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DeSantis’s personal guard: Fewer hurricanes, more immigration stunts

Last year Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis decided he needed to revive the old State Guard under his personal command—in order, he said, "to respond to a projected active hurricane season." In particular:

In a natural disaster-prone state such as Florida with a potentially active hurricane season on the horizon, there is a clear and present need for a larger civilian emergency response force.

But times change, and so do ambitions:

Promoted by DeSantis as an “emergency focused, civilian defense force” when it was established in June 2022, the state guard has quickly morphed into something quite different....Volunteers have been trained for military combat, including the use of weapons; khaki polo shirts and pants were replaced by camouflage uniforms;

Additionally, DeSantis’s compliant, Republican-led state legislature has contributed to the change of direction, this year approving a massive expansion in the force’s funding, size and equipment. Its budget increased from $10m to $107.5m, and its maximum size more than tripled from 400 recruits to 1,500.

On the governor’s shopping list were helicopters, boats, police powers and reportedly even cellphone-hacking technology for a force outside of federal jurisdiction, and accountable directly to him.

....Maj Gen John D Haas, Florida’s adjutant general overseeing the state’s national guard...seemed to confirm the veterans’ assertion that the state guard’s brief had changed. It was a  “military organization”, he said, that will be used for “aiding law enforcement with riots and illegal immigration”.

Several veterans have recently quit the Guard over this change in direction and have gone public with their concerns. The response, generally speaking, has been to accuse them of being whiners who should pound sand. DeSantis has his personal little military force in hand, and he has no intention of letting go.

30 thoughts on “DeSantis’s personal guard: Fewer hurricanes, more immigration stunts

  1. Adam Strange

    There are increasingly self-sorting populations which support guys like DeSantis and Trump because they completely understand what they stand for, and they like it. Some people are just not comfortable living in a liberal democracy.

    My concern is that they will reach a critical mass in parts of this country, and we will have to fight another civil war to avoid the fate of Germany in 1933 and Russia since forever.

    I may get some criticism for this opinion, but I believe that people of this authoritarian bent comprise about 42% of the populations of most of the countries on earth. They will always be with us, just waiting to institute another Reich, if they are not actively opposed.

    1. bbleh

      No question that they're a near-enough majority that without opposition they'd probably take over and do some serious damage (likely including terminating some of us undesirables). But like the Nazis and the Russian and Chinese (nominally) communist authoritarian regimes, I think the hard-core authoritarians -- the ones who really want to institute some form of dictatorship -- are maybe 20%, and the rest are "Good Germans" who don't want trouble and are willing to go along and look the other way. And I think there are more of the latter right now because of demographics. But whatever the proportions, you're absolutely right about the opposition: they're relentless, which means we gotta be too.

      1. Aleks311

        I disagree that such people are that common. And those people may not agree on exactly what policies they'd like to ram down everyone else's throat-- there are leftwingers who can be pretty authoritarian too. I'd put the total number down around 30% to 1/3.

    2. iamr4man

      When I look at Trump and DeSantis I kind of see the same guy, but thinking about it it seems to me that Trump appeals to people who want a monarch DeSantis appeals to people who want a dictator.

    3. azumbrunn

      It seems that a population like this exists everywhere. I take issue with your quantitative estimate though. Right now I agree with 42% in the US. But: The phenomenon comes in waves, there was one in the 1920s and 30s. There is one now. I hope it is cresting right about now. The trick would be to survive the crest without ceding power. After that we will be in the clear for a few decades. Or so I hope.

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  2. bbleh

    I swear I'm just waiting for him to start sporting epaulets and shoulder braid and a peaked cap and dark sunglasses.

    1. dilbert dogbert

      So many snappy uniforms to chose from the SS and SA and he goes with camo. The man has no fashion sense!!!
      Will they have to declare personal loyalty to DeeSantos?
      Will they have to salute him with the palm down straight arm and Heil DeeSantos???
      I have seen the future and it belongs to us.

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  4. Austin

    Who knew the Constitution would be a suicide pact? Maybe allowing rural people such outsized control over elections is a bad idea in a democracy, which is why more stable democracies don’t do that?

    It’s too bad that there is no mechanism to allow states to petition Congress for secession. A Flexit, Texit and Rexit (red state exit) would allow the rest of us to jettison most of our fascist problem: the blue states are nowhere near as ungovernable or prone to insurrection against the national government.

      1. Austin

        I think your post is supposed to scare me but I look at that map and think “yep those are definitely the parts of the US that we should get rid of.” Plus again I don’t think we’d actually have to get rid of all of it. Just let a few of them secede and immediately become economic basket cases - because even the “successful” red states depend on federal spending to remain “desirable” places to live - and then hold them up as examples to the others. (Notice nobody is talking about leaving the EU lately…)

  5. Salamander

    Sounds like somebody is readying himself to foment an armed insurrection.

    "Protecting Florida from immigrants"? Really? Is DeSatan going to send his little private army to Texas to harrass asylum seekers at the border? Seems as if Florida doesn't have a "border" to protect, making it necessary to cross state lines to get at immigrants in other states that do have borders.

    How is this even legal? Maybe the Liberal-Commie FBI needs to look into it.

  6. sonofthereturnofaptidude

    I don't think Desantis plans to use the state militia for his own personal regiment. I think he wants to take full credit for whatever he can that they accomplish. So if there's a prison riot and the militia puts it down, it makes him look strong, boosting his popularity.

    Of course, this could backfire, and in a way it already has.

    1. kkseattle

      Of all the state guards in the nation (18, I believe), this is the only one that reports directly to the Governor.

  7. azumbrunn

    Ha! A mini-Wagner! When does he send those guys on their march to Washington? Afterwards we send him to Belarus--where he will feel at home.

  8. Altoid

    Mighty big bodyguard for one little dude. He can rig them all with wrap-around sunglasses and ARs and call them something snappy, like, oh, "Tonton Macoutes." It'll make Florida's Haitian and Cuban and Venezuelan and Guatemalan immigrants feel like they never left home.

    So based on what the Herr Kommandant, er, adjutant general, says, DeSantis is planning to parade around in a bunch of riots now? What's he plotting that'll get people into the streets?

    Or, I know, their job will be to escort him on forays into Disney World and protect him from Teh Wokes.

  9. illilillili

    If the voters want corrupt self-serving politicians and large government spending the taxes the voters pay, then give the voters what they want!

  10. J. Frank Parnell

    In the original German, Florida State Guard is pronounced Leibstandarte Schutzstaffel Ronald DeSantis,

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