{"id":223604,"date":"2026-04-08T16:56:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T16:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/223604\/"},"modified":"2026-04-08T16:56:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T16:56:12","slug":"ron-desantis-and-sean-hannity-get-into-an-awkward-exchange-over-floridas-law-that-allows-cousins-to-marry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/223604\/","title":{"rendered":"Ron DeSantis and Sean Hannity get into an awkward exchange over Florida\u2019s law that allows cousins to marry"},"content":{"rendered":"

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis <\/a>and Sean Hannity became locked in an awkward exchange about marriages between first cousins on the latter\u2019s TV show.\u200b<\/p>\n

DeSantis<\/a> has been pushing to outlaw the practice in recent days, telling reporters that it was linked to “stealth jihad\u201d while at a press conference on April 6.<\/p>\n

The governor made the claim as he signed a law granting state officials greater authority over designating groups as terrorist organizations<\/a>.\u200b<\/p>\n

However, while opening the interview on Hannity<\/a>, the host said that he did not even know that marriages between first cousins were legal.<\/p>\n

\"Ron<\/p>\n

Ron DeSantis has claimed that marriages between cousins are linked to ‘stealth jihad’ (Hannity)<\/p>\n

\u200b\u201cUm, maybe I\u2019m just a little ignorant here,\u201d he said. \u201cI didn\u2019t know that it was legal to marry a first cousin.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u200bDeSantis replied, \u201cWell, in a lot of states, it\u2019s not. Florida needs to get with the program on that one.\u201d\u200b<\/p>\n

The Florida governor<\/a> claimed the concept of first cousin marriage is linked to \u201ccultures that are antithetical to American values\u201d, despite it being legal in a number of states. \u200b<\/p>\n

Sixteen U.S. states fully allow marriages between first-cousins, including California<\/a>, Colorado, Maryland<\/a>, New York and South Carolina<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Several other states allow the practice under certain conditions. Marriages between first-cousins is also legal in the United Kingdom<\/a>, France, Spain<\/a>, Germany and parts of the Middle East<\/a>. \u200b<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the broader issue of not allowing Islamist groups to get public money from things in Florida, whether it\u2019s education or any of the other things that we\u2019re doing, you\u2019ve got to draw very clear red line, and the red line I\u2019ve drawn is we\u2019ll spend millions on public safety, millions on education, but not one cent for jihad,\u201d DeSantis claimed. \u200b<\/p>\n

\"During<\/p>\n

During the interview, Sean Hannity said that he did not know marriages between first cousins were legal (Getty)<\/p>\n

State lawmakers voted down a proposal to ban marriages<\/a> between first cousins as recently as March.<\/p>\n

During the interview, DeSantis also promoted HB 1471 – the legislation that he signed on Monday. \u200b<\/p>\n

It forbids state courts from enforcing \u201cforeign or religious law\u201d if doing so would violate constitutional rights, according to a press release <\/a>from the governor\u2019s office.<\/p>\n

The legislation also enables the Florida Department of Law Enforcement\u2019s Chief of Domestic Security to recommend the designation of domestic terrorist groups, and enables institutions found to promote or support terrorist organizations to be stripped of funding. Students who promote \u201cterrorist violence\u201d can also face disciplinary action.<\/p>\n

\"DeSantis<\/p>\n

DeSantis also criticized European countries while appearing on Hannity (Reuters)<\/p>\n

Speaking to Hannity, he described the legislation as a \u201cban on any use of sharia law.\u201d\u200b<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t want to end up like Europe, where they have no-go zones, where you have these little subcultures where this stuff\u2019s imposed,\u201d he claimed. \u200b<\/p>\n

In December, DeSantis wrote on X<\/a> that his state would designate the Muslim Brotherhood<\/a> and the Council on American-Islamic Relations as terrorist organizations. \u200b<\/p>\n

U.S. District Judge Mark E. Walker later declared in March that DeSantis\u2019 designation of CAIR as a terrorist group violated the First Amendment.<\/p>\n

Hiba Rahim, CAIR-Florida\u2019s executive director, hit out at both HB 1471 and DeSantis\u2019s executive order in a press release<\/a>.\u200b<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have already been unjustly targeted \u2013 most notably when Governor DeSantis falsely labeled CAIR as terrorists without lawful authority or evidence,\u201d Rahim wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen HB 1471 was filed, it seemed clear that this was an agenda-driven bill.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Sean Hannity became locked in an awkward exchange about marriages between first cousins…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":223605,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,3291,30,29,5530,412,23646,28271,87871],"class_list":{"0":"post-223604","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-florida","9":"tag-florida-governor","10":"tag-florida-headlines","11":"tag-florida-news","12":"tag-press-conference","13":"tag-ron-desantis","14":"tag-sean-hannity","15":"tag-state-officials","16":"tag-terrorist-organizations"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223604","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=223604"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223604\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/223605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=223604"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=223604"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=223604"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}