too, am a Navy SEAL.”

“He was just a fucking Navy lawyer, never a SEAL,” former Navy officer Scott Mettler posted. “The SEALs were merely his clients.”

“An actual text from [a] right leaning civilian last night. They think he's a SEAL,” another vet tweeted.



Ron DeSantis in Iraq.

DeSantis for Governor
And in response to Kinzinger, Allmon tweeted, “Let me assure everyone that DeSantis was NEVER a U.S. Navy SEAL! Adam, though we may disagree on political issues, I thank YOU for your Honorable Service to our country! God Bless you and keep you safe.”

DeSantis also spent time during his JAG career stationed at the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where he was an assistant urinalysis coordinator.

Some former SEALs weren’t even aware until a couple of years ago that DeSantis served at all, and his name was not well-known in the SEAL community, Kevin Kent (SEAL Team 5; BUD/S class 200) told The Daily Beast. Kent said he has not heard “anything positive or negative from the community,” and doesn’t know “of anyone that feels like [DeSantis] is stealing valor or banking on the [Naval Special Warfare] community.”

A little embellishment here or there by someone who may have been “SEAL-adjacent,” such as a support technician or, ahem, a JAG, “usually starts out being harmless, and then it snowballs and you just can’t stop,” according to Shipley. “Not everybody in a Dallas Cowboys T-shirt was a Dallas Cowboy, but when you’re wearing a SEALs shirt in Walmart and somebody walks up to you and asks if you were a SEAL, nine times out of 10 they’ll say no. But that tenth time, they say yes—and they like the reaction they get.”

Making a broader point, U.S. Marine Corps recruiter Maj. Tom Schueman said he thinks it’s “unfortunate that the Global War on Terror generation has created a taxonomy of service.”

“Service always comes at a cost, and everyone who wears the uniform makes a sacrifice,” Schueman told The Daily Beast. “We should be proud of our service, and honest in our characterization of it.”

The DeSantis campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/actual-seals-fume-desantis-navy-215216967.html

 

@sirius1902

And here again you are incapable of any objective let alone rational thought and can only name call and personally attack because you are brainwashed with fear hate and anger.


As proven by two points. One DeSantis definitely tried to create the false impression he was Navy Seal by invoking their name and saying he served along with them. Because he knows most people will just see Navy Seal and not look behind it.

“With DeSantis, ‘I was with SEAL Team 1,’ well, it’s the truth,” said Shipley. “But without going into a lot of detail, people [naturally] think, ‘Ah, you were a SEAL.’”

“It bothers me,” Kinzinger told The Daily Beast. “I deployed to support SEALs, Delta, etc, and never once have tried to pretend I was one. And never once said I ‘deployed with the SEALs.’”

“He was just a fucking Navy lawyer, never a SEAL,” former Navy officer Scott Mettler posted. “The SEALs were merely his clients."

https://www.yahoo.com/news/actual-seals-fume-desantis-navy-215216967.html”

That's not me saying those things those are actual Seals and veterans.

But then you also prove how brain washed you are with lie after lie.

That's a lie.

That's a lie.

That's a lie.

And President Biden never said that. That is what Devin Archer testified to under oath in a congressional hearing.


And you being brainwashed is also proven not by just telling lies but by your hate filled angry ranting name calling and personal attacks. Proving it is all just emotionally based because it is fed by the right wing false propaganda noise machine that feeds you fear hate and anger.

 

Poor Trump wanna be. Trails Trump by 40-50 points in latest GOP polls.

 

And poor Nikki Haley. She was already toast but now she['s burnt toast. She dared to tell at least a few half truths like Trump Pence DeSantis and a couple others are responsible for racking up the national debt. And you know how treasonous conservative/America Hating/Republicans are about telling the truth. Now they are going to have to kick her out of the party. They won't put up with that anymore than they will put up with the Constitution.

 

"Nikki Haley lamented that Trump added trillions to the national debt."

 

Just more of stumbles demented wet dream hopes.

Nikki picked up points from the debate.
From deplorables by the way.

 

Nikki has yet to be on the same stage as Trump. Lets see how she fares then. Even though no GOP debate will talk about Trump's big lie. That is until Trump actually shows up to a debate. Then every GOP wanna be will have to cowboy up as they say.

 

Trump will not be on the ballot.
Neither will Biden.
You need to let the courts deal with trump and biden and find a new leader to follow.
And a different patriot to spew about.

Your material is dated and boring.

 

Haley and Desantis are very happy to hear this.

 

Oh look shooters little parrot showed up again.