Appearing in a nationally televised interview Wednesday, Republican State Representative Anthony Sabatini defended lawsuits he’s filed against local governments that are requiring their residents to wear masks inside places of business.
Fielding loaded questions from CNN’s Brianna Keilar, Sabatini lambasted the face-covering order being adopted by several counties across Florida, calling such orders broad and in violation of the state’s equal protection clause.
“We do believe it is unconstitutional,” Sabatini told Keilar. “We have a very robust privacy clause here in the state of Florida, in our state constitution, and it’s supposed to protect all sorts of private information and liberty when it comes to a person.”
“This is something government’s never done before. We’ve never had government tell you what to do with your own face,” he continued.
GOP Florida lawmaker Anthony Sabatini and residents are filing lawsuits against cities and counties with mask mandates. Sabatini says that the state is doing “just fine” handling the pandemic, despite public health officials deeming Florida an epicenter. https://t.co/10vBEdRZtX pic.twitter.com/4kEwpvqTa8
— CNN Newsroom (@CNNnewsroom) July 15, 2020
Sabatini, however, didn’t take the bait, refuting much of Keilar’s talking points while calling out the media’s myopic focus on one singular stat: confirmed cases.
“Brianna, I think what you’re doing is what a lot of folks in the media have done which is harped exclusively on one metric, namely cases,” Sabatini pushed back. “The media has almost exclusively focused on this one number versus the two most important numbers — obviously, hospitalizations and fatalities.”
“If we focus on the two most relevant metrics, Florida is doing fine,” he continued.
Besides cutting the Republican lawmaker off and interrupting his rebuttal numerous times, Keilar also tried to compare wearing a mask in public to wearing a seatbelt. When asked if seatbelts were unconstitutional, Sabatini hit Keilar with a haymaker.
“Seatbelts, of course, are something that are assigned for people to wear in very highly regulated areas of public domain, namely highways,” Sabatini said. “When you go to a highway, you’re driving very fast, you’re operating a piece of technology and so the state has an interest in governing what happens in those very specific arenas.
With Keilar conducting one of the most unprofessional interviews in recent memory, very little was accomplished in the area of political discourse.
Keilar’s emotional response to the mask mandate didn’t stop there, however, with the CNN correspondent frantically trying to score points on Sabatini in a Twitter thread.
Being able to comprehend the difference between opposing a government requirement of face masks—and the actual wearing of masks themselves—is an intelligence test that should be required before any person is allowed to sign up for a @Twitter account.
— Rep. Anthony Sabatini (@AnthonySabatini) July 15, 2020
And yet you do also oppose the actual wearing of masks themselves – at least in your own case. You say they’re annoying and you won’t even wear one in a grocery store, even though it puts customers and essential workers at risk of dying. https://t.co/2wn6PMrjSg
— Brianna Keilar (@brikeilarcnn) July 15, 2020
Your argument is uninformed crap, refuted by constitutional experts, the rant of someone who admits they don’t actually know a single person who has died from covid. It’s a luxury the family members of 138,000 Americans don’t enjoy.
— Brianna Keilar (@brikeilarcnn) July 15, 2020
Your moronic emotional tirade never seems to cease @brikeilarcnn. I spent 100+ days on national guard duty in response to COVID—actually helping people.
You on the other hand, mindlessly and angrily parrot “guidelines” to get a rise—you are an embarrassment to journalism. https://t.co/AaIXNNytKw
— Rep. Anthony Sabatini (@AnthonySabatini) July 15, 2020
As it stands, several counties across the state have issued orders that make wearing a mask mandatory inside establishments like restaurants, grocery stores, buses, churches, and nonprofits. Many of these mandates carry penalties if violated, including fines and potential jail time.
Sabatini maintains that such orders are unconstitutional. He hopes that pushback will lead to counties altering the language — much like what was done in Seminole County.