Politico is facing another round of criticism over a tweet about Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and federal relief funds.
The criticism started after Politico shared a story on Monday about DeSantis’ criticism of President Joe Biden, and the “billions” Florida has received in federal dollars.
“DeSantis has been a critic of Biden on nearly every policy front. But he sure does like the president’s wallet. Over the past two years, DeSantis’ admin received billions in federal relief cash, which the governor has used to fund his top priorities,” the tweet caption read.
The premise of the caption is incredibly bizarre.
For starters, it is not “the president’s wallet.” Congress appropriates funds for federal programs.
Also, it is not as though the funds used in programs are coming from Biden’s bank account. The money comes from hardworking taxpayers. And this tweet gives the impression that Biden is somehow funding government relief programs and has the discretion to deny money to states because he doesn’t like a certain governor.
Tim Carney, a conservative columnist for the Washington Examiner, tweeted, “Step one: Increase federal spending in all parts of our life. Step two: Suggest that if you take this money, you should stop criticizing the president. Step three: High five your editors for your super pwnage.”
“I was not aware that Joe Biden has billions of dollars to his name. Or did you mean federally allocated taxpayer dollars, you dolts?” Ben Shapiro tweeted.
The Atlantic’s Conor Friedersdorf tweeted, “I strongly dislike the phrase ‘the president’s wallet.’ It’s the federal treasury, filled with the taxpayers’ dollars, which are allocated by Congress.”
Nicholas Fondacaro of The Media Research Center suggested the writers need to go back to school as he wrote, “Looks like the folks at Politico need to go back to high school civics to learn a) who funds the government, b) which branch has the power of the purse, and c) the president isn’t a sugar daddy despite liberal fantasies.”
Check out some of the other reactions below:
https://twitter.com/ScottJenningsKY/status/1576996317767028736
https://twitter.com/seanmdav/status/1577000714890776577
This was just a weird tweet and a weird story. Elected officials should not have to withhold criticism of a president for fear of not receiving federal relief funds after a catastrophic natural disaster — or be labeled a hypocrite or something.
Those funds do not belong to the president. He is not some king in charge of the nation’s coffers who distributes funds as he pleases. The federal government sending Florida relief funds is not some great act of grace from our wonderful and magnificent and majestic President Biden — that is simply its job.