WATCH: MSNBC’s Ari Melber Rips Ron DeSantis as “The Poster Child of COVID Failures”

As Florida cases of COVID-19 have risen over the last few weeks, Ron DeSantis hasn’t seemed interested in doing anything to combat the problem. In fact, the ambitious Republican has dug his heels in on culture war issues.

And while DeSantis focuses on schools and masks, Florida hospitals are being overloaded with COVID patients. During a Wednesday monologue, Ari Melber ripped the Florida governor as “the poster child of COVID failures.”

The host began by discussing DeSantis’ attempts to fundraise by bashing Dr. Anthony Fauci. “They’re hocking t-shirts as well as coozies,” he said. “For a governor in the middle of a deadly virus, the first point here would be, grow up.”

Melber continued:

“What he’s doing is a MAGA-style trolling exercise in the middle of a deadly outbreak. He literally tried to ban any verification process to find out who’s vaccinated. That just comes down to information. So, he’s the one trying to in a very1984-style way, restrict information while claiming he’s for liberty and freedom. How do you know that’s over the line? I’ll give you one piece of reasoning. A federal judge recently blocked Florida’s attempt to ban that kind of vaccine information saying that vaccine documentation or passports cannot just be banned outright by the state. It’s not like Gov. DeSantis can stop private enterprise. Well, he tried to do that, too.”

At this point, the governor doesn’t care about keeping people in his state safe. He is only interested in fighting the culture war that he thinks the Republican party demands from him.