When Gov. Ron DeSantis delivered his State of the State address in 2022, the Republican declared Florida as the nation’s freest state. In fact, the governor used the word “freedom” more than a half dozen times in his prepared remarks, concluding that the Sunshine State “has stood as freedom’s vanguard.” Soon after, the governor hit the presidential campaign trail, boasting to voters nationwide that Florida deserves to be seen as a “citadel of freedom.”
As regular readers know, the pitch was difficult to take seriously. This is the same DeSantis who made it harder for Floridians to vote. And made it easier to ban books from school libraries and classrooms. And created restrictions on the right to peaceably protest. And signed an infamous anti-LGBTQ measure described by opponents as the “Don’t Say Gay“ policy.
DeSantis and Florida Republicans also approved a far-right abortion ban and punished the state’s largest private employer for issuing a press release disagreeing with the governor in ways that apparently hurt his feelings.
Now that DeSantis’ national campaign has collapsed, freedom’s vanguard is exploring new ways to curtail freedoms. The Tampa Bay Times reported:
Gov. Ron DeSantis on Friday backed legislative efforts to prevent lab-grown or “cultivated” meat from being made or sold in Florida. “I know the legislature is doing a bill to try to protect our meat,” DeSantis said during an appearance at the South Florida State College Hardee Campus in Bowling Green. “You need meat, OK. And we’re going to have meat in Florida. ... We’re not going to have fake meat. Like that doesn’t work.”
The local report added that cultivated meat “involves a process of taking a small number of cultured cells from animals and growing them in controlled settings to make food. Industry officials have argued the cultivated meat process has been closely scrutinized by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture to ensure safety.”
I won’t pretend to be an expert on the matter, though my general understanding is that the leading private companies in this space have high hopes for the future of the industry. Cultivated meat isn’t yet competing with its traditional rivals at your local grocery store, but it has the potential to make a positive difference when it comes to environmental impacts and animal welfare.
If DeSantis wanted to pursue new government regulations related to labeling, that might make some sense. If he wanted to impose limits on government subsidies for companies working on cultivated meats, that would be worth some public conversation.
But the Florida Republican is instead throwing his support behind a statewide ban.
Or put another way, private consumers can buy private companies’ cultivated meats, but in the citadel of freedom, under DeSantis’ vision, such purchases would be prohibited under new government restrictions on the free market.
Leading Democrats have come to believe they have the upper hand in the larger debate over “freedom,” and Florida Republicans are inadvertently helping make the Democrats’ case.