Al Sharpton went on television Sunday to call Ron DeSantis a racist.
The man who turned a teenage girl's rape hoax into a national career was back on MS NOW to lecture America about bigotry.
What Sharpton said – and what Florida just did while he was talking – tells you everything about who is actually winning this fight.
DeSantis Does a Hakeem Jeffries Impression After Florida Redistricting Win
The story starts with Hakeem Jeffries making a threat he couldn't back up.
The House Minority Leader told Florida Republicans they were going to "F around and find out" if they proceeded with their new congressional redistricting maps.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis heard the threat.
Then DeSantis mocked it to a laughing crowd at a press conference in Ormond Beach, doing a spot-on impression of Jeffries' delivery – deepened voice, exaggerated posturing, the whole routine.
"He goes out there and he's like, 'We're gonna do maximum warfare against Republicans. Florida Republicans, you F around, you gonna find out,'" DeSantis told the crowd, before dropping back into his normal voice and adding, "What I said was, go ahead – make my day."
The Florida Senate passed the new maps 21 – 17.
The new maps are projected to give Republicans 24 of Florida's 28 congressional seats.
The same week, the Supreme Court handed down Louisiana v. Callais – a 6 – 3 ruling that struck down Louisiana's race-drawn congressional district as an unconstitutional gerrymander under the Fourteenth Amendment.
Al Sharpton Calls DeSantis Racist While Tawana Brawley Hoax Hangs Over Him
That is when Al Sharpton reached for the only tool he has ever owned.
He invited Florida Democrat chair Nikki Fried onto MS NOW and asked her to respond to DeSantis "mocking" Jeffries, framing the impression alongside what he called Republicans "dismantling civil rights protections."
Fried obliged, calling DeSantis' behavior an attempt to "dehumanize" Jeffries and "dismantle" human decency.
Sharpton agreed it was all just more "racist rhetoric" from the Republican Party.
It’s the same playbook he’s run for nearly 40 years.
In 1987, a 15-year-old named Tawana Brawley claimed she had been kidnapped and gang-raped by white men – including law enforcement – in Dutchess County, New York.
Sharpton made himself her champion, accused state officials of covering up the crime, and turned the story into a national firestorm.
A grand jury spent seven months on the case, heard from 180 witnesses, and produced more than 6,000 pages of testimony before concluding Brawley had invented the entire story to avoid a beating from her stepfather.
Sharpton was ordered to pay $65,000 in a civil defamation judgment brought by the prosecutor he had falsely accused.
Asked years later if he owed anyone an apology, Sharpton said, "What do I have to apologize for? I believed her."
That was not an isolated mistake – it was the founding model.
Supreme Court Voting Rights Act Ruling Guts Jeffries' Entire Strategy
Sharpton, Fried, and every Democrat crying racism over the DeSantis impression are refusing to say something out loud.
DeSantis was mocking Jeffries' threat, not his race.
The impression was built around what Jeffries said – "maximum warfare," "F around and find out" – not around anything about his appearance or identity.
Democrats called the impression racist anyway, because that is what they do when they are losing.
The Supreme Court did not strike down Louisiana's map because six conservative justices decided to target black voters.
Justice Samuel Alito wrote that the Constitution prohibits government from using race as the basis for drawing district lines – the same rule that applies everywhere else in American law.
"Allowing race to play any part in government decision-making represents a departure from the constitutional rule that applies in almost every other context," Alito wrote for the majority.
Democrats have spent decades building political machines on race-drawn districts, and the Supreme Court just told them that road is closed.
That is the real reason Sharpton is on television calling DeSantis racist.
Jeffries threatened Florida, DeSantis laughed at him, the legislature passed the maps anyway, and the Supreme Court handed down a ruling the same week that validated exactly what Florida did.
When you have no argument, you call the other side racist and hope nobody looks too hard at the man making the accusation.
Al Sharpton has been betting on that for 40 years.
Florida just showed what happens when you stop flinching.
Sources:
- Sean James, "Al Sharpton Slams Ron DeSantis for Mocking Hakeem Jeffries With 'Offensive Accent,'" Mediaite, May 3, 2026.
- "DeSantis Escalates Feud with Mocking Hakeem Jeffries Impression," Florida News / iHeart Media, May 1, 2026.
- "Did he go too far? Ron DeSantis attempts Hakeem Jeffries impersonation in redistricting victory lap," Florida Politics, April 30, 2026.
- "Al Sharpton's Role in Tawana Brawley Hoax Resurfaces," Newsweek, July 29, 2019.
- Louisiana v. Callais, 608 U.S. ___ (2026), April 29, 2026.