Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis backed protestors in China during a Tuesday press event, saying they were “right” to oppose “draconian” policies.
Protests erupted in China following a deadly blaze in a high-rise building that killed 10 people.
Locked doors and other COVID-19 mitigation measures reportedly trapped people inside the burning building, the BBC reported.
“I just want to make a comment about what we’ve been seeing going on in China,” DeSantis said. “This zero Covid policy is draconian, it violates people’s liberties, and it is completely unscientific, and the people of China are right to be able to speak out and protest against what the Chinese Communist Party is doing.”
The Biden administration has remained largely silent on the protests, with no public statements made at the time of publication. Democratic Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia claimed that members of Congress had “more flexibility” than the administration in discussing the demonstrations.
“I think those of us in Congress have a little more freedom and I think we can push the administration, but as you said, we don’t want to feed the propaganda machinery that turns these protesters driven by Chinese people into what the overall message would be of the Chinese people,” Warner said Monday.
Chinese President Xi Jingpin implemented a “zero COVID” policy centered on lockdowns and contact tracing, but the approach reportedly caused food shortages in Shanghai earlier this year.
“This CCP has a maniacal desire to exert total control over its population,” DeSantis said. “Zero Covid is really just the pretext for them to do what they want to do anyways, and that is not a model that can work over the long term. The people in China are finally speaking out against it, and I just think we need these draconian Covid policies to go to the ash heap of history where they belong.”
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