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Ron DeSantis, expert in annoying the right people

AP Photo/Mary Altaffer

Ho-hum. It’s another day ending in “Y,” and Ron DeSantis continues to annoy all the right people. We admire your consistency, Governor.

The latest to join list: New York City Mayor Eric Adams and actress Nicola Peltz-Beckham. One runs a high-tax,  crime-ridden city that in recent years has chased off thousands of high-earning young professionals. You may remember the other from her roles in Transformers: Age of Extinction and, last year, as the tragic Dorothy Stratten in Hulu’s Welcome to Chippendales.  

Hizzoner was piqued that New York was included on DeSantis’ his three-city Presidents Day swing, where he touted his commitment to law enforcement as well as his opposition to left-leaning criminal justice reforms.

Ahead of DeSantis’ appearance before a group of local Republicans and law enforcement officers on Staten Island, Adams poked at the Florida governor and probable Republican presidential candidate in a tweet.

“Welcome to NYC, @GovRonDeSantis, a place where we don’t ban books, discriminate against our LGBTQ+ neighbors, use asylum seekers as props, or let the government stand between a woman and health care. We’re happy to teach you something about values while you’re here.”

Led by DeSantis War Room top gun Christina Pushaw, the corresponding ratio was spectacular.

Meanwhile, DeSantis remained stubbornly on message. Introduced by former candidate for New York governor Lee Zeldin — whose own law-and-order platform pushed incumbent Kathy Hochul to the limit — the Sunshine State’s chief executive went straight for New York’s squishy underbelly: 

“This idea of no cash bail and you just release ’em right back on to the street, and I read that New York is the only state that doesn’t allow judges to consider, when they’re making a bail determination, whether someone’s a danger to the community,” DeSantis said. 

“As much as I’m proud of Florida doing well, I want the country to do well. … We fight the woke when they go after our law enforcement. We do not surrender to the woke mob. Our state is where woke goes to die.”

So, with all this feisty high-profile banter going on, how does a member of the Hollywood set get on the list? 

Let’s review.

For her three-day, $3.2 million wedding to Brooklyn Beckham in Palm Beach last year, the bride and her mom apparently wanted Meghan and Harry of the royal Windsor clan on the guest list, but not the governor of Florida.

“(DeSantis) must be OFF THE GUEST LIST. PLEASE CONFIRM!!” the bride wrote 1:09 a.m. on March 3, 2022, according to documents.

We know this because of filings in a pair of dueling civil suits over the planning and execution of the celebration.

What’s the DeSantis prohibition all about? Who knows? Nicola doesn’t flaunt her politics, so we can’t say if, like 98% of Hollywood damsels, she was righteously riled up about DeSantis’ policy positions.

Here’s a potential clue: Nicola’s daddy, Trian Fund Management founder and Wendy’s board chairman Nelson Peltz, hosted a big-ticket fundraiser in February 2020 for then-President Donald Trump. And we know what Trump thinks about DeSantis.

Nonetheless, being banned from a Palm Beach event dripping with the impossibly rich and famous is nothing even remotely approaching a slight. Indeed, any way you slice it, an endorsement such as this, rich with backhanded praise, is beyond price.

Score another for the possible future presidential contender.

Did we forget anybody? Right, right. Before we go, we must acknowledge the look-at-me snow-boot-stomping from the Midwest:  Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who condemned DeSantis’ visit with Chicago’s Fraternal Order of Police in Elmhurst, and Second City Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who sneered, “Ron DeSantis has perfected being a bigoted, racist demagogue.” Project much, Madam Mayor?

But who are you going to believe? Overseers of a state and city that bled nearly 327,000 residents since July 2020 — a 2.5% slide — or the one whose state was No. 1 in the U.S. for population growth in 2022. Last year alone, Florida processed nearly 322,000 requests for out-of-state driver’s license trades — 41,885 of them from former New Yorkers.

As the saying goes, “Moving vans don’t lie.”

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David Strom 5:20 PM | May 01, 2024
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