Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was confronted by a reporter asking him if the US and his state have done enough to protect children in school five years after the Parkland shooting.
On 14 February 2018, Nikolas Cruz killed 17 people at the school and wounded 17 others.
Tuesday’s questioning of the governor, who entered the office after winning the 2018 election, took place the day after a shooting at Michigan State University on Monday night when three people were killed and five were wounded.
“It’s been five years since the Parkland shooting today. Last night, we had a campus shooting in Michigan. Do you feel we’ve done enough as a state and a country to protect campuses and schools?” a reporter asked Mr DeSantis.
“So five years ago was one of the worst days that this state’s ever had. And I was not governor yet at the time, but it was something that I think not only reverberated in every corner of our state but really across the country,” Mr DeSantis said.
He added that “when I became governor, I got to know many of the families. And these are really, really difficult losses. It was an abominable act,” according to Mediaite.
Mr DeSantis went on to claim that more than $1bn has been spent to “bolster school security” since he became governor.
“We’ve worked hard to bring accountability to folks who maybe could have done something to prevent this guy from being in this position, whether it was removing the sheriff of the county or there was having this school security grand jury, which has led to the removal of some of the school board members,” he added.
“You’ve seen the superintendent replaced. And so I took it very seriously to say, you know, if there’s never accountability, then these things are more likely to happen again. And the thing is, there are things that happen in life that you can’t always foresee or prevent,” Mr DeSantis said. “Sometimes people you wouldn’t expect can do some horrible things. But this was an individual as soon as this had happened, everybody knew in that community who had done it without even getting any firsthand information.”
“It’s almost like he was just a ticking time bomb. So I think we put a lot of effort into that,” he said.
Florida put in place a red flag law in March 2018, when Rick Scott, now a Republican Senator from the state, was the governor.
Mr DeSantis opposed the legislation when he ran for governor, according to CNN.
“We’re going to reform the capital sentencing procedure in Florida,” Mr DeSantis said on Tuesday in reference to the fury many of the victims’ families felt last year when Cruz avoided the death penalty.
“Of course, to get convicted of a crime, you need a unanimous jury. But Nikolas Cruz was somebody everyone knew was guilty and he’s entitled to process,” the governor said. “But ... he admitted it.”
“So then they go for the penalty phase... you kill 17 people – what other penalty can you get other than the ultimate penalty?” Mr DeSantis said. “And yet you have one holdout that can nullify that. That was not the law in Florida for most of the time.”
