APALACHICOLA, Fla. – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis held news conference Wednesday morning at the Franklin County Courthouse in Apalachicola, where he unveiled a statue of Benjamin Franklin.
The governor had previewed Wednesday’s visit to Franklin County during his remarks in July at the Jefferson County Courthouse, where he unveiled a Thomas Jefferson statue as one of the “America 250″ celebrations that he said were planned in each of Florida’s 67 counties.
“We are here as part of America’s 250 to honor the namesake of this county and one of the delegates to that convention in 1787, Benjamin Franklin, who, you know, I don’t know that we’ve ever had someone quite like Franklin in all of American history,” DeSantis said Wednesday. “(...) In the hopper, Alexander Hamilton in Hamilton County, we are going to have James Madison in Madison County, and we’re even going to go down to the Florida Keys to air mail in a James Monroe statue in Monroe County, which is going to be, really, really great.”
DeSantis was joined by Florida Lt. Gov. Jay Collins, Florida Secretary of State Cory Byrd and Visit Florida President and CEO Bryan Griffin.
”He was a renowned author, inventor, scientist, and civic leader. A brilliant thinker, the Founding Fathers trusted him in key moments in our history. In my office, I have a picture hanging that shows Franklin and Jefferson and Hamilton writing the Constitution, and that is a reminder every day of what those men went through and what they did to give us what we have today," Byrd said. “Franklin helped draft the Declaration of Independence, secure a military alliance with France, and negotiate the Treaty of Paris, which ended the war with Great Britain. In all his accomplishments, Benjamin Franklin embodied the virtues of hard work, enterprise, ingenuity — virtues which have characterized America’s rise as the most dynamic and innovative nation in the world."
Watch Wednesday’s news conference again in the video player below or by clicking here.
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