This weekend, Florida Democratic gubernatorial nominee Charlie Crist selected Karla Hernández as his running mate. NBC News political reporter Marc Caputo questioned why Crist would choose a — gasp — teachers’ union president. Bulwark columnist Tim Miller tweeted, “[I don’t know] anything about Karla she might be nice but letting [Florida Gov. Ron] DeSantis run on relitigating pandemic school closure policy seems absolutely insane from a strategic standpoint.”
We think she seems pretty damn nice and awesome!
Back in the early days of the pandemic, Republicans argued that school closures and mask mandates were metaphorical child abuse. Then they escalated to accusing teachers of literal child abuse and grooming. So, DeSantis’s first attack against Hernández is gross but hardly shocking: He accused her of “protecting” a sex offender as union president. We’re just going to get this out of the way right here: SHE DIDN’T.
Wendell Nibbs wasa former Brownsville Middle School PE teacher who pleaded guilty to child sex charges in 2020. DeSantis described Nibbs as “one of their top union henchmen,” but he was a shop steward — that is, he was elected to represent the school to the union — not Luca Brasi. DeSantis can’t resist the melodrama or slanderous lies!
Everybody knew this was going on, and her union protected him knowing that he represented a threat to those students in middle school classrooms. He abused and he abused and he abused, and he finally got caught and he’s finally in prison.
They cared more about the power of their union than they did about the best interests of these kids. That is disgraceful. You do not put union politics ahead of middle school students who are in danger of being sexually abused. I think that’s disqualifying to be in any political office, much less lieutenant governor of the state of Florida.
DeSantis ran away, taking no questions when he was done with this absolute smear, literally none of which happened except for the fact that it was a long time before Nibbs got caught. No, nobody was “protecting” him. Yeah, Nibbs is garbage. Nine girls accused him of sexual misconduct over his 15 years working as a Miami-Dade County public school teacher. He was first arrested in November 2017 or two counts of sexual battery on a child, and the victims’ accounts detail explicit comments, coercion, and repeated rape inside a classroom. The allegations extend back to 2004, and while it’s awful that he remained free for so long, Hernández and the rest of the union had literally nothing to do with it.
First place, Hernández didn’t even become president of the United Teachers of Dade until 2016. The criminal investigation into Nibbs began in 2015 — and the union doesn’t represent members in criminal cases. DeSantis appears to have run with a manufactured smear from the repulsive Libs of TikTok account.
PREVIOUSLY: Breaking! Meet The Gross Anti-Gay Bigot, Insurrectionist ‘Libs Of TikTok’
Chaya Raichik, who runs the account, tweeted Friday, “Charlie Crist just picked Karla Mats [sic] as his running mate for Gov. She’s the president of a teacher’s union who covered up for a teacher who pled guilty to sexual assault of a student. There were allegations against him for 12 YEARS and the union she was in charge of protected him.”
Raichik, who can’t bother to spell Hernández’s name correctly, promotes the libel that the union “protected” Nibbs and that Hernández was “in charge” during the imaginary coverup. The union plays no role in criminal investigations and Miami-Dade Public Schools district conducts civil investigations. According to the Popular Information newsletter, “Hernández never accompanied Nibbs to any proceeding or had any other role whatsoever in MDPS’ civil investigations of Nibbs.”
Raichik assembled her hit piece pretty quickly, and it’s likely that she had some help. The DeSantis campaign’s Rapid Response Director Christina Pushaw frequently interacts with the Libs of TikTok account online and told the Washington Post that she’s a “strong supporter of its mission.” The Florida Republican Party repeated this garbage on its website.
Raichik also shared a photo of Hernández posing for a photo with a man in a red shirt underneath a school marquee that reads in part, “We are keeping kids safe.” This is supposedly crushing irony. However, it’s not clear that the Black man in that photo is Nibbs. If it is that sick bastard, the photo is hardly damning. The union represents 30,000 employees of the Miami-Dade County School System.
The Crist campaign also turned DeSantis’s attempted guilt-by-association smear against him.
“It’s a lie. And to top it off, it’s coming from a Governor whose own campaign was led by accused child sexual predator Matt Gaetz, and whose disgusting actions DeSantis still refuses to condemn,” said the Crist campaign’s Communications Director, Samantha Ramirez.
“While Ron DeSantis shields sexual predators in his own party, Karla Hernández is a former special needs teacher who has devoted her life to serving the people of her community.”
I think Hernández is a solid choice for lieutenant governor. I’m glad Crist isn’t running away from teachers’ unions or teachers in general.
Finally, here’s a quick video of DeSantis appearing in public with creepy Rep. Matt Gaetz, dressed like he’s a 1980s nightclub dealer. While Gaetz heaps undue praise on DeSantis, the governor can’t stop touching his dumb hair and stupid face like an idiot.
[Popular Information / Florida Politics]
Follow Stephen Robinson on Twitter.
Do your Amazon shopping through this link, because reasons.
Yr Wonkette is 100 percent ad-free! Please subscribe, donate, and otherwise help keep us alive and kicking!
![The Key Social Platform Metrics to Track [Infographic]](https://www.socialmediatoday.com/imgproxy/yih0D9JSuCD3zGuYdgBP3ai49z_hed60tWBoqs9jL_I/g:ce/rs:fill:770:364:0/bG9jYWw6Ly8vZGl2ZWltYWdlL3NvY2lhbF9tZXRyaWNzMi5wbmc.png "The Key Social Platform Metrics to Track [Infographic]")
