You knew this was going to happen. Maybe you were hoping it wouldn’t. But here we are — a massive tragedy occurs with the collapse of the condominium tower in Surfside, FL, and politics rears its ugly head.

Let’s start with this gem from Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA. On Friday, Kirk tweeted that he spoke with “several architects” who believe that domestic terrorists brought the building down.

I have spoken to several architects who believe that the building collapse in Surfside was not an act of nature. Many are saying this was "domestic terrorism"

— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) June 25, 2021

Kirk didn’t name the “architects” with whom he spoke, nor did he provide any other information as to which flavor of “domestic terrorism” was responsible. The handful of white supremacist groups that Joe Biden tells us are lurking everywhere? Antifa, whose terrorism is pretty much limited to street thuggery? None of these groups have the mental wattage to pull off such an engineering stunt. So Charlie, let’s not go conspiracy here, okay? We’ve already experienced the Loose Change lunatics who thought 9/11 was an inside job. We don’t need any more of such nonsense.

On the other side of the political divide there are those who blame climate change! Because of course!

Apparently the land under the Champlain Towers South had been sinking about 2 millimeters per year through much of the 1990’s. But while Shimon Wdowinski, professor of earth and environment at Florida International University, said that the collapse “appears to be something very localized to one building,” and that “the problem was more likely to be related to the building itself,” that didn’t stop the media from jumping to climate change theories. Yahoo News quoted alarmist warnings from Harold Wanless, the director of University of Miami’s geological sciences department. They also called Wanless an “expert on sea level rise.”

Wanless told Yahoo News:

“Just using the U.S. government projections, we could be at 11 to over 13 feet [of sea level rise] by the end of the century. There’s only 3 percent of Miami-Dade County that’s greater than 12 feet above sea level.”

“People have to understand how serious this is going to be quickly, in the next two or three decades. We’re just seeing the beginning of this accelerated ice melt.”

What’s more, other people in the media have tried to make political hay out of the tragedy by pointing fingers at FL Gov. Ron DeSantis. For example, Hannah Dreier of the Washington Post blasted DeSantis in a tweet for not allowing FEMA to get onsite for a full day.

There's a saying in emergency management: The first 24 hours are the only 24 hours.

FEMA was ready to deploy to the condo collapse almost immediately, and included the crisis in its daily briefing, but didn't get permission from Gov. DeSantis to get on the ground for a full day. pic.twitter.com/rVmCN47sQJ

— Hannah Dreier (@hannahdreier) June 26, 2021

But apparently Hannah Dreier doesn’t know how the emergency chain of command works. Or, more likely, she does know, but wants to trash DeSantis as much as possible. As one Twitter user pointed out:

“Time to kill another conspiracy theory: How this works: Emergency declaration from the local government -> state government -> federal government. The mayor didn’t sign an emergency order until 4:33 pm ET. The governor signed one less than an hour later, at 5:32pm.”

Plus, DeSantis Press Secretary Christina Pushaw set the record straight on the Surfside tragedy, with receipts.

And here’s a link to the state of emergency that DeSantis signed, one hour after the declaration signed by Mayor Cava. Note the time stamp at the very end: 5:32 PM.

So did Dreier delete her false tweets? Nope, I was still able to embed one for this post. It is as the late Rush Limbaugh would say: They tell you whom they fear. And the one Republican whom leftists fear, perhaps even more than Donald Trump, is Ron DeSantis.

But despite the falsehoods and conspiracies, we’re learning more about the tragedy in Surfside, and it appears to have been a perfect storm of possible design flaws, shoddy construction, and even corruption. We’re learning that developers of the tower may have been paying off officials for permits, too.

In addition, CBS Miami has reported on letters that residents of the very building that collapsed sent in 2019 to complain about nearby construction. They had concerns, but were brushed off. Not my problem, said the chief building official from the City of Surfside.

As of this writing, ten people are dead in Surfside. There are about 150 people still missing, with the odds of them being found alive rapidly dwindling. In fact, it’s been over 100 hours since the last person emerged alive from the rubble, which most likely means no more survivors. Funerals will be conducted in the days and weeks ahead, while families mourn.

Meanwhile investigators try to figure out just what caused this 13-story building to collapse. How shameful it is that some people have to make political hay out of a tragedy, armed with only a minimum of facts. All while scores of bodies still remain within the rubble, and their loved ones still haven’t buried them.

Featured image: Phillip Pessar/City of Surfside Construction/cropped/CC BY 2.0.