Update: NAACP President Derrick Johnson calls the fact that Florida leads the nation in black-owned businesses “propaganda” in laughable interview.
In what appears to be an attempt to hurt Florida’s tourist economy and undermine Ron DeSantis running for president, the NAACP has taken the extraordinary step to issue a “travel warning” to those going to the Sunshine State. The move is further evidence that leftwingers are willing to discredit the reputations of long-valued institutions to “win” a news cycle.
The Miami Herald reports, “The NAACP issued a travel advisory Saturday in response to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ attempts to ban books, reject the Advanced Placement African American Studies course and restrict diversity, equity, and inclusion programs in Florida colleges. The advisory was proposed to the Board of Directors in April during the Florida chapter’s conference in Orlando.
“Florida is openly hostile toward African Americans, people of color and LGBTQ+ individuals,” the advisory says. “Before traveling to Florida, please understand that the state of Florida devalues and marginalizes the contributions of, and the challenges faced by African Americans and other communities of color.”
For NAACP President Derrick Johnson, DeSantis has launched “unrelenting attacks on fundamental freedoms.”
“Let me be clear — failing to teach an accurate representation of the horrors and inequalities that Black Americans have faced and continue to face is a disservice to students and a dereliction of duty to all,” Johnson said in a statement.
“Once again, hate-inspired state leaders have chosen to put politics over people,” chair Leon Russell said in a statement. “Governor Ron DeSantis and the state of Florida have engaged in a blatant war against principles of diversity and inclusion and rejected our shared identities to appeal to a dangerous, extremist minority.”
One of the nation’s oldest civil rights groups, the NAACP joins the League of United Latin American Citizens, a civil rights organization, and Equality Florida, a gay rights advocacy group, in warning travelers that they should not visit Florida.
The League of United Latin American Citizens issued its warning after the governor signed a law that will require “private employers in Florida with 25 or more workers to confirm an employee’s eligibility to work in the United States. It will also invalidate ID cards issued to undocumented immigrants in other states, such as New York, and it will require Florida hospitals that accept Medicaid to ask patients whether they are U.S. citizens or whether they are ‘lawfully present’ in the country.
Equality Florida issued its travel advisory last month, citing concern with a number of laws in Florida, including last year’s passage of legislation that prohibits classroom instruction and discussion about sexual orientation and gender identity in some elementary school grades, a law that is often referred to by opponents as the ‘Don’t Say Gay” bill,’ according to The New York Times.
Although many left-leaning institutions, including the Times, call the latter bill the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, the bill had nothing about regulating speech. Instead, it prohibited sexually explicit books from being taught to schoolchildren between the ages of 4 and 8.
The law took out of some public middle school libraries books like Gender Queer, which, writes the Washington Examiner, “follows the author’s ‘journey of self-identity, which includes the mortification and confusion of adolescent crushes, grappling with how to come out to family and society, bonding with friends over erotic gay fanfiction, and facing the trauma and fundamental violation of pap smears.’
In 2021, it was named one of the most challenged books in the country for its depictions of graphic sexual content that many deemed inappropriate for children. It has been banned by school boards across the country for this reason, while many have also fought to keep the controversial graphic novel on the shelves.”
Staff for the Florida governor posted pictures from the book on social media to allow people to decide for themselves.
It’s not a surprise that leftwing groups would do everything they can to hurt Florida’s economy. DeSantis is expected to announce a run for the White House soon and will likely point to Florida’s booming economic success as a reason to vote for him.
The governor routinely polls better than Joe Biden in swing states and is seen by many as a more significant threat to the incumbent president than former President Donald Trump.
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