Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is pushing back against claims from a far-left California Democrat that his state banned “The Diary of Anne Frank.”
DeSantis is blasting the accusation as yet another left-wing smear campaign against Florida’s successful education policies.
The governor responded Monday after Democrat California state Sen. Scott Wiener posted on X that Florida had banned the iconic World War II-era diary.
Wiener called the false claim “proof” of the dangers of the “MAGA movement.”
Notably, Wiener is behind several controversial legislative pushes in California.
Most of those laws appear to target children, including the decriminalization of adult men engaging in sexual “relationships” with minors.
In addition, Wiener was behind laws that allow dangerous male inmates to be housed in female prisons if they claim to be “transgender.”
While attacking Florida, Wiener cited an article from leftist propaganda outlet The Guardian claiming that the state led the nation in book bans.
Those false claims included Florida allegedly pulling Anne Frank’s diary from school shelves.
In a post on X, DeSantis wrote:
“This is not the first time a leftist has accused Florida of ‘banning’ a book that is on the state’s recommended reading list.
“Another lie debunked.”
Community Notes on X quickly fact-checked Wiener’s post.
The note attached to the post points out that “The Diary of Anne Frank” is, in fact, part of Florida’s official eighth-grade curriculum.
Wiener’s office later tried to walk back his claim.
In a statement, his office claimed Wiener was referring to a graphic novel version of Anne Frank’s diary that had been removed by Hillsborough County School District last year, along with hundreds of other books.
“Senator Wiener’s tweet refers to the well-documented incident of the Hillsborough School District removing the Diary of Anne Frank, along with over 600 other titles, from library shelves in response to an aggressive crackdown from the state Department of Education,” Wiener’s office said in a statement.
“At least 9 school districts in Florida have removed books like The Diary of Anne Frank from bookshelves because the state is empowering far-right activists like Moms For Liberty to go after any schools that don’t go along with their extremist MAGA agenda.”
District officials said at the time they faced pressure from the Florida Department of Education to remove any material deemed “pornographic.”
In total, more than 600 books were temporarily pulled in Hillsborough, including “The Diary of Anne Frank” and Elana K. Arnold’s “What Girls Are Made Of.”
Critics claimed the purge was overly broad and not based on parental complaints.
Supporters, meanwhile, argued districts were acting out of an abundance of caution in response to new state standards.
DeSantis has repeatedly said that media outlets and left-wing politicians have spread falsehoods about Florida’s book policies, conflating isolated local disputes with the state’s broader education law.
His administration has defended the “Parental Rights in Education Act” as a commonsense measure that prevents inappropriate instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in classrooms.
It was smeared by critics and inaccurately dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” law.
The controversy is the latest flashpoint in the culture war over parental rights and education.
For DeSantis, the accusation that Florida banned one of the most famous historical diaries in the world provided another opportunity to accuse Democrats and their media allies of deliberately misrepresenting his policies.
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