DeSantis scathes blaming climate change for Hurricane Idalia: ‘That is a lie’

YANKEETOWN, Fla. – Gov. Ron DeSantis scathed the notion that man-made climate change is to blame for powerful hurricanes ramming into Florida with high sustained wind speeds and devastation.

DeSantis was asked at a press conference Sunday what he thinks about “Joe Biden and the corporate media [blaming] climate change” for hurricanes like Idalia, which made landfall last Wednesday in the Big Bend region of Florida as a Category 3.

“There was a storm that went on this almost exact track in 1896 and it had 125 mile an hour winds, just like this one,” DeSantis said. “The most powerful storm hurricane we’ve ever had is actually [the] Labor Day Hurricane of 1935. It had 185 miles an hour sustained winds.”

The governor called such claims “false” and urged people to “stop politicizing natural disasters” and the weather.

“We know from history, there have been times where it’s been very busy in Florida. Late 40s, early 50s, you had a lot of hits of significant hurricanes,” DeSantis said. “I think sometimes, people need to take a breath and get a little bit of perspective here.”

“But the notion that [we] somehow just adopt very left wing policies at the federal level, that somehow we will not have hurricanes, that is a lie,” he said. “And that is people trying to take what’s happened with different types of storms, and use that as a pretext to advance their agenda on the backs of people that are suffering – and that’s wrong.”

“We’re not going to do that in the state of Florida,” DeSantis said.

Idalia briefly became a Category 4 storm after rapidly intensifying over the warm Gulf of Mexico waters just shortly before weakening to Category 3 at landfall.

For comparison, DeSantis’ cited hurricanes were the same strength or stronger.

In 1896, the hurricane DeSantis referenced did make landfall in the Big Bend region of Florida with landfall winds of 125 mph. It resulted in around 100 deaths.

The Labor Day Hurricane of 1935 reportedly killed around 408 people in the Florida Keys. Winds were sustained anywhere from 150mph to 200 mph, a strong Category 5 storm, and some gusts even reaching 250 mph. The storm, however, was very compact.

The question from the reporter came a few days after President Joe Biden said that disasters like Idalia are clearly impacted by climate change, saying no “intelligent” person could doubt it.

Biden visited Florida over the weekend to witness Idalia’s damage firsthand. He and DeSantis did not meet, but Biden said last week that the governor and he “trust” each other in responding to Idalia and helping Floridians recover.

With recovery continuing less than a week after landfall, power outages have become virtually nonexistent from the storm in most parts of Florida aside from the landfall counties in the Big Bend.

Outages sat at around 30,000 as of Monday morning, almost entirely in that landfall region, but still declining.