Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who is vying for the presidency, has said he favors dismantling the IRS, the Dept. of Education, the Dept. of Energy, as well as the Department of Commerce.

After Martha MacCallum of Fox News Channel asked him if he would favor abolishing any agency, he mentioned the four federal organizations.

DeSantis, a former member of the US House of Representatives, stated that if Congress cooperated with him, he would favor abolishing those four governmental bodies.

However, he said that if the legislature refused to approve the proposal, he would use the organizations to combat “woke ideology” and “leftism,” such as by utilizing the Dept. of Education to “reverse every bit of the transgender sports stuff.”

Both options, according to DeSantis, would be a “win for conservatives.”

The Florida governor, who was just re-elected last year, is currently polling in second place, significantly behind former President Trump. DeSantis, however, is polling better than the rest of the GOP field for president even if he is falling behind Trump.

The opening Republican presidential primary debate will take place on August 23 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

DeSantis stated earlier this week during talks in Texas that he would support engagement regulations that permit the use of lethal force against drug cartel operators who breach America’s border wall. “You would react firmly if someone broke into your home with the intention of doing anything horrible.” On the other hand, he said, “Why can’t we do it at the southern border?” DeSantis further declared that he would label the cartels as transnational criminal organizations or international terrorist groups.

The government has lost a total of over $200 billion dollars in COVID relief money due to possible fraud, waste, and abuse, according to a study from the Office of the Inspector General of the Administration of small businesses issued this week.

The most recent estimate from the OIG is much larger than earlier estimates, which were estimated to be around $100 billion.

The Paycheck Protection along with COVID-19 Economic Disaster Loan programs were among the relief efforts, designed to offer small firms and people who lost their employment as a result of tight lockdown measures immediate financial help.

According to the research, at least 17% of the relief monies—a total of around $1.2 trillion—were given to alleged fraudsters, involving “far greater than $136 billion in COVID-19 EIDLs as well as $64 billion in PPP funds.”

Inspector General Hannibal “Mike” Ware said that 1,011 indictments, 803 arrests, and 529 convictions had been made as a consequence of the OIG’s investigation into the allegedly stolen cash. Relief money that was unlawfully stolen has been recovered and given back to the SBA in the amount of $30 billion.

According to a prior prediction made by Ware in an interview in 2021, “In regard to the financial value, the total amount of fraud associated with these COVID assistance initiatives is going to be greater than any federal program that has come before it.”

According to the audit, the SBA’s widespread fraud was caused by “weakened or removed” regulations that allowed for the quick transfer of emergency cash to individuals in need.

According to the OIG, fraudsters who perceived a chance to take advantage of the SBA’s lessened hurdles were drawn to the simplified review process by the “allure of ‘easy money.'”

“OIG is pursuing tens of thousands of potential leads for investigations into claims of fraud, waste, and abuse involving public funds. The quick congressional move to raise the period of limitations for COVID-19 EIDL and PPP fraud to a ten-year period will result in thousands of inquiries for years to come. We strive to uncover fraud schemes, and since we anticipate that the total potential fraud estimate may change, we could periodically update this report,” according to the OIG report.

SBA acting assistant administrator Bailey DeVries was concerned that Ware’s study had “serious errors which significantly overestimate fraud.”

Additionally, DeVries asserted that the study would “unintentionally deceive the public into believing that everything that we did together had no major effect on protecting against fraudsters.”

She shifted part of the responsibility to “the prior administration” for putting speed ahead of quality, which “unnecessarily weakened the control conditions for PPP and COVID-EIDL for the initial several months of the program.”

According to DeVries, 86% of the fraud happened within the first nine months of the assistance programs’ implementation, and she argued that as time went on, the agency’s fraud prevention measures got better.

Ron DeSantis, a contender for president of the United States and governor of Florida, filed a request this week asking a federal judge to throw out a case Walt Disney Co. brought against him on the grounds that it lacks the legal authority to do so.

In his appeal for a Florida judge to throw out the lawsuit Disney brought against him around the end of April, DeSantis referenced a number of precedents, which includes a 2023 lawsuit the city of Miami brought against him, and claimed he along with another state official, who also happens to be a defendant, are “immune from suit”

After Florida state legislators enacted a bill to limit many of Disney’s perks concerning its special tax district, the Reedy Creek Improvement District (RCID), the business accused DeSantis of a “targeted strategy involving government retaliation.” The district has let Disney World, a popular tourist destination, to self-govern its territory.

In reaction to Disney’s criticism against the state’s Parental Rights in Education Act, referred to as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill by its detractors, DeSantis reacted by labeling Disney a “woke corporation.” Disney claimed that the state’s decision to revoke the company’s special tax status was a result of Disney’s criticism of the legislation.

The district was not entirely abolished, but the state government changed its name to what is now the “Central Florida Tourism Oversight District” (CFTOD) and appointed the governor’s associates to its board to serve instead. Just prior to the new CFTOD board taking office, Disney attempted to circumvent its authority by reaching deals with the previous RCID administration.

While DeSantis later signed a measure making the company’s agreements with RCID leadership legally illegal at the state level, the new CFTOD board deemed the arrangements void and sued Disney for noncompliance.

Since the governor only signed the law, the governor’s petition further claims that “any alleged injuries” resulting from the legislation can’t be “traceable back to the State Defendants, and encouraging the State Defendants wouldn’t give Disney relief.”

A plaintiff can’t “challenge a statute by suing the lawmakers who passed it instead of the officials who execute it,” according to the motion, which cites an Eleventh Circuit decision. Instead, the plaintiff must sue the officials who carry out the legislation.

The petition also states that the governor does not have any influence over the newly appointed CFTOD board: “His sole link to CFTOD is his power to appoint CFTOD’s Board,” the motion says.

The Journal also highlighted that the case would be presided over by U.S. District Judge Allen Winsor, who was chosen by Trump and previously dismissed two lawsuits that sought to overturn the “Don’t Say Gay” rule.

Disney has until the end of July to submit a motion in opposition.

A $9.2 billion loan meant to aid in the development of three electric car battery factories in the United States would result in Ford receiving the largest government cheque for an auto manufacturer since the 2009 bailouts.

According to Bloomberg, a financial loan from the Biden administration aims to support American manufacturers in their competition with Chinese automakers for green technology and assist the sector in achieving Biden’s audacious goal of electrifying 67% of all commercial passenger cars produced in the US by 2032. In a project named BlueOval, Ford is collaborating with the South Korean battery manufacturer SK On Co. to construct three battery factories in Tennessee and Kentucky.

According to Reuters, “Ford Treasurer Dave Webb stated that cooperation between the public and private sectors has traditionally sped up significant technological shifts.”

The EPA’s Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing (ATVM) credit program is the source of Biden’s pledge to Ford. The loan will be the biggest ever made in the program’s history. According to the Energy Department, Ford and SK have already begun construction on the battery production plants that will generate over 120 gigawatt hours yearly. According to Bloomberg, BlueOval received subsidies from the state governments of Kentucky and Tennessee before securing the hefty loan coming from the federal government, so taxpayers would bear the majority of the expense.

Some people were upset by the federal government’s intervention in the free market to encourage EVs, and they criticized the multibillion-dollar loan. Steven Milloy, an attorney and senior policy scholar at the Energy & Environment Legal Institute who was a member of the transition team for former President Trump, questioned why the EV industry needed so much assistance from the government.

“If electric vehicles (EVs) are so amazing, why do Ford and its South Korean partner require a $9.2 billion loan from the government to construct battery plants?” Tweeted Milloy. “Why On Earth doesn’t the ESG cartel provide funding for them?”

Ford hopes that it can produce as many as two million electric vehicles by 2026. Ford estimated that the EV push will cost the business $3 billion through 2023 despite producing 132,000 EVs last year. In terms of EV sales in the US, the firm is still much behind Tesla, which Elon Musk founded. When Tesla first launched in 2003, it incurred losses for ten years until making a profit in 2013. A remarkable increase from $5.5 billion in 2021 to $12.6 billion in 2022 was accomplished by Musk’s business.