Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis sat down with host Tucker Carlson in a new episode of Fox Nation’s "Tucker Carlson Today" to discuss what he wishes he had known during the peak of the coronavirus pandemic one year ago.

The Republican explained that it took a few weeks into the outbreak for him to recognize that extreme restrictions were not really all that effective, as many were blindly following the lead of Dr. Anthony Fauci.

"If I had more data, I would have had the ability to say, ‘Wait a minute. Why would we need to close a gym for two weeks?" he asked. "These are younger people going to work out. If you’re healthy, you’re going to end up dealing with the virus better."

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"And so I think that it took me a few weeks, March and into April, to get enough data to say, ‘Okay, we’re not doing Faucism, we’re going to make sure our states open," he said. "We’re going to get the kids back in school and we’ll just focus our protection on elderly people, who are the ones at risk…Some of the restrictions we did, I think, were ineffective."

These strict lockdowns nationwide were adhered to by a majority of states, which DeSantis cited as being a huge factor when it came to many Americans moving to Florida – a state that believes in law and order, yet is open for business.

"Some of these states like Minnesota, California – I think the fact that they were locked down and had the opportunity [in Florida] to go out and do stuff…added fuel to the fire," he said.

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