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‘Such Nonsense’: Testy DeSantis Shouts Down Critique of His Gun Policies

The Florida governor was again forced to defend himself in the wake of the Jacksonville shooting.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis got into a fiery exchange with an audience member at a Thursday press conference after the man said the governor was to blame for a racially motivated shooting in Jacksonville last month that killed three. “You have allowed weapons to fill the streets…that have caused the deaths of the people who were murdered a couple weeks ago,” the audience member said before DeSantis cut him off. “I’m not going to let you accuse me of committing criminal activity,” DeSantis shot back. “I am not going to take that.” The back-and-forth devolved further as DeSantis decried his arguments as “such nonsense.” Video shows campaign staff escorted the man out before he could finish his comments. Critics have maintained that the loose gun laws championed by DeSantis, as well as his efforts to defund and ban diversity programs, contributed to the climate surrounding the Jacksonville shooting. At the presser, DeSantis defended his record and said the gunman should have been ruled ineligible to buy a firearm given his history of mental illness, making no mention of the swastikas on his weapon nor his racist manifesto.