'That's How Elections Should Be Run': Gov. Ron DeSantis Praises Florida's Election Results
TALLAHASSEE (CBSMiami) – Florida Governor Ron DeSantis praised the state's improvements with counting Election Day ballots, following the election chaos in Broward and Palm Beach counties in 2018 and the 2000 Bush vs. Gore recount debacle.
At a press conference in Tallahassee on Wednesday, Gov. DeSantis said Florida is now an inspiration to others.
"Florida was able to handle 11 million ballots, a combination of in-person early voting, vote-by-mail, Election Day, and process them in a timely way, tabulate them and report them. And these other states had opportunity to do that. They haven't done it the way Florida did it, I think that inspires confidence. I think that's how elections should be run," said DeSantis.
In addition to the praising Florida's swift ballot count, he said the contrast between Florida and some other states is dramatic.
"I think it's a testament to the state's performance, that as you see chaos unfolding in some of these other battleground states, where the votes may not be counted for days, where one state isn't counting anything today, they're just going to go back tomorrow—that people are actually looking at Florida and asking the question: 'Why can't these states be more like Florida?'" DeSantis said.
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The governor also praised both Broward and Palm Beach counties for handling the issues that arose after the 2018 Gubernatorial election.
"Those two counties did a great job and I commend both supervisors and those counties for all their hard work," he said.
When DeSantis took office, he accepted the resignation of the Broward County Supervisor of Elections and also suspended and removed the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections.
"I also appointed Laura Lee as Secretary of State, and she conducted a review of our elections infrastructure, we had a particular focus on cybersecurity just because there have been threats in those areas and took appropriate action. And we also had additional personnel ready to go for this election, should there have needed to be more manpower to help people vote or to process votes."
The Governor said that is "very important for public confidence and for voters," then he thanked all of the elections supervisors and all of the election workers through the state of Florida saying, "they really did an admirable job up and down the state."
DeSantis also talked about President Trump's victory in Florida saying the President has always been there for the Sunshine state.
"Whenever we needed hurricane relief, helping our military bases, our space, infrastructure and space industries, Everglades funding, you name it, the President's been there. And I think that was really a historic victory for President Trump here in the state of Florida."
