Florida's AG hates rainbow crosswalks, but he digs giving guns to felons

News and commentary from a Florida vantage point

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier apparently hates rainbows.

He’s been doing his level best to wipe them out — well, repainting them — all over the alleged “Free” State of Florida.

As the state’s top lawyer, he says he’s enforcing rules that ban political messaging on state-mandated roads. Signs with his boss’s name on them are fine. Roads renamed after Charlie Kirk or Donald Trump are fine. But rainbows are not fine.

This is a little odd considering Uthmeier teaches religious education classes in Tallahassee. He should know that the rainbow, according to the Bible story, is the gift God gave Earthlings as a promise never to drown everybody on the planet again. (Everyone except Noah and a few friends and animals, of course. I’m still unclear how dinosaurs and mosquitoes fit into that picture.)

So, what’s not to like about rainbows?

Because rainbows are woke, of course.

And in the “Free” State of Florida, you are free to agree with Uthmeier and his boss, Gov. Ron DeSantis, or you are free to leave. And in Florida, infamously, we Don’t Say Gay. And the gay rights flag comprises the colors of the rainbow. As do all those colorful sidewalks.

Now, to be balanced and fair, while Uthmeier has a burr under his saddle about rainbows and what they represent in popular culture, he’s all about guns.

He couldn’t wait to endorse a court decision opening up the state to the open carry of firearms.

And now, he’s campaigning to allow criminals to carry guns, too.

Yep. Our state’s chief law enforcement officer thinks crooks should be able to pack heat.

Catch them painting a crosswalk with rainbow colors, and they’re off to the slam. But that Colt on their hip? That’s fine and dandy.

This has the law-enforcement community scratching its collective head, and the association of the state’s elected prosecutors has taken exception to Uthmeier’s assertion that “non-violent” felons ought to be able to carry guns, to wit:

“A person who chooses to act in their own self-interest in a manner that risks being sent to prison is a dangerous person,” wrote Douglas Wyler, the general counsel for the prosecutors’ association. “Such a person has demonstrated their disregard for the law without concern for the consequences. From a constitutional perspective, it is a class of people who were historically barred from possession of a firearm, precisely because they are dangerous.

How very odd that our chief law enforcement attorney is at odds with the people who actually put people in jail. Especially since Uthmeier loves, loves, loves concentration camps like Alligator Alcatraz, which he named.

Perhaps this counterintuitive disconnect may have something to do with the fact that Uthmeier, while holding the position of Florida Attorney General, an elective office, has never actually run for public office himself until now.

He was DeSantis’ chief flunky—pardon me, chief of staff—who got appointed to the job when Ashley Moody took a powder to fill in for Marco Rubio when he bailed on his job in the United States Senate to become Trump’s secretary of state.

As DeSantis’ henchman, he has been reported to have been in the heart of the Hope Florida scandal, for which a grand jury presentment in Tallahassee has yet to be released.

Now, he’s finally running for office, trying to keep the job DeSantis gifted him. He faces a Republican primary challenger, and the winner of that contest likely will face former state Sen. Jose Javier Rodriguez, favored among Democrats running for the job.

His Give Crooks Guns stance may play with some Second Amendment fans, but it’s a head-on collision with law enforcement advocates, and it’s hard not to see this, politically, as an unforced error.

Uthmeier is twisting himself in knots to explain his convoluted constitutional arguments. But at the street level, it will be a hard sell—as will his latest declaration that he thinks it’s fine for the state government to give tax dollars to churches, which is a clear violation of the First Amendment’s “Establishment” clause—and state law— that will inevitably end up in court.

He’s a novice at running for office, so maybe he should recall that when you’re explaining, you’re losing.

Or maybe we should just keep that to ourselves.

As Sun Tzu suggested in his Art of War, “Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.”

FOR MORE ON THIS ISSUE:

State can fund religious charter schools, ‘encourage’ religion, Uthmeier says

Rare divide: Florida’s elected prosecutors oppose Uthmeier on arming certain felons

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J.C. Bruce is the founder of Tropic Press, a Florida online news service dedicated to sharing news and commentary relevant to Florida readers, whether it originates in the Sunshine State or elsewhere. Bruce is an award-winning former newspaper editor, journalist and author living in Florida, his native state.

Onward thru the fog

It’s easy to feel overwhelmed if you are a rational person living in the Free State of Florida, but there are plenty of smart, reasonable people just like you here. The purpose of this newsletter and the Tropic Press website is to provide a source of news and commentary that shines a light through this irrational fog.

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J.C. Bruce

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