President Joe Biden has come under fire for his failure of leadership, especially with the Maui wildfires and the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio. Although he did show up in Florida to survey the aftermath of Hurricane Idalia not long after, such failures with other tragedies were still on display, as he once more punted on responding about when he'll go to East Palestine. "There is a lot going on here, and I just haven’t been able to break," the president said, making clear it will be some time, since he's about to take an international trip.
While Biden did visit Maui, he was met with a less-than-warm welcome by outraged residents, and showed up nearly two weeks after the wildfires. He had been on vacation when the news of the disaster broke, offering a "no comment" when asked, and also arrived in Maui from Lake Tahoe, where he had also been on vacation.
At strong contrast is the leadership of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), who is also running for president. The DeSantis campaign released a roundup of responses from people praising the governor for his response to the hurricane, including news outlets and political pundits across various networks. This included coverage from Townhall, as Julio was able to offer reports on the ground in real time.
The DeSantis War Room similarly tweeted out a video roundup of praise for the governor.
As Matt covered on Tuesday and Karen Townsend wrote for our sister site of Hot Air on Monday, part of DeSantis' response involved bringing attention to the failed response in Maui, and calling the media out for their narrative on the matter.
During a Sunday press conference, DeSantis was asked, "Do you trust the federal government to help, seeing what happened in Hawaii just a few weeks ago and in East Palestine a few months ago?"
It's certainly a fair question, and one can't exactly expect a very honest response from the White House on it.
"I think that Maui is a total catastrophe, what happened there. And I don’t think we have all the answers to that. I think we should have all the answers to that.It’s interesting how incurious our corporate media is about what happened in Maui. I mean, I don’t see them interviewing parents who can’t find their kids and people we know, there’s a lot of people missing. So that was a total disaster, really, really heartbreaking to hear some of the stories, even though they’re not being publicized," DeSantis responded.
MUST WATCH: @RonDeSantis rips the federal government and corporate media over the “total catastrophe” in Maui.
— DeSantis War Room 🐊 (@DeSantisWarRoom) September 3, 2023
“It’s interesting how incurious our corporate media is about what happened in Maui. I don’t see them interviewing parents who can’t find their kids." pic.twitter.com/2FG81tHten
Putting the media in their place is what DeSantis does best, after all, especially when it comes to storm coverage, just as he did when asked last week about how former and potentially future President Donald Trump had not yet commented about the hurricane.
"That is not my concern," DeSantis made clear. "My concern is protecting the people of Florida," as he spent the rest of his answer discussing a preparedness response.
There's also a contrast in the responses, though it's not a matter of politics to point out that a sluggish response from the Biden administration's EPA has made it so people are afraid to return to their homes in East Palestine, or else they risk getting sick. They've felt forgotten and abandoned. There's so much mystery in Maui, from the amount of people accounted for to those black "Biden curtains."
Meanwhile, in Florida, as Julio covered, the National Guard was able to provide assistance in Florida, and residents had power restored in record time. Impacted communities were given the assistance and aid they needed, with the governor providing frequent updates and providing support on the ground.
As we can see from his response to the question about Trump, DeSantis puts politics aside when it comes to making sure people are as safe and prepared as possible. He even left the campaign trail to return to the state to give remarks when three people were killed at a Dollar General near a historically black college, and also to handle the storm.
But, when others push a political agenda in the face of tragedy, as Biden did when on the ground in Florida. DeSantis became the first governor to reject Green New Deal funding, which had the left in a collective meltdown mode.
"The notion that somehow if we just adopt very left-wing policies at the federal level, that somehow we will not have hurricanes is a lie," DeSantis reminded when pushing back against the president's narrative.
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