Early last month, Florida’s increasingly popular Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, signed a bill banning the establishment of so-called “coronavirus passports” in the state.
That is, neither businesses nor government entities could require citizens or temporary residents of the state to show proof they have been vaccinated for the COVID-19 pandemic before entering a venue or taking part in an event.
“Over the last year we’ve avoided protracted lockdowns and school closures in Florida because I have refused to take the same approach as other lockdown Governors,” said Gov. DeSantis in a press release May 4. “This legislation ensures that legal safeguards are in place so that local governments cannot arbitrarily close our schools or businesses.
“In Florida, your personal choice regarding vaccinations will be protected and no business or government entity will be able to deny you services based on your decision,” he added.
Well, it looks like DeSantis is going to get a legal opportunity to defend his state’s ban.
The governor has been jousting with the Biden regime in an attempt to get the cruise line industry restarted following its year-long shutdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. But the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is telling cruise lines they should require all passengers to show proof of being vaccinated before allowing them on board ships. Cruise lines have said they will follow the CDC’s guidance, which they are considering mandates.
Breitbart News reports:
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is essentially “mandating, effectively, a vaccine passport which is discriminatory,” particularly in relation to the cruise industry, and vowed to oppose any attempts to make vaccine passports a reality if Congress pursues such a controversial agenda item.
DeSantis told Breitbart News in an exclusive interview on Tuesday that the current tension with the cruise industry over vaccine passports is really rooted in the federal agency, as it is “mandating, effectively, a vaccine passport which is discriminatory because we have 100 million-plus Americans who have recovered from COVID.”
“They have immunity. Many of them are not getting vaccinated because they’re already immune. So we don’t believe that that’s good policy to allow that,” he said, ripping the agency for keeping the cruise industry at port.
He added that he would “not even be having this discussion about cruise lines had we not sued the CDC because really they don’t have a leg to stand on.”
“They’re basically saying, Congress has delegated them carte blanche authority to do whatever the hell they want to with cruise ships,” he told Breitbart.
“And so like a vaccine passport, look, obviously I’m not supportive of it, but even people who support, you have to admit, it’s a controversial matter, and it would absolutely require Congress to be the one to authorize that,” he continued. “And I would oppose it if they tried to do that, but clearly, you can’t just say a bureaucracy can do whatever the heck they want.”
The savvy gov also noted that the CDC is “absolutely” being guided by politics.
“You saw a lot of examples, but the one that was the most crystal clear to me was when we were getting ready to do vaccine distribution. They have their ACIP [Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices] panel. They wrote a report in November, I was probably the only governor who read it,” he said, adding it was “mostly about social justice and inequity and all these left-wing buzz terms.”
