August of 2021, we did better than August of 2019 pre-COVID.

And so it just shows you that freedom works.

And look, people vote with their feet.

If the media was right and that these other states, the New Yorks and that were the right way and Florida did the wrong way, then you would see people leaving Florida to flock to those

states. And in fact, you see the opposite. Back in 2018, after a hotly contested election, Ron DeSantis

was elected governor of Florida. It was a tight race, but since then, the governor has dramatically

shifted the political tide in the state of Florida. Florida now has a majority of Republican

voters for the first time in state history. Before this, Ronda Santos served as a congressman here in

Florida from 2013 to 2018. But it was in 2020, his name really broke through. His leadership

through COVID-19 drew the eyes of many as he was unwilling to accept that society had to crumble

and people's livelihood stripped

in order to take on the virus. And while so many governors over the last year had kept locking

people down, Florida lifted people up. Since then, Governor DeSantis has only grown in popularity,

suing the Biden administration over the COVID-19 vaccine mandate,

taking action against the immigration crisis on the southern border, and even acting to

solve the ongoing national supply chain interruptions. Governor DeSantis is often reading

the tea leaves of national politics while defending rights within Florida. His action is

part of a new sense of state power that's gone unappreciated for a very long time.

In this episode, the governor and I discussed the biggest lies the media has manufactured about Florida and about him over these past two years,

just how his trademark fighting attitude came about and the surprising upside to all of the smearing from the mainstream media.

Thank you. the smearing from the mainstream media. Hey, hey and welcome.

This is the Ben Shapiro Show Sunday special.

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