As many Broward County residents still clean up days after a historic deluge, Florida's top Democrats criticized Gov. Ron DeSantis for not visiting the devastated areas.
Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried and other Democrats claimed Tuesday that DeSantis went missing in action and was campaigning while people in Broward suffered last week from catastrophic flooding, property damage, and now gas shortages.
"Instead of fighting with Mickey Mouse, how about this, Ron? Show up for the people of our state," Fried said in a news conference in Plantation. "Be here, see the damage, hear the stories of your constituents."
NBC6 reached out to DeSantis' office and asked for a response on the Democrats' news conference and if there were any future travel plans for the governor to visit Fort Lauderdale.
Get South Florida local news, weather forecasts and entertainment stories to your inbox. Sign up for NBC South Florida newsletters.
"It's wrong for the media & political critics to rush to politicize every natural disaster," DeSantis' deputy press secretary Jeremy T. Redfern said in a statement to NBC6. "The governor left before the unprecedented flooding (which intensified later in the night.) He returned the next today. Nonetheless, at the direction of Governor DeSantis, the state emergency response apparatus was and continues to be in full swing responding to the flooding and the needs of the localities as they are communicated to us."
Redfern went on to mention DeSantis declaring a state of emergency for Broward and how Florida’s Division of Emergency Management was working to alleviate gas supply issues.
