title: David Bowie

text: In "Mr. Rice's Secret" (2000), Bowie played the title role as the neighbour of a terminally ill 12-year-old. Bowie appeared as himself in the 2001 Ben Stiller comedy "Zoolander", judging a "walk-off" between rival male models, and in Eric Idle's 2002 mockumentary "". In 2005, he filmed a commercial with Snoop Dogg for XM Satellite Radio. Bowie portrayed a fictionalized version of physicist and inventor Nikola Tesla in Christopher Nolan's film "The Prestige" (2006), which was about the bitter rivalry between two magicians in the late 19th century. Nolan later claimed that Bowie was his only preference to play Tesla, and that he personally appealed to Bowie to take the role after he initially passed. In the same year, he voice-acted in Luc Besson's animated film "Arthur and the Invisibles" as the powerful villain Maltazard, and appeared as himself in an episode of the Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant television series "Extras". In 2007, he lent his voice to the character Lord Royal Highness in the "SpongeBob's Atlantis SquarePantis" television film. In the 2008 film "August", directed by Austin Chick, he played a supporting role as Ogilvie, a "ruthless venture capitalist." Bowie's final film appearance was a cameo as himself in the 2009 teen comedy "Bandslam".


title: David Bowie

text: In a 2017 interview with "Consequence of Sound", director Denis Villeneuve revealed his intention to cast Bowie in "Blade Runner 2049" as the lead villain, Niander Wallace, but when news broke of Bowie's death in January of the same year, Villeneuve was forced to look for talent with similar "rock star" qualities. He eventually cast actor and lead singer of Thirty Seconds to Mars, Jared Leto. Talking about the casting process, Villeneuve said: "Our first thought [for the character] had been David Bowie, who had influenced "Blade Runner" in many ways. When we learned the sad news, we looked around for someone like that. He [Bowie] embodied the "Blade Runner" spirit." David Lynch also hoped to have Bowie reprise his "Fire Walk With Me" character for "Twin Peaks: The Return" but Bowie's illness prevented this. His character was portrayed via archival footage. At Bowie's request, Lynch overdubbed Bowie's original dialogue with a different actor's voice, as Bowie was unhappy with his Cajun accent in the original film.


title: David Bowie

text: Bowie was a painter and artist. He moved to Switzerland in 1976, purchasing a chalet in the hills to the north of Lake Geneva. In the new environment, his cocaine use decreased and he found time for other pursuits outside his musical career. He devoted more time to his painting, and produced a number of post-modernist pieces. When on tour, he took to sketching in a notebook, and photographing scenes for later reference. Visiting galleries in Geneva and the Brücke Museum in Berlin, Bowie became, in the words of Sandford, "a prolific producer and collector of contemporary art. ... Not only did he become a well-known patron of expressionist art: locked in Clos des Mésanges he began an intensive self-improvement course in classical music and literature, and started work on an autobiography."


title: David Bowie

text: One of Bowie's paintings sold at auction in late 1990 for $500, and the cover for his 1995 album "Outside" is a close-up of a self-portrait (from a series of five) he painted that same year. His first solo show, titled "New Afro/Pagan and Work: 1975–1995", was in 1995 at The Gallery in Cork Street, London. In 1997, he founded the publishing company 21 Publishing, whose first title was "Blimey! – From Bohemia to Britpop: London Art World from Francis Bacon to Damien Hirst" by Matthew Collings. A year later, Bowie was invited to join the editorial board of the journal "Modern Painters", and participated in the art hoax later that year. The same year, during an interview with Michael Kimmelman for "The New York Times", he said "Art was, seriously, the only thing I'd ever wanted to own." Subsequently, in a 1999 interview for the BBC, he said "The only thing I buy obsessively and addictively is art". His art collection, which included works by Damien Hirst, Derek Boshier, Frank Auerbach, Henry Moore, and Jean-Michel Basquiat among others, was valued at over £10m in mid-2016.


title: David Bowie

text: After his death, his family decided to sell most of the collection because they "didn't have the space" to store it. On 10 and 11 November, three auctions were held at Sotheby's in London, first with 47 lots and second with 208 paintings, drawings, and sculptures, third with 100 design lots. The items on sale represented about 65 percent of the collection. Exhibition of the works in the auction attracted 51,470 visitors, the auction itself was attended by 1,750 bidders, with over 1,000 more bidding online. The auctions has overall sale total £32.9 million (app. $41.5 million), while the highest-selling item, Basquiat's graffiti-inspired painting "Air Power", sold for £7.09 million.


title: David Bowie

text: Outside of music, Bowie dabbled in several forms of writings during his life. In the late 1990s, Bowie was commissioned for writings of various media, including an essay on Jean-Michel Basquiat for the 2001 anthology book "Writers on Artists" and forewords to Jo Levin's 2001 publication "GQ Cool", Mick Rock's 2001 photography portfolio "Blood and Glitter", his wife Iman's 2001 book "I Am Iman", "Q" magazine's 2002 special "The 100 Greatest Rock 'n' Roll Photographs" and Jonathan Barnbrook's artwork portfolio "Barnbrook Bible: The Graphic Design of Jonathan Barnbrook". He also heavily contributed to the 2002 Genesis Publications memoir of the Ziggy Stardust years, "Moonage Daydream", which was rereleased in 2022.


title: David Bowie

text: Bowie also wrote liner notes for several albums, including "Too Many Fish in the Sea" by Robin Clark, the wife of his guitarist Carlos Alomar, Stevie Ray Vaughan's posthumous "Live at Montreux 1982 & 1985" (2002), the Spinners' compilation "The Chrome Collection" (2003), the tenth anniversary reissue of Placebo's debut album (2006) and Neu!'s "Vinyl Box" (2010). Bowie also wrote an appreciation piece in "Rolling Stone" for Nine Inch Nails in 2005 and an essay for the booklet accompanying Iggy Pop's "" the same year.


title: David Bowie

text: "Bowie Bonds", the first modern example of celebrity bonds, were asset-backed securities of current and future revenues of the 25 albums (287 songs) that Bowie recorded before 1990. Issued in 1997, the bonds were bought for US$55 million by the Prudential Insurance Company of America. Royalties from the 25 albums generated the cash flow that secured the bonds' interest payments. By forfeiting 10 years worth of royalties, Bowie received a payment of US$55 million up front. Bowie used this income to buy songs owned by his former manager, Tony Defries. The bonds liquidated in 2007 and the rights to the income from the songs reverted to Bowie.


title: David Bowie

text: Bowie launched two personal websites during his lifetime. The first, an Internet service provider titled BowieNet, was developed in conjunction with Robert Goodale and Ron Roy and launched in September 1998. Subscribers to the dial-up service were offered exclusive content as well as a BowieNet email address and Internet access. The service was closed by 2006. The second, www.bowieart.com, offered fans to view and purchase selected paintings, prints and sculptures from his private collection. The service, which ran from 2000 to 2008, also offered a showcase for young art students, in Bowie's words, "to show and sell their work without having to go through a dealer. Therefore, they really make the money they deserve for their paintings."


title: David Bowie

text: Bowie's songs and stagecraft brought a new dimension to popular music in the early 1970s, strongly influencing both its immediate forms and its subsequent development. Bowie was a pioneer of glam rock, according to music historians Schinder and Schwartz, who credited Bowie and Marc Bolan with creating the genre. At the same time, he inspired the innovators of the punk rock music movement. When punk musicians were "noisily reclaiming the three-minute pop song in a show of public defiance", biographer David Buckley wrote that "Bowie almost completely abandoned traditional rock instrumentation." Bowie's record company promoted his unique status in popular music with the slogan, "There's old wave, there's new wave, and there's David Bowie".


title: David Bowie

text: Musicologist James Perone credited Bowie with having "brought sophistication to rock music", and critical reviews frequently acknowledged the intellectual depth of his work and influence. The BBC's arts editor Will Gompertz likened Bowie to Pablo Picasso, writing that he was "an innovative, visionary, restless artist who synthesised complex avant garde concepts into beautifully coherent works that touched the hearts and minds of millions".


title: David Bowie

text: Broadcaster John Peel contrasted Bowie with his progressive rock contemporaries, arguing that Bowie was "an interesting kind of fringe figure... on the outskirts of things". Peel said he "liked the idea of him reinventing himself... the one distinguishing feature about early-70s progressive rock was that it didn't progress. Before Bowie came along, people didn't want too much change". Buckley called the era "bloated, self-important, leather-clad, self-satisfied"; then Bowie "subverted the whole notion of what it was to be a rock star".


title: David Bowie

text: Buckley called Bowie "both star and icon. The vast body of work he has produced ... has created perhaps the biggest cult in popular culture. ... His influence has been unique in popular culture—he has permeated and altered more lives than any comparable figure."


title: David Bowie

text: Through continual reinvention, his influence broadened and extended. Biographer Thomas Forget added, "Because he has succeeded in so many different styles of music, it is almost impossible to find a popular artist today that has not been influenced by David Bowie." In 2000, Bowie was voted by other music stars as the "most influential artist of all time" in a poll by "NME". Alexis Petridis of "The Guardian" wrote that Bowie was confirmed by 1980 to be "the most important and influential artist since the Beatles". Neil McCormick of "The Daily Telegraph" stated that Bowie had "one of the supreme careers in popular music, art and culture of the 20th century" and "he was too inventive, too mercurial, too strange for all but his most devoted fans to keep up with". The BBC's Mark Easton argued that Bowie provided fuel for "the creative powerhouse that Britain has become" by challenging future generations "to aim high, to be ambitious and provocative, to take risks". Easton concluded that Bowie had "changed the way the world sees Britain. And the way Britain sees itself". In 2006, Bowie was voted the fourth greatest living British icon in a poll held by the BBC's "Culture Show". Annie Zaleski of "Alternative Press" wrote, "Every band or solo artist who's decided to rip up their playbook and start again owes a debt to Bowie".


title: David Bowie

text: Numerous figures from the music industry whose careers Bowie had influenced paid tribute to him following his death; panegyrics on Twitter (tweets about him peaked at 20,000 a minute an hour after the announcement of his death) also came from outside the entertainment industry and pop culture, such as those from the Vatican, namely Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, who quoted "Space Oddity", and the Federal Foreign Office, which thanked Bowie for his part in the fall of the Berlin Wall and referenced "Heroes".


title: David Bowie

text: Belgian amateur astronomers at the MIRA Public Observatory in conjunction with Studio Brussel created a "Bowie asterism" in homage to Bowie in January 2016; it depicts the lightning bolt of "Aladdin Sane" using the stars Sigma Librae, Spica, Zeta Centauri, SAO 204132, Sigma Octantis, SAO 241641 and Beta Trianguli Australis which were near Mars at the time of Bowie's death.


title: David Bowie

text: On 7 January 2017, the BBC broadcast the 90-minute documentary "David Bowie: The Last Five Years". On 8 January 2017, which would have been Bowie's 70th birthday, a charity concert in his birthplace of Brixton was hosted by actor Gary Oldman, a close friend. A David Bowie walking tour through Brixton was also launched, and other events marking his birthday weekend included concerts in New York, Los Angeles, Sydney, and Tokyo.


title: David Bowie

text: On 6 February 2018, the maiden flight of the SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket carried Elon Musk's personal Tesla Roadster and a mannequin affectionately named Starman into space. "Space Oddity" and "Life on Mars?" were looping on the car's sound system during the launch.


title: David Bowie

text: An exhibition of Bowie artefacts, called "David Bowie Is", was organised by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, and shown there in 2013. The London exhibit was visited by over 300,000 people, making it one of the most successful exhibitions ever staged at the museum. Later that year the exhibition began a world tour which started in Toronto and included stops in Chicago, Paris, Melbourne, Groningen and Brooklyn, New York where the exhibit ended in 2018 at the Brooklyn Museum. The exhibition hosted around 2,000,000 visitors over the entire course of its run.


title: David Bowie

text: A biopic, "Stardust", was announced on 31 January 2019, with musician and actor Johnny Flynn as Bowie, Jena Malone as his wife Angie, and Marc Maron as his publicist. The film follows Bowie on his first trip to the United States in 1971. The film was written by Christopher Bell and directed by Gabriel Range. Bowie's son Duncan Jones spoke out against the film, saying he was not consulted and that the film would not have permission to use Bowie's music. The film was set to premiere at the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival, but the festival was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It received generally unfavourable reviews from critics.


title: David Bowie

text: A film based on Bowie's musical journey throughout his career was announced on 23 May 2022. Titled "Moonage Daydream", after the song of the same name, the film is written and directed by Brett Morgen and will feature never-before-seen footage, performances and music and led by Bowie's own narration. Morgan stated that "Bowie cannot be defined, he can be experienced... That is why we crafted 'Moonage Daydream' to be a unique cinematic experience." The documentary is the first posthumous film about Bowie to be approved by his estate. After spending five years in production, the film premiered at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival, was released theatrically in the US in IMAX on 16 September 2022, and will release on HBO Max in the spring of 2023.


title: David Bowie

text: From the time of his earliest recordings in the 1960s, Bowie employed a wide variety of musical styles. His early compositions and performances were strongly influenced by rock and roll singers like Little Richard and Elvis Presley, and also the wider world of show business. He particularly strove to emulate the British musical theatre singer-songwriter and actor Anthony Newley, whose vocal style he frequently adopted, and made prominent use of for his 1967 debut release, "David Bowie" (to the disgust of Newley himself, who destroyed the copy he received from Bowie's publisher). Bowie's fascination with music hall continued to surface sporadically alongside such diverse styles as hard rock and heavy metal, soul, psychedelic folk, and pop.


title: David Bowie

text: Musicologist James Perone observes Bowie's use of octave switches for different repetitions of the same melody, exemplified in his commercial breakthrough single, "Space Oddity", and later in the song "Heroes" to dramatic effect; Perone notes that "in the lowest part of his vocal register ... his voice has an almost crooner-like richness."


title: David Bowie

text: Voice instructor Jo Thompson describes Bowie's vocal vibrato technique as "particularly deliberate and distinctive". Schinder and Schwartz call him "a vocalist of extraordinary technical ability, able to pitch his singing to particular effect." Here, too, as in his stagecraft and songwriting, Bowie's roleplaying is evident: historiographer Michael Campbell says that Bowie's lyrics "arrest our ear, without question. But Bowie continually shifts from person to person as he delivers them ... His voice changes dramatically from section to section." In addition to the guitar, Bowie also played a variety of keyboards, including piano, Mellotron, Chamberlin, and synthesisers; harmonica; alto and baritone saxophones; stylophone; viola; cello; koto (in the ""Heroes"" track "Moss Garden"); thumb piano; drums (on the "Heathen" track "Cactus"), and various percussion instruments.


title: David Bowie

text: Bowie met dancer Lindsay Kemp in 1967 and enrolled in his dance class at the London Dance Centre. He commented in 1972 that meeting Kemp was when his interest in image "really blossomed". "He lived on his emotions, he was a wonderful influence. His day-to-day life was the most theatrical thing I had ever seen, ever. It was everything I thought Bohemia probably was. I joined the circus." In January 1968, Kemp choreographed a dance scene for a BBC play, "The Pistol Shot", in the Theatre 625 series, and used Bowie with a dancer, Hermione Farthingale; the pair began dating and moved into a London flat together. Bowie and Farthingale broke up in early 1969 when she went to Norway to take part in a film, "Song of Norway"; this affected him, and several songs, such as "Letter to Hermione" and "Life on Mars?", reference her; and, for the video accompanying "Where Are We Now?", he wore a T-shirt with the words "m/s Song of Norway". They were last together in January 1969 for the filming of "Love You till Tuesday", a 30-minute film that was not released until 1984: intended as a promotional vehicle, it featured performances from Bowie's repertoire, including "Space Oddity", which had not been released when the film was made.


title: David Bowie

text: Bowie married his first wife, Mary Angela Barnett, on 19 March 1970 at Bromley Register Office in Bromley, London. They had an open marriage. Angela described their union as a marriage of convenience. "We got married so that I could [get a permit to] work. I didn't think it would last and David said, before we got married, 'I'm not really in love with you' and I thought that's probably a good thing", she said. Bowie said about Angela that "living with her is like living with a blow torch." Their son Duncan, born on 30 May 1971, was at first known as Zowie. Bowie and Angela divorced on 8 February 1980 in Switzerland. Bowie received custody of their son. After the gag order that was part of their divorce agreement ended, Angela wrote "Backstage Passes: Life on the Wild Side with David Bowie", a memoir of their turbulent marriage.


title: David Bowie

text: On 24 April 1992, Bowie married Somali-American model Iman in a private ceremony in Lausanne. The wedding was later solemnised on 6 June in Florence. The couple's marriage influenced the content of Bowie's 1993 album "Black Tie White Noise", particularly on tracks such as "The Wedding"/"The Wedding Song" and "Miracle Goodnight". They had one daughter, Alexandria "Lexi" Zahra Jones, born in August 2000. The couple resided primarily in New York City and London as well as owning an apartment in Sydney's Elizabeth Bay and Britannia Bay House on the island of Mustique.


title: David Bowie

text: Bowie declared himself gay in an interview with Michael Watts for a 1972 issue of "Melody Maker", coinciding with his campaign for stardom as Ziggy Stardust. According to Buckley, "If Ziggy confused both his creator and his audience, a big part of that confusion centred on the topic of sexuality." In a September 1976 interview with "Playboy", however, Bowie said: "It's true—I am a bisexual. But I can't deny that I've used that fact very well. I suppose it's the best thing that ever happened to me." His first wife, Angie, supported his claim of bisexuality and alleged that Bowie had a relationship with Mick Jagger.


title: David Bowie

text: In a 1983 interview with "Rolling Stone", Bowie said his public declaration of bisexuality was "the biggest mistake I ever made" and "I was always a closet heterosexual." On other occasions, he said his interest in homosexual and bisexual culture had been more a product of the times and the situation in which he found himself than of his own feelings.


title: David Bowie

text: "Blender" asked Bowie in 2002 whether he still believed his public declaration was his biggest mistake. After a long pause, he said, "I don't think it was a mistake in Europe, but it was a lot tougher in America. I had no problem with people knowing I was bisexual. But I had no inclination to hold any banners nor be a representative of any group of people." Bowie said he wanted to be a songwriter and performer rather than a headline for his bisexuality, and in "puritanical" America, "I think it stood in the way of so much I wanted to do."


title: David Bowie

text: Buckley wrote that Bowie "mined sexual intrigue for its ability to shock", and was probably "never gay, nor even consistently actively bisexual", instead experimenting "out of a sense of curiosity and a genuine allegiance with the 'transgressional'." Sandford said, according to Mary Finnigan—with whom Bowie had an affair in 1969—Bowie and his first wife Angie "created their bisexual fantasy". He wrote that Bowie "made a positive fetish of repeating the quip that he and his wife had met while 'fucking the same bloke' ... Gay sex was always an anecdotal and laughing matter. That Bowie's actual tastes swung the other way is clear from even a partial tally of his affairs with women." The BBC's Mark Easton wrote in 2016 that Britain was "far more tolerant of difference", and that gay rights (such as same-sex marriage) and gender equality would not have "enjoyed the broad support they do today without Bowie's androgynous challenge all those years ago".


title: David Bowie

text: Over the years, Bowie made numerous references to religions and to his evolving spirituality. Beginning in 1967 from the influence of his brother, he became interested in Buddhism and, with commercial success eluding him, he considered becoming a Buddhist monk. Biographer Marc Spitz states that the religion reminded the young artist that other goals in life existed outside fame and material gain and one can learn about themselves through meditation and chanting. After a few months' study at Tibet House in London, he was told by his Lama, Chime Rinpoche, "You don't want to be Buddhist... You should follow music." By 1975, Bowie admitted, "I felt totally, absolutely alone. And I probably was alone because I pretty much had abandoned God." In his will, Bowie stipulated that he be cremated and his ashes scattered in Bali "in accordance with the Buddhist rituals".


title: David Bowie

text: After Bowie married Iman in a private ceremony in 1992, he said they knew that their "real marriage, sanctified by God, had to happen in a church in Florence". Earlier that year, he knelt on stage at The Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert and recited the Lord's Prayer before a television audience. In 1993, Bowie said he had an "undying" belief in the "unquestionable" existence of God. In a separate 1993 interview, while describing the genesis of the music for his album "Black Tie White Noise", he said " … it was important for me to find something [musically] that also had no sort of representation of institutionalized and organized religion, of which I'm not a believer, I must make that clear." Interviewed in 2005, Bowie said whether God exists "is not a question that can be answered... I'm not quite an atheist and it worries me. There's that little bit that holds on: 'Well, I'm "almost" an atheist. Give me a couple of months... I've nearly got it right. He had a tattoo of the Serenity Prayer in Japanese on his left calf.


title: David Bowie

text: "Questioning [his] spiritual life [was] always ... germane" to Bowie's songwriting. The song "Station to Station" is "very much concerned with the Stations of the Cross"; the song also specifically references Kabbalah. Bowie called the album "extremely dark... the nearest album to a magick treatise that I've written". "Earthling" showed "the abiding need in me to vacillate between atheism or a kind of gnosticism... What I need is to find a balance, spiritually, with the way I live and my demise." Released shortly before his death, "Lazarus"—from his final album, "Blackstar"—began with the words, "Look up here, I'm in Heaven" while the rest of the album deals with other matters of mysticism and mortality.


title: David Bowie

text: As a seventeen-year-old still known as Davy Jones, he was a cofounder and spokesman for the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Long-Haired Men in response to members of The Manish Boys being asked to cut their hair prior to a television appearance on the BBC. He and his bandmates were interviewed on the network's 12 November 1964 installment of "Tonight" to champion their cause. He stated on the programme, "I think we all like long hair and we don't see why other people should persecute us because of it."


title: David Bowie

text: In 1976, speaking as the Thin White Duke persona and "at least partially tongue-in-cheek", he made statements that expressed support for fascism and perceived admiration for Adolf Hitler in interviews with "Playboy", "NME", and a Swedish publication. Bowie was quoted as saying: "Britain is ready for a fascist leader ... I think Britain could benefit from a fascist leader. After all, fascism is really nationalism... I believe very strongly in fascism, people have always responded with greater efficiency under a regimental leadership." He was also quoted as saying: "Adolf Hitler was one of the first rock stars" and "You've got to have an extreme right front come up and sweep everything off its feet and tidy everything up." Bowie later retracted these comments in an interview with "Melody Maker" in October 1977, blaming them on mental instability caused by his drug problems at the time, saying: "I was out of my mind, totally, completely crazed." In the same interview, Bowie described himself as "apolitical", stating "The more I travel and the less sure I am about exactly which political philosophies are commendable. The more government systems I see, the less enticed I am to give my allegiance to any set of people, so it would be disastrous for me to adopt a definitive point of view, or to adopt a party of people and say 'these are my people'."


title: David Bowie

text: In the 1980s and 1990s, Bowie's public statements shifted sharply towards anti-racism and anti-fascism. In an interview with MTV anchor Mark Goodman in 1983, Bowie criticised the channel for not providing enough coverage of Black musicians, becoming visibly uncomfortable when Goodman suggested that the network's fear of backlash from the American Midwest was one reason for such a lack of coverage. The music videos for "China Girl" and "Let's Dance" were described by Bowie as a "very simple, very direct" statement against racism. The album "Tin Machine" took a more direct stance against fascism and neo-Nazism, and was criticised for being too preachy.


title: David Bowie

text: At the 2014 Brit Awards on 19 February, Bowie became the oldest recipient of a Brit Award in the ceremony's history when he won the award for British Male Solo Artist, which was collected on his behalf by Kate Moss. His speech read: "I'm completely delighted to have a Brit for being the best male – but I am, aren't I Kate? Yes. I think it's a great way to end the day. Thank you very, very much and Scotland stay with us." Bowie's reference to the forthcoming September 2014 Scottish independence referendum garnered a significant reaction throughout the UK on social media.


title: David Bowie

text: In 2016, filmmaker and activist Michael Moore said he had wanted to use "Panic in Detroit" for his 1998 documentary "The Big One". Denied at first, Moore was given the rights after calling Bowie personally, recalling: "I've read stuff since his death saying that he wasn't that political and he stayed away from politics. But that wasn't the conversation that I had with him."


title: David Bowie

text: Bowie was involved in philanthropic and charitable efforts for HIV/AIDS research in Africa, as well as other humanitarian projects helping disadvantaged children and developing nations, ending poverty and hunger, promoting human rights, and providing education and health care to children affected by war.


title: David Bowie

text: On 10 January 2016, Bowie died of liver cancer in his New York City apartment. He had been diagnosed 18 months earlier but had not made his condition public. The Belgian theatre director Ivo van Hove, who had worked with Bowie on his off-Broadway musical "Lazarus", explained that he was unable to attend rehearsals due to the progression of the disease. He noted that Bowie had kept working during the illness.


title: David Bowie

text: Following Bowie's death, fans gathered at impromptu street shrines. At the mural of Bowie in his birthplace of Brixton, south London, which shows him in his "Aladdin Sane" character, fans laid flowers and sang his songs. Other memorial sites included Berlin, Los Angeles, and outside his apartment in New York. After news of his death, sales of his albums and singles soared. Bowie had insisted that he did not want a funeral, and according to his death certificate he was cremated in New Jersey on 12 January. As he wished in his will, his ashes were scattered in a Buddhist ceremony in Bali, Indonesia.


title: David Bowie

text: Bowie's 1969 commercial breakthrough, the song "Space Oddity", won him an Ivor Novello Special Award For Originality. For his performance in the 1976 science fiction film "The Man Who Fell to Earth", he won a Saturn Award for Best Actor. In the ensuing decades he was honoured with numerous awards for his music and its accompanying videos, receiving, among others, six Grammy Awards and four Brit Awards—winning Best British Male Artist twice; the award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 1996; and the Brits Icon award for his "lasting impact on British culture", given posthumously in 2016.


title: David Bowie

text: In 1999, Bowie was made a Commander of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French government. He received an honorary doctorate from Berklee College of Music the same year. He declined the royal honour of Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 2000, and turned down a knighthood in 2003. Bowie later stated "I would never have any intention of accepting anything like that. I seriously don't know what it's for. It's not what I spent my life working for."


title: David Bowie

text: During his lifetime, Bowie sold over 100 million records worldwide, making him one of the best-selling music artists. In the United Kingdom, he was awarded 9 platinum, 11 gold, and 8 silver albums, and in the United States, 5 platinum and 9 gold. Since 2015, Parlophone has remastered Bowie's back catalogue through the "Era" box set series, starting with "Five Years (1969–1973)". Bowie was announced as the best-selling vinyl artist of the 21st century in 2022.


title: David Bowie

text: "Rolling Stone"s 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list includes "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars" at number 40, "Station to Station" at number 52, "Hunky Dory" at number 88, "Low" at number 206, and "Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)" at number 443. And, on their 500 Greatest Songs of All Time list, "Rolling Stone" includes "Heroes" at number 23, "Life on Mars?" at number 105, "Space Oddity" at number 189, "Changes" at number 200, "Young Americans" at number 204, "Station to Station" at number 400, and "Under Pressure" at number 429. Four of his songs are included in The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.


title: David Bowie

text: In the BBC's 2002 poll of the 100 Greatest Britons, Bowie was ranked 29. In 2004, "Rolling Stone" magazine ranked him 39th on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. Bowie was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996 and into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2005. He was inducted into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame in 2013. Days after Bowie's death, "Rolling Stone" contributor Rob Sheffield proclaimed him "the greatest rock star ever". The magazine also listed him as the 39th greatest songwriter of all time.


title: David Bowie

text: In 2008, the spider "Heteropoda davidbowie" was named in Bowie's honour. In 2011, his image was chosen by popular vote for the B₤10m note of the local currency of his birthplace, the Brixton Pound. On 5 January 2015, a main-belt asteroid was named 342843 Davidbowie. On 13 January 2016, Belgian amateur astronomers at MIRA Public Observatory created a "Bowie asterism" of seven stars which had been in the vicinity of Mars at the time of Bowie's death; the "constellation" forms the lightning bolt on Bowie's face from the cover of his "Aladdin Sane" album. In March 2017, Bowie featured on a series of UK postage stamps issued by the Royal Mail. On 25 March 2018, a statue of Bowie was unveiled in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, the town where he debuted Ziggy Stardust. The statue features a likeness of Bowie in 2002 accompanied with various characters and looks from over his career, with Ziggy Stardust at the front.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: Ronald Dion DeSantis (; born September 14, 1978) is an American politician serving as the 46th governor of Florida since January 2019. A member of the Republican Party, DeSantis represented Florida's 6th district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2013 to 2018.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: Born in Jacksonville, DeSantis spent most of his childhood in Dunedin, Florida. He graduated from Yale University and Harvard Law School. DeSantis joined the United States Navy in 2004 and was promoted to lieutenant before serving as a legal advisor to SEAL Team One; he was deployed to Iraq in 2007. When he returned to the U.S. a year later, the U.S. Department of Justice appointed DeSantis to serve as a Special Assistant U.S. attorney at the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Middle District of Florida, a position he held until his honorable discharge in 2010.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis was first elected to Congress in 2012, defeating his Democratic opponent Heather Beaven. During his tenure he became a founding member of the Freedom Caucus and was an ally of President Donald Trump. DeSantis frequently criticized Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. He briefly ran for U.S. Senate in 2016, but withdrew when incumbent senator Marco Rubio sought reelection.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In August 2018, DeSantis won the Republican nomination for governor, and chose state representative Jeanette Nuñez as his running mate. The close results of the general election between DeSantis and the Democratic nominee, Tallahassee mayor Andrew Gillum, triggered a machine recount. DeSantis was certified the winner with a 0.4% margin of victory.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: As governor, DeSantis resisted imposing restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic in Florida, including face mask mandates, stay-at-home orders, and vaccination requirements. In May 2021, he signed into law a bill that prohibited businesses, schools, cruise ships, and government entities from requiring proof of vaccination. DeSantis cut spending in Florida, achieving a record budget surplus for the state, and engaged in recovery efforts after Hurricane Ian and Hurricane Nicole. He was reelected in a landslide victory over Charlie Crist in the 2022 Florida gubernatorial election; his 19.4% margin of victory was the state's largest in 40 years.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis was born on September 14, 1978, in Jacksonville, the son of Karen (née Rogers) and Ronald Daniel DeSantis. He is of Italian descent: all of his eight great-grandparents were born in Italy, and they were originally from "comuni" in the provinces of L'Aquila, Benevento, Avellino and Campobasso. His maternal great-great-grandfather Salvatore Storti immigrated to the United States from Italy in 1904, eventually settling in Pennsylvania. His great-great-grandmother Luigia Colucci joined her husband in the United States in 1917. DeSantis's mother was a nurse and his father installed Nielsen TV rating boxes. His family moved to Orlando, Florida, before relocating to Dunedin, Florida, when he was six years old. His sister Christina Marie DeSantis was born on May 5, 1985, in Orlando and died in 2015. He was a member of the Little League team from Dunedin National that made it to the 1991 Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. DeSantis attended Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic School and Dunedin High School, graduating in 1997.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: After high school, DeSantis studied history at Yale University. He was captain of Yale's varsity baseball team and joined the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity. He was an outfielder on the Yale baseball team; as a senior in 2001, he had the team's best batting average at .336. While attending Yale he worked a variety of jobs, including as an electrician's assistant and a coach at a baseball camp. DeSantis graduated from Yale in 2001 with a B.A. "magna cum laude".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: After Yale, he taught history and coached for a year at Darlington School. He subsequently attended Harvard Law School, graduating in 2005 with a Juris Doctor "cum laude".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In 2004, during his second year at Harvard Law, DeSantis was commissioned an officer in the U.S. Navy and assigned to the Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps (JAG). He completed Naval Justice School in 2005. Later that year, he reported to the JAG Trial Service Office Command South East at Naval Station Mayport, Florida, as a prosecutor. He was promoted from lieutenant, junior grade to lieutenant in 2006. He was then stationed at Joint Task Force Guantanamo (JTF-GTMO), working directly with detainees at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. The records of DeSantis's service in the U.S. Navy were often redacted upon release to the public, to protect personal privacy according to the Navy.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: Captain Patrick McCarthy supervised DeSantis at the Guantanamo camp and has said that DeSantis was tasked with ensuring that prisoners were given their rights under Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions. DeSantis "made sure [detainees] were addressed in a way that was consistent with the law", McCarthy said.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In 2007, DeSantis reported to the Naval Special Warfare Command Group in Coronado, California, where he was assigned to SEAL Team One and deployed to Iraq with the troop surge as the legal advisor to the SEAL Commander of the Special Operations Task Force-West in Fallujah.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis returned to the U.S. in April 2008, at which time he was reassigned to the Naval Region Southeast Legal Service. The U.S. Department of Justice appointed him to serve as a Special Assistant U.S. attorney at the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Middle District of Florida. DeSantis was assigned as a trial defense counsel until his honorable discharge from active duty in February 2010. He concurrently accepted a reserve commission as a lieutenant in the Judge Advocate General's Corps of the US Navy Reserve.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: During his military career, DeSantis has been awarded the Bronze Star Medal, the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal, the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, and the Iraq Campaign Medal. As of 2022, he is still serving in the U.S. Navy Reserve.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In 2012, DeSantis announced he would run in the Republican primary for Florida's 6th congressional district. The district had previously been the 7th, represented by 10-term Republican John Mica, but Mica's share of Orlando had been drawn into the new 7th District, and Mica opted to run there even though the new 6th included the bulk of his former territory.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis won the six-candidate Republican primary with 39% of the vote, while the runner-up, state representative Fred Costello, received 23%. In the November general election, DeSantis defeated Democratic nominee Heather Beaven 57–43%, with majorities in all four counties. He was reelected in 2014 and 2016.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: Before the 114th United States Congress, DeSantis was named the chairman of the Subcommittee on National Security.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis introduced the Faithful Execution of the Law Act of 2014 (H.R. 3973; 113th Congress) in the House on January 29 of that year. The bill would have directed the United States Department of Justice to report to Congress whenever any federal agency refrained from enforcing laws or regulations for any reason. In its report, the government would have been required to explain why it had decided not to enforce that law. DeSantis spoke in favor of the bill, arguing that "President Obama has not only failed to uphold several of our nation's laws, he has vowed to continue to do so in order to enact his unpopular agenda. ...The American people deserve to know exactly which laws the Obama administration is refusing to enforce and why." The bill passed in the House but did not become law.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis signed a 2013 pledge sponsored by Americans for Prosperity vowing to vote against any global warming legislation that would raise taxes. In 2015, DeSantis was a founding member of the Freedom Caucus, a group of congressional conservatives and libertarians.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In August 2017, DeSantis added a rider to the proposed fiscal 2018 spending bill package that would end funding for the Mueller investigation "or for the investigation under that order of matters occurring before June 2015" (the month Trump announced he was running for president). The amendment was intended to counter a bipartisan bill written by two Democratic and two Republican U.S. senators which would have limited the president's power to fire the special counsel. The DeSantis amendment sought to cut off the investigation's funding by November 2017. It was also a response to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein's statement that the DOJ "doesn't conduct fishing expeditions". DeSantis stated that the DOJ order dated May 17, 2017, "didn't identify a crime to be investigated and practically invites a fishing expedition".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In May 2015, DeSantis announced his candidacy for the United States Senate seat held by Marco Rubio, who initially did not file to run for reelection due to his bid for the U.S. presidency. He was endorsed by the fiscally conservative Club for Growth. When Rubio ended his presidential bid and ran for reelection to the Senate, DeSantis withdrew from the Senate race and ran for reelection to the House.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In January 2018, DeSantis announced his candidacy for governor of Florida to succeed term-limited Republican incumbent Rick Scott. President Trump had said in December 2017 that he would support DeSantis should he run for governor. During the Republican primary, DeSantis emphasized his support for Trump by running an ad in which DeSantis taught his children how to "build the wall" and say "Make America Great Again" and dressed one of his children in a red "Make America Great Again" jumper. Asked if he could name an issue where he disagreed with Trump, DeSantis did not identify one. On July 30, 2018, Jonathan Martin of "The New York Times" wrote that the support DeSantis's primary campaign had received demonstrated both Trump's king-making capacity in a Republican-trending state and a "broader nationalization of conservative politics" whereby "a willingness to hurl rhetorical lightning bolts at the left, the media and special counsel Robert S. Mueller can override local credentials, local endorsements and preparedness for a state-based job".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On August 28, 2018, DeSantis won the Republican primary by defeating his main opponent, Adam Putnam. His next opponent was Democratic nominee Andrew Gillum in the general election. The race was "widely seen as a toss-up".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In a televised interview on Fox News, DeSantis made a statement that received widespread media attention, and was interpreted by Florida Democratic Party Chair Terrie Rizzo as a racist dog whistle. According to a profile by Dexter Filkins in "The New Yorker":


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis began the campaign with a disastrous gaffe, saying on television, "The last thing we need to do is to monkey this up" by electing Gillum. DeSantis insisted that there was no racial motive behind the statement—"He uses a lot of dorky phrases like that," one of his former colleagues told me—and the outrage didn't endure. But his tone deafness created a disadvantage. "We were handling Gillum with kid gloves," the lawyer close to DeSantis told me. "We can't hit the guy, because we're trying to defend the fact that we're not racist."


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In September 2018, DeSantis announced state representative Jeanette Núñez as his running mate. He resigned his House seat on September 10, 2018, to focus on his gubernatorial campaign. The same month, DeSantis was criticized by television talk show host Joe Scarborough for not having a fully formed policy platform, and canceled a planned interview with the "Tampa Bay Times" to have additional time to put together a platform before an in-depth policy interview.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis was endorsed by the Florida Police Chiefs Association. In the campaign, some sheriffs endorsed DeSantis, while other sheriffs backed Gillum.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis's gubernatorial platform included support for legislation that would allow people with concealed weapons permits to carry firearms openly. He also supported a law mandating the use of E-Verify by businesses and a state-level ban on sanctuary city protections for undocumented immigrants. DeSantis promised to stop the spread of polluted water from Lake Okeechobee. He expressed support for a state constitutional amendment to require a supermajority vote for any tax increases. DeSantis opposed allowing able-bodied, childless adults to receive Medicaid. He said he would implement a medical cannabis program, while opposing the legalization of recreational cannabis.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: Initial election-night results had DeSantis winning by nearly 100,000 votes, and Gillum conceded. Gillum rescinded his concession after late-counted ballots brought the race within less than 34,000 votes, a margin of 0.4%. The close margin required an automatic machine recount of the ballots.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: A machine recount in three statewide contests (governor, U.S. senator, and agriculture commissioner) began with a November 15 deadline. Although three counties missed the deadline, it was not extended. DeSantis was confirmed as the winner and Gillum conceded on November 17.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis prefiled the oath of office with the Florida secretary of state and became governor on January 8, 2019. The official swearing-in ceremony was held at noon that day. On January 11, DeSantis posthumously pardoned the Groveland Four, four black men falsely convicted of rape in 1949.In January 2019, DeSantis officially suspended Broward County sheriff Scott Israel for his response to the mass shootings at the Fort Lauderdale airport and Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, appointing Gregory Tony to replace Israel. In his first two weeks in office, DeSantis appointed Barbara Lagoa, Robert J. Luck and Carlos G. Muñiz to fill the three vacancies on the Florida Supreme Court, shifting the court's majority from liberal to conservative. He replaced the entire South Florida Water Management District board. He signed a $2.5 billion executive order for water quality and Everglades restoration work. In January 2019, DeSantis signed an executive order calling for the end of Common Core in Florida.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In June 2019, DeSantis signed a measure that would make it harder to launch successful ballot initiatives. Petition-gathering for ballot initiatives to legalize medical cannabis, increases to the minimum wage, and expansion of Medicaid were also under way.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: After the 2020 Republican National Convention was pulled from its originally scheduled host city, Charlotte, following conflict between Trump and North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper over plans for a large-scale gathering without public-health protocols in place to prevent spread of COVID-19, DeSantis campaigned to have Florida be the new host state. He competed with similar entreaties from Tennessee and Georgia. DeSantis won, with the main festivities of the RNC, including Trump's keynote speech, relocated to Jacksonville. Ultimately, the entire event was scrapped in favor of rallies online and on television.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On February 2, 2021, DeSantis announced his support of legislation to crack down on Big Tech and prevent alleged political censorship. He also announced his support of a number of election law restrictions.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In March 2021, DeSantis proposed legislation to impose restrictions and stricter requirements for Florida universities to collaborate with Chinese academics and universities; he said this would crack down on economic espionage by China. DeSantis signed two such bills in June.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In April 2021, DeSantis signed into law the Combating Public Disorder Act he had been advocating. Aside from being an anti-riot statute, it forbade intimidation by mobs; penalized damage to historic properties or memorials, such as downtown Miami's Christopher Columbus statue, which was damaged in 2020; and forbade publishing personal identifying information online with intent to harm. DeSantis had argued for this legislation by citing the George Floyd protests of 2020 and the 2021 United States Capitol attack, although only the former was mentioned at the signing ceremony. Several months after the signing, a federal judge blocked the portion of the law that introduced a new definition of "riot", calling it too vague.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On May 5, 2021, Desantis announced that all Florida police officers, firefighters, and paramedics would receive a $1,000 bonus.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In May 2021, he signed a deal with The Seminole Tribe of Florida to allow the tribe to offer statewide online sports betting.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In its 2021 session, the Florida legislature passed DeSantis's top priorities. During his tenure, DeSantis had a generally smooth relationship with the Legislature, which enacted many of his proposals.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: During 2021, there was speculation that DeSantis would run for president in the 2024 election. On September 7, DeSantis said he thought such speculation was "purely manufactured". During a September 30 appearance on Fox News, he said he would run for reelection as governor in 2022 but was not thinking beyond that. On November 5 he filed to run for reelection as governor, and on November 8 announced that he had done so. In a straw poll conducted at the 2022 Conservative Political Action Conference for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, DeSantis came in second with 28% of the vote, behind Donald Trump, who received 59%.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On December 2, 2021, DeSantis announced that as part of a $100 million funding proposal for the Florida National Guard, $3.5 million would be allocated to the reactivation of the Florida State Guard, a volunteer state defense force that has been inactive since 1947.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In 2022, DeSantis was increasingly seen as a contender for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. Various writers predicted that DeSantis could defeat former president Donald Trump or said that DeSantis is preferable to Trump in view of the January 6 hearings and subsequent straw polls. This idea gained more traction after the 2022 United States midterm elections, when DeSantis was reelected governor by almost 20 percentage points over Democratic nominee Charlie Crist, while Trump-endorsed candidates, such as Mehmet Oz in the United States Senate race in Pennsylvania, performed poorly.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In September 2022, after similar actions by Texas Governor Greg Abbott, an agent of DeSantis recruited 50 newly arrived asylum seekers, mostly from Venezuela, in San Antonio, Texas, and flew them via two chartered planes to the Crestview, Florida airport, where they did not debark, then proceeded to Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts. Attorneys representing the immigrants claimed the refugees were lied to, promised jobs, funds, English lessons, legal services and housing assistance at their destination. The Florida legislature had appropriated $12 million to transport migrants out of the state, funding under the purview of attorney Larry Keefe, DeSantis's public safety czar, who was in charge of immigrant affairs and had a prior relationship with the air carrier. Vertol was paid $615,000 on September 8 for the transport, and received another $980,000 less than two weeks later. The destination community was not notified of the refugees' impending arrival and requirements. The migrants filed a class-action suit against DeSantis, calling his treatment of them "extreme and outrageous, and utterly intolerable in a civilized community." DeSantis's spokesperson noted that the refugees had all signed a consent form, and called the lawsuit "political theater" by "opportunistic activists" at the expense of "illegal immigrants".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In March 2020, DeSantis decided against declaring a state of emergency in Florida during the COVID-19 pandemic. Scientists and media outlets have given mixed reviews of DeSantis's handling of the pandemic. Florida's death rate from COVID-19 (75,000 deaths) ended up being within the national average and Florida's economy fared better than many other U.S. states.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: Early in the pandemic, DeSantis boasted about the low number of COVID-19 cases in Florida, and harshly criticized those who had argued that the state's lax response to the virus was insufficient. Experts argued that delays in lockdown would greatly increase Florida's COVID numbers and leave it susceptible to becoming a new hot spot. DeSantis rejected the implementation of a statewide face mask mandate, belatedly implemented stay-at-home orders, and let his stay-at-home order implemented in April expire.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On March 8, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention privately briefed DeSantis that Florida was already experiencing community spread of COVID-19. The next day, he publicly denied such a claim. On March 10, federal official Anthony Fauci publicly confirmed that Florida had community spread. DeSantis confirmed Florida's community spread only on March 14.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: By the end of March 2020, Florida had 6,741 confirmed cases of COVID-19. DeSantis declared that he would not issue a statewide stay-at-home order because the Trump administration had not recommended it. On April 1, he ordered that all Floridians stay home for 30 days with exceptions for essential services and activities. He received criticism for falsely stating on April 9 that COVID-19 had caused no fatalities under 25 in the United States. DeSantis acknowledged this error after critics pointed it out, and clarified that there have been no deaths from the virus in people under 25 in Florida. In early June, he partially lifted his stay-at-home order, lifting restrictions on bars and cinemas; the same day he lifted the restrictions, Florida recorded the largest case surge in six weeks.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis's handling of COVID-19 in Florida was initially unpopular among the state's voters: by May 2020, he was the only U.S. governor whose approval had declined after COVID-19 became widespread in the U.S. But after a few months, DeSantis's reluctance to impose restrictions in response to the pandemic led to an increase in approval, especially among Republican voters.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis sought to have the 2020 Republican National Convention in Jacksonville. In conversations with Trump in May, he said he would not require the use of face masks. By July, as Florida became a global epicenter of the virus, Trump called off the event. During Trump's reelection campaign, DeSantis worked to help him win Florida. He attended Trump's rallies and high-fived attendees while not wearing a mask, contrary to public health guidance at the time.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In June 2020, DeSantis said the bulk of new cases were present in "younger demographics" and argued that increased testing, particularly of asymptomatic individuals, and more efficient identification of outbreaks in areas such as prisons and in Florida's agriculture sector were responsible for most of the increase. He emphasized that the strain on the hospital system had decreased since the previous peak in case numbers, and that Florida was ready to handle any additional influx in hospital patients, adding that the state had "twice as many" open hospital beds than on March 1. DeSantis announced that he would reinstate some restrictions on business activity in late June to halt the virus's spread, but said Florida is "not going back" on reopening the economy, arguing that "people going to a business is not what's driving" the surge in cases. Anthony Fauci said that states reopening faster than federal guidelines were contributing to a rise in cases.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On June 28, 2020, DeSantis said Florida was in "good shape" in its fight against COVID-19. In July 2020, when Florida was a global epicenter of the coronavirus with nearly 5,800 deaths, DeSantis largely sidelined health experts and scientists, with "The Washington Post" reporting that he relied primarily on his wife, a former television reporter, and his chief of staff, a former hospital executive.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In September 2020, he lifted all restrictions on capacity in bars and restaurants, despite persistent cases. He banned cities and counties from collecting fines from face mask mandates and urged public health officials in Florida cities to focus less on universal COVID-19 testing.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: The DeSantis administration largely ignored the scientists in Florida's Emerging Pathogens Institute, the "Sun-Sentinel" reported. Instead, in August and September 2020, DeSantis invited to Florida other scientists who endorsed less restrictive COVID-19 policies that he agreed with, so that they could conduct press conferences with him. They included radiologist Scott Atlas, a Trump administration advisor known for spreading misinformation about COVID-19.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis favored reopening schools for in-person learning for the 2020–21 school year. By October 2020, he announced all 67 public school districts were open for in-person learning.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: According to a December 2020 article in the "Sun-Sentinel", DeSantis "imposed an approach in line with the views of the president and his powerful base of supporters."


title: Ron DeSantis

text: By February 2021, DeSantis had generally positive approval ratings, ranging from 51% to 64%. In March 2021, "Politico" called him the most "politically ascendant" governor in the country, as his controversial policies had been at that point "short of or even the opposite of ruinous", while Florida had "fared no worse, and in some ways better, than many other states". By August 2021, amid a record in new cases within the state, Florida had become the state with the highest per capita hospitalizations for COVID-19. By April 2021, Florida was 27th out of 50 in both cases and deaths per capita. A study published in the "American Journal of Public Health" found substantial underreporting of deaths from COVID-19 in Florida from March to September 2020. Experts noted similar underreporting had occurred throughout the nation.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In February 2021, DeSantis threatened to withhold COVID-19 vaccines from counties that criticized the manner in which vaccines were distributed. The same month, the Biden administration mulled imposing travel restrictions on Florida and other domestic locations to prevent further spread of COVID-19. DeSantis expressed his discontent with what he characterized as "trying to shut FL's border" and announced his intention to fervently oppose it if executed.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On May 3, 2021, DeSantis signed an executive order officially rescinding the state of emergency and all COVID-19-related public health orders. This order superseded all local public health orders and prohibited municipalities from enacting any further public health order related to COVID-19. The same day, he signed a bill into law that prohibited businesses, cruise ships, schools, and government entities from requiring proof of vaccination for use of services.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In July 2021, Florida experienced a record surge in COVID-19 cases, setting a new daily case record on July 30 and accounting for around 1 in 5 new infections in the country. Amid the resurgence, DeSantis banned public schools from implementing mask mandates, claiming without evidence that masks were harmful to children, and in August 2021 he threatened to fine, withhold funding, or withhold salary from any school district or school official who did so. Previously, data released by the Florida Department of Health had tied over 100,000 COVID-19 cases to Florida private and public K-12 schools from September 2020 to April 2021. In late August, the DeSantis administration ordered Alachua and Broward school districts to reverse their mask mandates or face a reduction in state funding, leading the districts' leaders to declare that they would take legal action in response.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In August 2021, President Biden singled out Florida and Texas as "states with low vaccination rates" that "account for one third of all new COVID-19 cases in the entire country". Biden added, "if some governors aren’t willing to do the right thing to beat this pandemic, then they should allow businesses and universities who want to do the right thing to be able to do it." DeSantis responded, "We will not allow Joe Biden and his bureaucratic flunkies to come in and commandeer the rights and freedoms of Floridians." He also said, "No elected official is doing more to enable the transmission of COVID in America than Joe Biden with his open borders policies." "The Washington Post" reported that this claim was based on "guesswork and assumptions, not evidence", while PolitiFact reported that COVID-19 hot spots tend to be clustered far from the border, in places with low rates of public vaccination, not along the southern border, as would be expected if migrants were driving the surge in cases. Moreover, the U.S. does not have an open borders policy, as most migrants at the southern border are prevented from entering the country by Title 42.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On August 27, 2021, Judge John Cooper ruled that DeSantis could not ban mask mandates in schools. The state appealed, automatically suspending Cooper's ruling while the appeal was considered, but Cooper overruled that suspension on September 8, lifting DeSantis's ban, citing the need to protect unvaccinated children.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis has heavily promoted monoclonal antibody treatment for COVID-19, which can treat people after they get sick and reduce hospitalization. One such medication is made by Regeneron, which is a major investment of DeSantis's largest political donor. At a September press conference, DeSantis said that local governments will face a $5,000 fine for imposing vaccine mandates. He said government agency vaccine mandates violate the state's law banning private businesses from requiring vaccine passports for customers. At the event, a number of speakers spoke out against the vaccine and vaccine mandates, including one person who falsely claimed the vaccine "changes your RNA".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On September 21, 2021, DeSantis appointed Joseph Ladapo, a vocal supporter of his COVID-19 policies, as Florida's surgeon general. Ladapo has a history of promoting unproven treatments against COVID-19, opposes COVID-19 vaccine requirements, has questioned the safety of COVID-19 vaccines, and has associated with America's Frontline Doctors, a pro-Trump healthcare group known for promoting falsehoods about the pandemic.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In October 2021, DeSantis offered to pay police officers $5,000 to relocate to and work in Florida, making a specific appeal to officers who refused to comply with vaccine requirements.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On November 18, 2021, DeSantis signed a legislative package into law, officially making Florida the first state to impose fines on businesses and hospitals that require inoculation against COVID-19 without exemptions or alternatives. The legislation was signed a day after Florida Republican lawmakers passed his anti-mandate agenda. DeSantis called it "the strongest piece of legislation that's been enacted anywhere in the country" in opposition to COVID-19 vaccination mandates.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In May 2022, a Bloomberg News op-ed claimed that, when adjusting state death tolls based on what they would be if age distribution were equal between the states, Florida's COVID-19 death toll would be less than the national average and only slightly more than California's. The op-ed also found that young people have been far more likely to die from COVID-19 in Florida than California, probably because children were in physical schools in Florida during the 2020-21 school year.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In June 2022, DeSantis decided against ordering COVID-19 vaccines for children under 5, making Florida the only state not to preorder vaccines for that demographic.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In September 2022, DeSantis declared a state of emergency for the entire state of Florida as Ian approached. He also asked for federal aid ahead of time. On October 5, after Ian deserted Florida, President Joe Biden arrived in Florida and met with DeSantis and Senators Marco Rubio and Rick Scott. DeSantis and Biden held a press conference in Fort Myers to report on the status of the cleanup. In addition, DeSantis partnered with Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, Inc., to use the Starlink satellite Internet service to help restore communication across the state.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: First lady Casey DeSantis partnered with State Disaster Recovery Mental Health Coordinator Sara Newhouse and the Department of Health and Department of Children and Families to deploy free mental health resources to communities Ian affected.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In September 2021, DeSantis announced that he would run for reelection in 2022. His Democratic opponent was Charlie Crist, a former Florida governor and U.S. representative. Crist left the Republican Party in 2010 to become an independent, before joining the Democratic Party in 2012. Crist heavily criticized DeSantis's decision to deport illegal immigrants to Democratic states, arguing that it was human rights abuse. During an interview with Bret Baier on Fox News, Crist said that DeSantis was "one of the biggest threats to democracy". During the gubernatorial debate, which was held on October 23, DeSantis called Crist a "worn-out old donkey" in response to a question Crist asked DeSantis on whether he would serve another full four-year term. DeSantis also mentioned that Crist promised in his 2006 gubernatorial campaign that he would not raise taxes, but when elected signed a large increase in taxes and fees. DeSantis also criticized Crist's role in the U.S. House of Representatives, bringing up that in Crist's five years in the house, he showed up for work for only 14 days.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In the November 8 election, DeSantis defeated Crist. Many news outlets called his win a "landslide". Having won over 1,500,000 more votes than Crist, a margin of 19.4%, DeSantis's margin of victory was Florida's largest since 1982. He won Miami-Dade County, which had been a Democratic stronghold since 2002, and Palm Beach County, which had not voted Republican since 1986. Crist conceded the election shortly after DeSantis was projected to be the winner.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: Following the U.S. Supreme Court's "Dobbs" decision, which returned abortion rights back to the states, DeSantis pledged to "expand pro-life protections". On April 14, 2022, he signed into law a bill that bans elective abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy; under the previous law, the limit had been 24 weeks. The law includes exceptions permitting termination of a viable pregnancy beyond 15 weeks if at least two physicians certify that it is necessary to avert a "serious risk" to the pregnant woman's physical health or that the fetus has a "fatal fetal abnormality", but does not make exceptions for rape, human trafficking, incest, or mental health.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: The statute prohibits partial birth abortion, experimentation on fetuses, and harming infants born alive during or immediately after an attempted abortion. It also enforces previously enacted minimum health and safety standards for third-trimester abortion and standards for humane and sanitary disposal of fetal remains that had not been enforced due to U.S. Supreme Court decisions. Abortion providers found in violation of the statute's provisions can be charged with up to a third-degree felony. The provisions generally apply only to physicians who perform abortions, but any health care employee of an abortion provider can be charged with a felony for failure to report violations.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: The law was expected to go into effect on July 1, but a state judge blocked its enforcement, ruling that the Florida Constitution guarantees a right to privacy that renders the law unconstitutional. After DeSantis appealed the ruling, the law went into effect on July 5, pending judicial review. Floridians anticipated a state Supreme Court decision on the law's validity. Before the "Dobbs" decision upheld the Mississippi law that inspired Florida's, the Supreme Court of Florida had cited the privacy argument to invalidate a similar state law. Although "Dobbs" overruled "Roe v. Wade"'s holding that privacy rights secured a federal right to abortion until viability, that decision concerned the scope of an unenumerated right held to be implicit in the U.S. Constitution's broader guarantees of liberty or due process.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis has said that the debate over how to reduce the federal deficit should shift emphasis from tax increases to curtailing spending and triggering economic growth. He supports a "no budget no pay" policy for Congress to encourage the passage of a budget. He believes the Federal Reserve System should be audited.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In the wake of the alleged IRS targeting controversy, DeSantis called for IRS commissioner John Koskinen's resignation for having "failed the American people by frustrating Congress's attempts to ascertain the truth". He co-sponsored a bill to impeach Koskinen for violating the public's trust. Citizens Against Government Waste, a conservative think tank, named DeSantis a "Taxpayer Superhero" in 2015.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: He supported the Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny (REINS) Act, which would require that regulations that have a significant economic impact be subject to a vote of Congress prior to taking effect.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis introduced the Let Seniors Work Act, which would repeal the Retirement Earnings Test and exempt senior citizens from the 12.4% Social Security payroll tax, and co-sponsored a measure to eliminate taxes on Social Security benefits.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: He sponsored the Transportation Empowerment Act, which would transfer much of the responsibility for transportation projects to the states and sharply reduce the federal gas tax.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: He voted for the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. He said the bill would bring a "dramatically lower tax rate", "full expensing of capital investments", and more jobs to America.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: As a result of a significant increase in gasoline prices, DeSantis would announce on November 22, 2021, that he would be temporarily waiving the state's gasoline tax in the next legislative session in 2022.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis opposes federal education programs such as No Child Left Behind Act and Race to the Top, saying that education policy should be made at the local level.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis introduced the Higher Education Reform and Opportunity Act, which would allow states to create their own accreditation systems, in 2016. In an op-ed for "National Review", he said his legislation would give students "access to federal loan money to put towards non-traditional educational opportunities, such as online learning courses, vocational schools, and apprenticeships in skilled trades".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In June 2021, DeSantis led an effort to ban the teaching of critical race theory in Florida public schools (though it had not been a part of Florida public school curriculum). He described critical race theory as "teaching kids to hate their country", mirroring a similar push by conservatives nationally. The Florida Board of Education approved the ban on June 10. The Florida Education Association criticized the ban, accusing the Board of trying to hide facts from students. Other critics claimed the ban was an effort to "politicize classroom education and whitewash American history".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On December 15, 2021, DeSantis announced a new bill, the Stop Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees (WOKE) Act, which would allow parents to sue school districts that teach their children critical race theory. The bill is designed to combat "woke indoctrination" in Florida businesses and schools by preventing instruction that could make some people feel that they bear "personal responsibility" for historic wrongdoings because of their race, gender or national origin, preventing instruction that teaches that individuals are "inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously.", and preventing instruction that teaches that groups of people are oppressed or privileged based on their race, gender or national origin. He said of the bill: "No taxpayer dollars should be used to teach our kids to hate our country or hate each other." On August 18, 2022, a Florida judge blocked the act, saying that it violates the First Amendment and is too vague.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis signed three education bills into law on June 22, 2021, and suggested that state colleges and universities could lose funding if they were found to promote "stale ideology" and "indoctrination". He offered no specific examples of students being indoctrinated by Florida higher education institutions. House Bill 233 requires institutions to annually “assess the intellectual freedom and viewpoint diversity at that institution using a survey adopted by the State Board of Education", while House Bill 5 and Senate Bill 1108 introduce new requirements for civics education, including lessons on the "evil of communist and totalitarian regimes". Critics of the laws, including the Florida Education Association, claim they will have a "chilling effect on intellectual and academic freedom" and that the bills were designed to intimidate educators and suppress the free exchange of ideas.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis announced that Florida would replace the Florida Standards Assessment (FSA) test with a system of smaller tests scattered throughout the year on September 14, 2021. He said the replacement would be three tests for the fall, winter and spring, each smaller than the FSA. Florida Commissioner of Education Richard Corcoran agreed with the decision, calling it a "huge victory for the school system". The new system is to be implemented by the 2022–23 school year. DeSantis signed a bill (SB 1048) ending the FSA testing on March 15, 2022. The new bill mandates a "progress monitoring system" that tests students three times a year, at the beginning, middle and end of each school year. The Florida Education Association criticized the bill, saying it failed to reduce the standardized testing done on students or "eliminate the big make-or-break test at the end of year." Corcoran praised the bill, saying the monitoring caters to students, gives teachers more easily available data, and is "much more helpful to parents, and most importantly, it's beneficial to students".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On March 22, 2022, DeSantis signed into law bill SB 1054, which requires students entering high school starting in the 2023–24 school year to take a financial literacy course. Florida is the largest U.S. state to mandate a financial literacy course.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On May 9, 2022, DeSantis signed House Bill 395, mandating that schools observe the traditional Soviet October Revolution Day on November 7 as Victims of Communism Day by devoting 45 minutes to teaching about communism, the role of Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, Fidel Castro, and other communist leaders in history, and "how people suffered under those regimes".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis has called himself a "Teddy Roosevelt conservationist". During his 2018 gubernatorial run, he said that he did not deny climate change's existence, but did not want to be labeled a "climate change believer", adding, "I think we contribute to changes in the environment, but I'm not in the pews of the global warming left."


title: Ron DeSantis

text: One of the more environmentally friendly Republicans, DeSantis signed an executive order in 2019 that included a variety of components relating to the environment. These included a promise to spend $2.5 billion over four years on restoring the Everglades and "other water protection", and the creation of a Blue-Green Algae Task Force, an Office of Environmental Accountability and Transparency, and a Chief Science Officer.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis supports banning hydraulic fracturing. On July 10, 2020, he announced that Florida would spend $8.6 million out of $166 million received by the state from a legal settlement between Volkswagen and the United States Department of Justice relating to emission violations to add 34 charging stations for electric cars. The stations would be along Interstates 4, 75, 95, 275 and 295. On June 16, 2021, DeSantis signed into law House Bill 839, which bans local governments in Florida from requiring gas stations to add electric car charging stations.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On June 21, 2021, DeSantis signed into law House Bill 919, which prohibits local governments from placing bans or restrictions on any source of electricity. Several sizable cities in Florida at that time (Orlando, St. Petersburg, Tallahassee, Dunedin, Largo, Satellite Beach, Gainesville, Sarasota, Safety Harbor and Miami Beach) were setting goals to get all their energy from renewable sources. The bill was described as similar to those in other states (Texas, Tennessee, Louisiana, Arizona and Oklahoma) that passed laws preventing cities from banning natural gas hookups.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis opposes gun control. He received an A+ rating from the National Rifle Association. He generally opposes firearm regulation, saying, "Very rarely do firearms restrictions affect criminals. They really only affect law-abiding citizens."


title: Ron DeSantis

text: After the 2018 Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida, DeSantis expressed his support for hiring retired law enforcement officers and military veterans as armed guards for schools. He disagreed with legislation Governor Rick Scott signed that banned bump stocks, added a mandatory three-day waiting period for gun purchases, and raised the legal age for purchases from 18 to 21. He has expressed support for measures to improve federal background checks for purchasing firearms and has said that there is a need to intervene with those who are exhibiting warning signs of committing violence instead of waiting until a crime has been committed.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In November 2020, DeSantis proposed an "anti-mob" extension to the preexisting stand-your-ground law in Florida that would allow gun-owning residents to use deadly force on individuals they believe are looting. It would also make blocking traffic during a protest a third-degree felony and impose criminal penalties for partaking in "violent or disorderly assemblies".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis was a critic of Obama's immigration policies; he opposed Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and Deferred Action for Parents of Americans (DAPA) and accused him of failing to enforce immigration laws. DeSantis has sought to ban "sanctuary cities". He co-sponsored the Establishing Mandatory Minimums for Illegal Reentry Act of 2015, also known as Kate's Law, which would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to increase penalties applicable to aliens who unlawfully reenter the U.S. after being removed. DeSantis encouraged Florida sheriffs to cooperate with the federal government on immigration-related issues. In June 2019, he signed an anti-"sanctuary city" bill into law. Florida had no sanctuary cities before the law's enactment, and immigration advocates called the bill politically motivated.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis opposes efforts to defund the police, and as governor has introduced initiatives to "fund the police". In September 2021, DeSantis introduced a $5,000 signing bonus for Florida police officers in a bid to attract additional out-of-state police recruits.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis has a "0" rating from the Human Rights Campaign for his voting record on LGBT-related issues and legislation. In 2018, he told the "Sun-Sentinel" that he "doesn't want any discrimination in Florida, I want people to be able to live their life, whether you're gay or whether you're religious."


title: Ron DeSantis

text: On June 1, 2021, DeSantis signed the Fairness in Women's Sports Act (SB 1028). It bans transgender girls and women from participating and competing in middle-school and high-school girls' and college women's sports competitions in Florida. The law took effect on July 1.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In February 2022, DeSantis voiced his support for the Florida Parental Rights in Education Act, often denigrated as the "Don't Say Gay" law by its opponents, which would prohibit instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity in school classrooms from kindergarten to grade 3. He said it was "entirely inappropriate" for teachers and school administrators to talk to students about their gender identity. DeSantis signed the bill into law on March 28, 2022, and it took effect on July 1. In response to The Walt Disney Company's opposition to the bill, and amid an ongoing feud between DeSantis and Disney, DeSantis suggested that the Florida legislature revoke Disney World's special self-governing privileges over its property—privileges granted to the company in 1967. On April 22, 2022, he signed a bill to repeal the Reedy Creek Improvement Act, which allows Disney to self-govern its district, by June 2023.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In response to social media networks removing Trump from their platforms, DeSantis and other Florida Republicans pushed legislation in the Florida legislature to prohibit technology companies from de-platforming political candidates. A federal judge blocked the law by preliminary injunction the day before it was to take effect, on the grounds that it violated the First Amendment and federal law. When Twitter suspended DeSantis administration critic Rebekah Jones' account for violating rules against spam and platform manipulation, DeSantis's office applauded the decision, calling it "long overdue".


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis opted not to receive his congressional pension, and filed a measure that would eliminate pensions for members of Congress. After introducing the End Pensions in Congress Act, DeSantis said, "The Founding Fathers envisioned elected officials as part of a servant class, yet Washington has evolved into a ruling class culture."


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis supports a constitutional amendment to impose term limits on members of Congress, so that U.S. representatives would be limited to three terms and senators to two. As of 2022, he has served three terms as a U.S. representative.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis expressed support for the Voting Rights Restoration for Felons Initiative after it passed in November 2018, saying that he was "obligated to faithfully implement [it] as it is defined" when he became governor. After he refused to restore the voting rights for felons with unpaid fines, which voting rights groups said was inconsistent with the results of the referendum, he was challenged in court. The Florida Supreme Court sided with DeSantis on the issue, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit also sided with DeSantis in a 6–4 ruling.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: In April 2019, DeSantis directed Florida's elections chief to expand the availability of Spanish-language ballots and Spanish assistance for voters. In a statement, DeSantis said "It is critically important that Spanish-speaking Floridians are able to exercise their right to vote without any language barriers."


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis instructed Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody to investigate allegations of voter fraud perpetrated by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg after he announced a $16 million investment to pay off the financial obligations for felons so they may vote ahead of the 2020 presidential election in Florida. The allegations asserted Bloomberg had broken the law by offering incentives to vote.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: After the 2020 U.S. elections, DeSantis and other Republicans proposed changes to Florida election laws. DeSantis called for eliminating ballot drop boxes, as well as limiting voting by mail by requiring that voters re-register every year to vote by mail and requiring that signatures on mail-in ballots "must match the most recent signature on file" (rather than any of the voter's signatures in the Florida system). The changes to mail-in voting were notable given that Republicans had historically voted by mail more than Democrats, but Democrats outvoted Republicans by mail in 2020. According to a "Tampa Bay Times" analysis, DeSantis's signature match proposal could have led to rejections of his own mail-in ballots due to changes in his signature history over time; voting rights experts argued that the signature matching proposal could be used to disenfranchise voters whose signatures varied over time.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis is a Roman Catholic. He married Casey Black, a former television host for the Golf Channel and WJXT, in 2009. The couple lived in Ponte Vedra Beach, near St. Augustine, until it was drawn into the neighboring 4th district. They then moved to Palm Coast, north of Daytona Beach. They have three children. DeSantis is a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the American Legion.


title: Ron DeSantis

text: DeSantis played on the field the day of the 2017 congressional baseball shooting, and while not present at the time it occurred, he and fellow Representative Jeff Duncan reportedly met the perpetrator beforehand and were asked by him whether Republicans or Democrats were playing that day.


title: Jason Momoa

text: Joseph Jason Namakaeha Momoa (; born August 1, 1979) is an American actor. He made his acting debut as on the syndicated action drama series "Baywatch: Hawaii" (1999–2001), which was followed by portrayals of Ronon Dex on the Syfy science fiction series "Stargate Atlantis" (2005–2009), Khal Drogo in the first two seasons of the HBO fantasy drama series "Game of Thrones" (2011–2012), Declan Harp on the Discovery Channel historical drama series "Frontier" (2016–2018), and Baba Voss on the Apple TV+ science fiction series "See" (2019–2022). Momoa was featured as the lead of the two lattermost series.


title: Jason Momoa

text: Since 2016, Momoa portrays Arthur Curry / Aquaman in the DC Extended Universe (DCEU), first appearing in a cameo in the film "" (2016) and then in "Justice League" (2017) and its 2021 director's cut, headlining in Aquaman (2018) and its sequel Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom releasing in December 2023, as well as a cameo in the TV series "Peacemaker" (2022–present). Momoa also played Duncan Idaho in the 2021 film adaptation of the science fiction novel "Dune".


title: Jason Momoa

text: An only child, Momoa was born on August 1, 1979, in Honolulu, Hawaii, to Coni (Lemke), a photographer, and Joseph Momoa, a painter. His father is of Native Hawaiian ancestry and his mother is of German and Irish heritage, with self-identified Pawnee ancestry. Shortly after his birth, his parents divorced and he and his mother moved to Norwalk, Iowa where he was raised. He graduated from Norwalk High School where he was part of the soccer team alongside Brandon Routh. He attended the University of Hawaii.


title: Jason Momoa

text: At 19 years old, while living and working in Honolulu, Momoa decided to audition for the television series "Baywatch Hawaii", in which he was cast as Jason Ioane (1999–2001).


title: Jason Momoa

text: In addition to his appearances in "Johnson Family Vacation" (2004), and "" (2005–2009), Momoa was cast as Roman in four episodes of the comedy-drama television series "The Game" (2009). He portrayed the title protagonist in "Conan the Barbarian" (2011), a reimagining of the 1982 film of the same name and a role made famous by Arnold Schwarzenegger. Momoa gained his role of Khal Drogo on HBO's "Game of Thrones" through his audition, in which he performed a Haka, one of many intimidating Māori dances traditionally used to convey a challenge to an opponent, or a welcome to a visitor.


title: Jason Momoa

text: Momoa directed and co-wrote "Road to Paloma" (2014), an American drama thriller film, together with writers Jonathan Hirschbein and Robert Homer Mollohan. The film stars Momoa, Sarah Shahi, Lisa Bonet, Michael Raymond-James, and Wes Studi. It premiered at the 2014 Sarasota Film Festival in April 2014. The film had a limited theatrical release on July 15, 2014, in New York City and Los Angeles and a VOD release.


title: Jason Momoa

text: In March 2014, Momoa joined the dark comedy/thriller indie "Sugar Mountain" alongside Cary Elwes and Haley Webb; its principal photography was done in Alaska. He also starred as Phillip Kopus, a Ramapough Mountain Indian, on the SundanceTV drama series "The Red Road" (2014–2015).


title: Jason Momoa

text: In June 2014, Momoa was reported to have been cast in the role of Arthur Curry/Aquaman, after he auditioned for Bruce Wayne/Batman. He first played the role in a cameo in the superhero film "", marking Aquaman's live action film debut. Momoa played the character in a leading role in the 2017 ensemble film "Justice League" and its director's cut; "Zack Snyder's Justice League". He then starred in the "Aquaman" solo film, which released in late 2018. He also reprised this role in "".


title: Jason Momoa

text: In August 2014, Momoa portrayed Connor in the Canadian horror action film "Wolves", and starred in the Sci-fi horror movie "Debug"; it was written and directed by Momoa's former "Stargate Atlantis" co-star, British-born Canadian actor David Hewlett. In February 2015, it was announced that he would portray a cannibal in the drama thriller film "The Bad Batch". In 2015, Momoa was cast in the Canadian action film "Braven", which was released on February 2, 2018.


title: Jason Momoa

text: Between 2016 and 2018, Momoa portrayed Declan Harp in all three seasons of the Canadian historical drama television series "Frontier" and was an executive producer on the show. The series chronicles the North American fur trade in late 1700s Canada, and follows Declan Harp, a part-Irish, part-Cree outlaw who is campaigning to breach the Hudson's Bay Company's monopoly on the fur trade in Canada, which has become corrupt and engages in illegal activities to enrich itself.


title: Jason Momoa

text: In February 2020, Momoa appeared in a halftime commercial for Rocket Mortgage for Super Bowl LIV. He also appeared in the teaser for "Scary Little Green Men" by Ozzy Osbourne from his album "Ordinary Man".


title: Jason Momoa

text: In January 2022, it was announced that Momoa would join the cast of the tenth "Fast & Furious" film titled "Fast X" as the villain, which is produced by and starring Vin Diesel.


title: Jason Momoa

text: In April 2022, it was announced that Momoa will star in the film adaptation of "Minecraft", with Jared Hess directing.


title: Jason Momoa

text: Momoa met his first fiancee, actress Simmone Jade Mackinnon, on the set of "Baywatch" in 1999. They were together for 6 years and became engaged in 2004. Mackinnon and Momoa called off their engagement after Momoa began a relationship with actress Lisa Bonet in 2005. Although it was previously believed that Momoa and Bonet had married on November 15, 2007, the couple did not marry until October 2017. In July 2007, Bonet gave birth to their first child, a daughter. Their second child, a son, was born in December 2008. In January 2022, Momoa and Bonet announced their split.


title: Jason Momoa

text: Momoa learned martial arts for his role as Ronon in "Stargate Atlantis". In 2017, Momoa started practicing Brazilian jiu-jitsu.


title: Jason Momoa

text: He is a fan of heavy metal music and has noted that he "build[s] [his] characters off of metal songs". He invited members of Archspire for cameo appearances in the first episode of the TV series "See", and he also practiced proper screaming technique with the vocalist of Archspire, Oli Peters, for a significant scene in the series. On October 30, 2020, Momoa was featured in the song "Doom" by black metal band Scour. Momoa is a hobby musician and plays bass guitar, mandolin, ukulele and guitar in his spare time, the first of which he took up after listening to Tool's song "Sober".


title: Jason Momoa

text: Momoa has numerous tattoos, including a halfsleeve on his left forearm, a tribute to his family god, or "aumakua".


title: Jason Momoa

text: He participated in protests against the building of the Thirty Meter Telescope on Mauna Kea, a holy spiritual site for native Hawaiians.


title: Jason Momoa

text: On November 15, 2008, Momoa was slashed across the face with a broken beer glass during an altercation at the Birds Cafe, a tavern in Hollywood, California. He received approximately 140 stitches during reconstructive surgery and the scar through his left eyebrow is apparent in his later work. The assailant was sentenced to five years in prison for the attack.


title: Ronald Reagan

text: Ronald Wilson Reagan ( ; February 6, 1911June 5, 2004) was an American politician who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He also served as the 33rd governor of California from 1967 to 1975 after having a career in entertainment.


title: Ronald Reagan

text: Reagan was born in Tampico, Illinois. He graduated from Eureka College in 1932 and began to work as a radio announcer in Iowa. In 1937, Reagan moved to California, where he found work as a film actor. From 1947 to 1952, Reagan served as president of the Screen Actors Guild, working to root out alleged communist influence within it. In the 1950s, he moved to a career in television and became a spokesman for General Electric. From 1959 to 1960, he again served as the guild's president. In 1964, his speech "A Time for Choosing" earned him national attention as a new conservative figure. Building a network of supporters, Reagan was elected governor of California in 1966. During his governorship, he raised taxes, turned the state budget deficit into a surplus, and challenged protesters in Berkeley by ordering in National Guard troops.


title: Ronald Reagan

text: After challenging and nearly defeating sitting president Gerald Ford in the 1976 Republican presidential primaries, Reagan easily won the Republican nomination in the 1980 presidential election and went on to defeat incumbent Democratic president Jimmy Carter. At the time of his first inauguration, Reagan was the oldest person to become president of the United States. Early in his presidency, he began implementing new political and economic initiatives. His supply-side economics policies, dubbed "Reaganomics", promoted economic deregulation and reductions in both taxes and government spending. He also survived an assassination attempt, spurred the war on drugs, ordered an invasion of Grenada, and fought public-sector labor unions. Reagan was reelected in 1984, defeating Carter's vice president, Walter Mondale, in an electoral landslide.


title: Ronald Reagan

text: Foreign affairs dominated Reagan's second term, including the bombing of Libya, Iran–Iraq War, Iran–Contra affair, and ongoing Cold War. In a speech in 1987, four years after he publicly described the Soviet Union as an "evil empire", Reagan challenged Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev to open the Berlin Wall. He transitioned Cold War policy from détente to rollback by escalating an arms race with the Soviet Union while engaging in talks with Gorbachev, culminating in the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. Over Reagan's two terms, the American economy saw a reduction of inflation from 12.5 percent to 4.4 percent and an average real gross domestic product annual growth of 3.6 percent. His cuts in domestic discretionary spending and taxes, as well as increases in military spending contributed to a near tripling of the federal debt.