The Republican governor of Florida intensified his attacks on the vaccine in order to contrast his record with that of former President Donald Trump.
Speaking from a studio in West Palm Beach, DeSantis held a 90-minute roundtable with vaccine skeptics and asked the Florida Supreme Court to set up a statewide grand jury to investigate "crimes and wrongdoing."
He has made his policies a key point of political discussion. He banned Biden-backed mask and vaccine mandates and reopened schools and businesses before most other states.
The governor could accentuate the differences between himself and the president if he entered the contest.
The governor made his announcement close to Mar-a-Lago, the oceanfront private club and estate where the president lives in Palm Beach.
Major announcements are held at locations that have subliminal messages. He called Biden "Brandon" in reference to the anti-Biden chant and signed a bill banning workplace vaccine mandates.
Trump has been more aggressive in his attacks on the congressman. Trump bashed the governor because he'd endorsed him in the past and helped him get the GOP nomination.
He said that governors who don't announce their vaccine status are useless. Many news outlets interpreted the comment as a dig against the congressman, who hasn't said if he received a booster shot.
It's not known if Trump will use his success on the vaccine in his program. Dr. Paul Offit, a leading infectious disease expert at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, said that Trump should take bows over the vaccines, calling them the greatest scientific and medical advancement in his lifetime.
He said that he didn't understand why Trump didn't brag more about it.
Offit said that Trump is a modest man who doesn't like putting his name on things.
There are several signs that the operation may become a liability to Trump. Republicans and Trump supporters booed when he encouraged them to get the vaccine.
One of Trump's most formidable opponents would be Ron DeSantis. In a USA Today-Suffolk University poll, Trump was behind by a wide margin.
The governor needs to contrast himself with Trump if he runs for president. Many news outlets and Democrats portray DeSantis as similar to Trump.
Insider reported in September that several GOP operatives believed that Trump's policies could be used to attack him.
John Thomas, who started a pro-DeSantis Super PAC, told Insider that pushing back and ensuring accountability is a win for the candidate. The issue serves as a reminder to the American people that he made the right calls when fighting against vaccine mandates.
Trump is bashed by the Biden administration on his policies. Trump's administration released guidance in support of wearing masks while he was in office.
Steven Cheung, Trump's campaign spokesman, told Insider that Trump allowed each state to decide what was best for its residents. He accused Biden of failing to continue the Trump administration's successes because more people died under Biden than under Trump.
He said that the initiative gave people the option of using drugs if they wanted to.
Other Trump supporters didn't like him very much. Alex Bruesewitz is the CEO of X Strategies.
"Facts be damned, this is what to expect from career politicians looking to climb the political ladder," he said. Ron DeSantis was Florida's biggest vaccine advocate when it was good PR, but now as he tries to position himself for his next campaign, he is reinventing reality and hoping nobody will notice." The political opportunism won't be easy to manipulate.
He did events across Florida to encourage the use of the COVID vaccine, but later had vaccine skeptics appear at several events and offered health advice that clashed with the CDC.
The FDA and CDC have cleared the bivalent booster for people as young as 6 months of age if they have previously had the vaccine. Florida's health agency recommends against the shots for healthy children. The countries with similar guidance are:
During his second term, he plans to go further. The governor wants the legislature to pass a law that would prevent hospitals from taking medical licenses from doctors who speak out against COVID-19.
He wants the Florida Surgeon General to start a program with the University of Florida to investigate sudden deaths in people who received the COVID shot, and he wants Ladapo to lead a public health integrity committee. Guidance will be given about COVID vaccines.
One of the committee members is a doctor. Bari Weiss, a conservative journalist, has been in the news in the last few days after revealing that he had a problem with the visibility of his social media posts.
The grand jury was investigating on Tuesday. He accused the government of downplaying vaccine side effects such as myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart muscle, in teens and young men, and called out CDC guidance that initially and wrongly said people could not become infectious with the coronaviruses if they were vaccinations.
"I think people want to know what's going on and they want to be held accountable," he said. There needs to be a thorough investigation about what happened.
He accused the pharmaceutical industry of possibly misleading on the vaccine and said a grand jury would have legal processes that would be able to get more information.
The Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which has shown in rare cases to be linked to an increase in blood clot, wasn't the focus of the DeSantis Roundtable. Other, non-COVID vaccines should be considered safe according to the scientists at the Roundtable.
Moderna didn't reply to questions about the announcement. Sharon Castillo, a spokeswoman for Pfizer, defended the effectiveness of the vaccine in an email to Insider.
The vaccines prevented more than 18 million hospitalizations and 3 million deaths.
The vaccine was authorized by numerous regulatory agencies after a thorough and independent evaluation of the scientific data on quality, safety, and efficacy.
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