One night in mid-February, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis took the stage at the Breakers in Palm Beach to brag about how much he’d done for the environment.
“Protecting Florida’s natural resources has been a top priority since my first day in office,” DeSantis, a Republican, told the crowd of more than 600 as they nibbled on shrimp salad and short ribs at the $2,500-a-seat fundraiser for the Everglades Foundation.
These were well-heeled nature lovers and outdoors enthusiasts who cherish the Everglades, the subtropical wetland that covers thousands of square miles of southern Florida. It’s a landscape teeming with plant and animal life, but scarred by the impacts of runaway urban development and industrial agriculture.
