A truism often misattributed to Albert Einstein or H.L. Mencken says, “Adversity introduces a man to himself.” When that individual holds a position of responsibility, adversity also introduces that person to the broader public. The collapse of the condominium in Surfside, Florida, unintentionally reveals how susceptible President Joe Biden is to baseless media talking points, and how independent-minded Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is.
The number of victims killed by the June 24 collapse of a condominium in Surfside, Florida, climbed to 24 on Saturday, as searchers continue to seek 124 missing persons. As the nation continues to mourn the rising death toll, the media successfully introduced the notion that a “climate crisis” triggered the disaster to the highest levels of political power.
In nationally televised remarks on Thursday, President Joe Biden raised the possibility that climate change had a hand in the condo collapse:
There are all kinds of discussions about whether or not they thought that water level rising — what impact it had. And interesting to me — I didn’t raise it — but how many of the survivors and how many of the families talked about the impact of global warming. How much — and they didn’t know exactly, but they talked about sea levels rising and about how — how there were — and, and the combination of that and the concern about incoming storm, incoming tropical storms.
Biden somewhat qualified the suggestion — which came moments after he visited the site of the wreckage and comforted the survivors and their family members. “I don’t think there is, at this point, any definitive judgment as to why it collapsed, and what [could have been] done to prevent it from happening,” he concluded.
His remarks meant that the media had likely injected the idea that climate change caused the devastating building collapse into the national conversation. Although a few news outlets raised the issue first, it got its largest audience on Tuesday, as CNN ran a chyron asking, “Could Climate Crisis Have Contributed to Building Collapse?” CNN anchor Erica Hill asked Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm if the structural implosion of concrete should be blamed on chlorofluorocarbons.
“Given what we know about the changing climate, given that you’ve seen an increase in so called extraordinary tides, and the impact that that can have in areas like south Florida, do you think that climate would have played a role in that building’s collapse?” Hill inquired.
Granholm took the bait, replying, “Obviously, we don’t know fully, but we do know that the seas are rising. We know that we’re losing inches and inches of beaches, not just in Florida, but all around.”
Joe Biden’s Energy Secretary: “We don’t know fully” if climate change played a role in the Surfside building collapse: pic.twitter.com/S87uPM8pVK
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) June 29, 2021
Although viewers described CNN’s linkage of tragedy with the Biden administration’s political agenda as “ghoulish,” that did not rein in the legacy media from fueling the narrative with more unproven assertions. Time magazine claimed, “The Surfside Collapse Is Renewing Focus on Climate Change Risks.” Rolling Stone detailed the tragic building collapse under the headline, “Miami’s Climate Dystopia Gets Real” and informed readers, “South Florida’s real estate is only going to get more deadly if we continue to ignore all the warning signs of a doomed coastline.” The Washington Post wrote of “the unprecedented infrastructure challenges that climate change poses” nationwide.
Finally, Erica Hill put her talking points into the mouth of the President of the United States. Curiously, the misinformation’s trajectory did not garner coverage among Hill’s fellow reporters. The same media could scarcely stop themselves from claiming that his predecessor, President Donald Trump, constantly rehashed Fox News headlines. CNN’s “Reliable Sources” ran an article, titled “Watch President Trump repeat Fox News talking points.” POLITICO gave Matthew Gertz of Media Matters a platform to declare, “I’ve Studied the Trump-Fox Feedback Loop for Months. It’s Crazier Than You Think.” Newsweek posted a compilation purportedly showing “30 Times Trump Repeated ‘Fox & Friends’ Talking Points in 2018.”
But when Biden recycles assertions that his own energy secretary could not “fully” endorse, there is no media coverage. CNN has no interest in alerting viewers where Biden’s self-serving comments originated; they just want him to keep repeating them.
Compare his performance to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who has served as the voice of reason during this time. DeSantis pushed back against attempts to politicize the tragedy, as well as all efforts to jump to a conclusion before the rubble is cleared.
DeSantis replied to an inquiry about whether climate change poses a “viable” explanation for the Surfside deaths by saying, “I don’t think there’s any evidence of that.”
“What we’re not going to do is use this to advance any pre-existing agenda,” Governor DeSantis told Fox News host Martha McCallum on Wednesday.
“We want the facts. We want the truth, and we want to know what needs to be done to be able to protect other folks that may be living in other types of buildings,” he said.
The president and the governor shared a moment of political and personal decency, as each complimented the other’s full support for the victims in Surfside. DeSantis could easily grandstand or prematurely point fingers at some aspect of the federal government’s response. Instead, he concentrated on finding the survivors, clearing the rubble, and comforting the survivors … and he left calculations about political advantage out of the conversation.
That’s the heart of someone who seeks to serve his constituents, not have their tragedy serve his political aims.
The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.