The war of words between California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) continued this week, with the latter referring to San Francisco as a “dumpster fire” that Democrats were fleeing, only to vote Democrat again in Florida.
The context of the insult was the ongoing fight over Disney, which — under pressure from left-wing employees — opposed Florida’s law barring sexuality and gender instruction from K-3 classes in public school, which critics call “Don’t Say Gay.”
Last week, Florida passed another law stripping Disney of special self-governing powers it had wielded since the building of Disney World in Orlando in the 1960s. Disney is demanding that Florida compensate it for decades of public improvements.
Newsom attacked DeSantis over the law, claiming it would raise property taxes and that it was generally bad for business:
Newsom also called the bill an “authoritarian” assault on free speech, which he claimed California protects (though a 2017 California law prohibiting “misgendering” was recently struck down by the courts as a violation of the First Amendment):
Newsom has also tried to use the controversy over the “Don’t Say Gay” bill to urge Disney to move jobs back to California, after the company announced last September that it would relocate 2,000 jobs from high-tax California to low-tax Florida.
On Monday, The Recount posted a video to Twitter in which DeSantis contemplated the problem of employees arriving from blue states in Florida and voting in the “exact same way they voter that turned San Francisco into the dumpster fire that it is.”
It is not clear that DeSantis was, as the San Francisco Chronicle alleges, “saying he doesn’t want Golden State businesses moving to Florida,” but rather noting a common concern among conservatives that successful “red” states may turn “blue.”
San Francisco is widely cited as an example of left-wing failure, with rising crime, homelessness, drug use, and poor public schools. Some San Francisco voters seem to have had enough, recalling three school board members in a recent election.
An aerial view shows a statue of Eureka, part of the Pioneer Monument, standinb above squares painted on the ground to encourage homeless people to keep to social distancing at a city-sanctioned homeless encampment across from City Hall in San Francisco, California, on May 22, 2020, amid the novel coronavirus pandemic. (Photo by Josh Edelson / AFP) (Photo by JOSH EDELSON/AFP via Getty Images)
Newsom was mayor of San Francisco before becoming lieutenant governor and then winning election as governor in 2018. He is associated with the beginning of the city’s decline, backing left-wing social policies but neglecting basic governance.
DeSantis has used the term “dumpster fire” in other recent contexts. “People are trying to get the hell out of these dumpster fire states that have just done so poorly,” he said in March, commenting on the ongoing exodus from blue states in general.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. His recent book, RED NOVEMBER, tells the story of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary from a conservative perspective. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.