DeSantis’ Spokeswoman Shreds WaPo For 2,000-Word Article Whining About Her Tweets

Christina Pushaw, press secretary for Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, tore into the Washington Post Wednesday over a lengthy article criticizing her tweets.

The Washington Post published a more than 2,000-word analysis of her tweets Wednesday and characterized her as having a hostile and derisive attitude toward the press. Pushaw responded by criticizing the outlet for focusing on her Twitter account rather than the numerous national and global crisis currently unfolding.

“Amid war in Europe, runaway inflation, a global energy crisis, our economy about to be plunged into recession, the many scandals of the Biden Administration, record-breaking illegal immigration and drug trafficking, and terroristic threats against Supreme Court Justices, the Washington Post chose to devote months of effort to writing a profile about a staffer in Tallahassee,” Pushaw told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“This is ‘DeSantis for Clicks,’ and Floridians see right through it. No wonder media credibility has fallen to an all time low,” she said.

The Washington Post article opened with a tweet Pushaw sent July 21 mocking journalists who were denied access to the Sunshine Summit, a July 22-23 event hosted by the Republican Party of Florida where DeSantis and numerous conservative commentators gave speeches.

“It has come to my attention that some liberal media activists are mad because they aren’t allowed into #SunshineSummit this weekend. My message to them is to try crying about it,” she wrote. “Then go to kickboxing and have a margarita. And write the same hit piece you were gonna write anyway.”

https://twitter.com/ChristinaPushaw/status/1550312275457851394?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener
The author portrayed this tweet as representative of Pushaw’s general approach to Twitter.

“The derisive tone was typical of Pushaw, 31, a state employee who earns $120,000 a year. In the 14 months since joining DeSantis’s staff, she has transformed the typically buttoned-down role of gubernatorial press secretary into something like a running public brawl — with Twitter as her blunt-force weapon,” he wrote.

“Her usual targets: Democrats, the news media and anyone else she deems insufficiently supportive of DeSantis’s agenda and her own conservative politics,” the piece said. 

The article also attempted to link Pushaw to the followers of the QAnon conspiracy theory, who it claims used the term “groomer” before Pushaw did.

“While conspiratorial QAnon followers had previously used the term ‘groomer’ to tar their enemies, its use took off among conservative politicians and pundits after Pushaw’s tweet, and has thereafter been widely used to demonize Democrats and educators who discussed sexuality or gender identity with young children,” the piece read.

Pushaw frequently criticizes the media on Twitter, and referred to the author of the Wednesday story, Paul Farhi, as “Washington Post’s Creepiest Reporter.” Her header image on Twitter is currently a screenshot of a Washington Post Headline from 2020 which reads: “Conservatives predict gas prices will spike under Biden. Experts say those fears are overblown.”

Farhi declined to comment and The Washington Post did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.