Yahoo Movies Biden’s policies will be good for Florida — as long as DeSantis doesn’t get in the way | Editorial
Today, the official Trump era ends, and the Biden years begin.
Unfortunately, Florida has a Biden problem. Of the state’s 67 counties, only 11, including Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach, went for the new president. The rest stayed red for Trump.
Here’s one challenge: Biden, unlike President Trump, is not associated with Florida.
He has no strong ties to the area. No vacations here like presidents John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon and Trump. In addition, there’s a hostile governor who likely will be egged on by the sore-loser former president, who will make Mar-a-Lago his home.
Still, Biden’s inauguration marks a new direction for the nation and, South Florida, by default. How will his administration’s first 100 days impact South Florida?
COVID-19
Gov. DeSantis should give it a rest.
Joe Biden wasn’t even president yet, but Florida’s governor already knew — knew! — that the soon-to-be-president’s plan to add FEMA’s organizational muscle to the nation’s underwhelming vaccine roll-out is a loser of an idea. A “big mistake,” DeSantis called it Tuesday.
Now, the governor needs to give it a chance. Unless DeSantis can point to what has gone spectacularly right while the coronavirus marched across the state — aided and abetted by the governor himself — it’s past time for a president to take charge and who’s committed to taking responsibility for subduing this disease.
During an interview with WFXE-FM in Columbus, Georgia, according to The New York Times, Biden outlined a “fundamentally new approach, establishing thousands of federally run or federally supported community vaccination centers of various size located in places like high school gymnasiums and NFL stadiums.”
This is just the big-picture approach that has been missing as the Trump administration went AWOL in developing a coordinated and collaborative national approach for getting shots in arms. And it’s just what Florida — especially South Florida — is desperate for.
FEMA, which has had its own challenges in the past, has the organizational framework, the ability to distribute necessary resources and a leader committed to the cause.
DeSantis’ small-government approach has left it up to the locals to come up with their own processes. They have been working hard to make it work, but senior citizens, given top priority, are having a hell of a time making appointments as phone lines and portals crash, available slots fill up and sites run out of vaccine.
As of Tuesday, Florida’s total COVID-19 death toll stood at 24,820, the fourth-highest in the country, according to a New York Times database. DeSantis, who seems to be impervious to Floridians’ suffering — and who continues to sow the pandemic with political chaos — should not do anything to impede the federal response.
That would be a big mistake.
IMMIGRATION
The most pressing issues in South Florida involve the fragile status of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals — DACA and TPS, or Temporary Protected Status, for Haitians and Venezuelans. Biden announced Tuesday that his administration will create an eight-year path for legal residency for millions of undocumented immigrants and also for the thousands of DACA recipients — DREAMers — who live in South Florida and across the country, awaiting legal status.
Biden also needs to soften the TPS timeline for Haitians, while keeping in force Trump’s last-minute reprieve from deportation that he granted up to 200,000 Venenzulans Tuesday. who have settled in South Florida — legally — as their countries remain in turmoil.
ENVIRONMENT
Under a Biden administration, Florida could be a big winner.
Just as the United States has needed a unified, national response to COVID-19, it needs one for dealing with climate change, and Biden already has named an environmental team and a climate czar — John Kerry.
First off, the United States, is rejoining the Paris climate accords. Biden knows that addressing climate change and sea-level rise decisively and quickly are imperative, especially for this coastal state. The Biden team will try to undo or block many of the current administration’s misguided initiatives.
A climate-savvy Biden administration will be a blessing for Florida, where environmental conditions underpin our very existence.
CUBA, LATIN AMERICA
Cuba remains a thorny issue, and scoring points with dual-generational Cuban exiles will be tricky for Biden. During his final days in office, President Trump clamped down on the island, declaring it a terrorist state and ending all of the Obama administration’s normalization of ties while Cuba continued its human-rights abuses.
If Biden favors a return to the Obama model — which he shouldn’t — he will face even stauncher criticism from Cuban exiles, who largely voted for Trump. Younger Cuban exiles would likely favor such thawing, but they are not as reliable a voting bloc.
Cuba is Biden’s true Florida dilemma.
By contrast, where Trump largely ignored Latin America — he mainly irritated Mexico and unsuccessfully threatened Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro — Biden has hinted he will have a coherent Latin American foreign policy, which is welcome news.
