Gov. Ron DeSantis wants to offer $5,000 bonuses to persuade anti-vaccine police officers to move to Florida, and MSNBC's Joe Scarborough said that showed Republicans wouldn't be moving beyond Trumpism any time soon.
The Florida Republican, who's considered the face of the post-Donald Trump GOP, wants to encourage police officers who lost their jobs for refusing to comply with vaccine mandates to move to his state, and the "Morning Joe" host blasted DeSantis.
"Any Republicans out there who wants to believe this party can come back and Trump is just a phase that we are going through, take a look at a guy who's considered to be the frontrunner for 2024," Scarborough said. "You can see how intellectually bankrupt this party is. Because that guy who's seen as a frontrunner, if Donald Trump doesn't run, a guy that is saying state power can be used to step on small business owners, oppress small business owners, and stop small business owners from protecting themselves, their workers and their customers. You have a guy that, again, is at the head of this party that's stepping on larger businesses, on cruise lines and telling them what they have to do and what they cannot do, if they want to take steps and keep people on their cruise line healthy, and let's face it, keep their bottom line healthy, Ron DeSantis is using the power of the centralized state to step on them, as well."
"He's stepping on teachers and using the centralized state to step on local school boards," Scarborough added, "and he's using the centralized states to step on anybody on the local level who wants to take reasonable and rational steps that their family doctors would recommend they take to keep their students and teachers and school principals and families safe. Now he's going to give a $5,000 bonus to somebody if they are an anti-vaxxer. That, ladies and gentlemen, is your Republican Party."