Hypocrisy on Bodily Autonomy at the DEA
Here’s a news item no one saw coming: A man was deemed unworthy of heading the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) because he didn’t demonstrate sufficient respect for Americans’ rights to take risks with their own bodies.
Watching President-elect Donald Trump assemble a Cabinet has been chaotic, to say the least. But no saga has been more interesting for the fate of bodily autonomy than the squabble over the DEA.
Trump announced the selection of 
Hillsborough County Sheriff Chad Chronister on November 30. The local Florida lawman was an odd choice for a federal agency that runs complicated international operations and has about 10,000 employees. There were also immediate whiffs of corruption; he’s married to the daughter of former San Francisco 49ers owner Edward J. DeBartolo Jr., whom Trump pardoned during his first term. But neither of those reasons are why he withdrew suddenly on December 3.
After the nomination was announced, Rep. Thomas Massie (R–Ky.) posted: “I’m going to call ’em like I see ’em. Trump’s nominee for head of DEA should be disqualified for ordering the arrest [of] a pastor who defied COVID lockdowns.”
Massie, a consistent opponent of the lockdowns, flagged a boastful March 2020 tweet from Chronister “announcing the arrest of Dr. Ronald Howard-Browne, Pastor of The River at Tampa Bay Church, who intentionally and repeatedly disregarded state and local public health orders, which put his congregation and our community in danger.” The arrest came just days after an executive order was put in place banning gatherings of 10 people or more—including faith-based gatherings. The evangelical pastor proclaimed worship an “essential service” and declared he would not close his church “until the rapture.”
Massie is right the arrest was nothing to brag about. It was one of the many, many instances of stat
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