A swing state no more? GOP confidence grows in Florida
Democrats are increasingly concerned that Florida, once the nation’s premier swing state, may slip away this fall and beyond as emboldened Republicans capitalize on divisive cultural issues and population shifts in crucial contests for governor and the U.S. Senate. The anxiety was apparent last week during a golf cart parade of Democrats featuring Senate candidate Val Demings at The Villages, a retirement community just north of the Interstate 4 corridor. It was once a politically mixed part of the state where elections were often decided, but now some Democrats now say they feel increasingly isolated. “I am terrified,” said 77-year-old Sue Sullivan, lamenting the state’s rightward shift. “There are very few Democrats around here.” In an interview, Demings, a congresswoman and former Orlando police chief challenging Republican Sen. Marco Rubio, conceded that her party’s midterm message isn’t resonating as she had hoped. “We have to do a better job of telling our stories and clearly demonstrating who’s truly on the side of people who have to go to work every day,” she said. The frustration is the culmination of nearly a decade of Republican inroads in Florida, where candidates have honed deeply conservative social and economic messages to build something of a coalition that includes rural voters and Latinos, particularly Cuban Americans. Donald Trump’s win here in 2016 signaled the evolution after the state twice backed Barack Obama. And while he lost the White House in 2020, Trump carried Florida by more than 3 percentage points, a remarkable margin in a state where elections were regularly decided by less than a percentage point. President Joe Biden will visit the state on November 1, exactly one week before Election Day, to rally Democrats. Demings said she’s had two conversations with the president about campaigning together, but she could not confirm any joint appearances. And Charlie Crist, the Democratic nominee for governor, said he would attend a private fundraiser with Biden on the day of the rally, but he wasn’t sure whether they would appear together in public. “If we could squeeze in a little public airtime, that’d be a wonderful thing I would welcome,” Crist said in an interview. Still, the GOP is bullish that it can keep notching victories, even in longtime Democratic strongholds. Some Republicans are optimistic the party could carry Miami-Dade County, a once unthinkable prospect that would virtually eliminate the Democrats’ path to victory in statewide contests, including presidential elections. And in southwest Florida’s Lee County, a major Republican stronghold, not even a devastating hurricane appears to have dented the GOP’s momentum. In fact, Republicans and Democrats privately agree that Hurricane Ian, which left more than 100 dead, may have helped Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis broaden his appeal. On Monday, he’ll participate in a debate against Crist in which he’ll likely highlight his stewardship of the state during a searing crisis. But the 44-year-old Republican governor has spent much of his first term focused on sensitive social issues. He’s signed new laws banning abortions at 15 weeks of pregnancy with no exceptions for rape or incest, along with blocking critical race theory and LGBTQ issues from many Florida schools. He has also stripped millions of dollars from a major league baseball team that spoke out against gun violence and led efforts to eliminate Disney’s special tax status for condemning his so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill. On the eve of the hurricane, DeSantis shipped dozens of Venezuelan immigrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard to call attention to illegal immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border. Crist, a former congressman and onetime governor himself, acknowledged some voters “dig” DeSantis’ focus on cultural issues, “but most Floridians are good, decent people.” He noted that at least one Hispanic radio host has compared DeSantis to former Cuban dictator Fidel Castro. “Customarily, when you come out of a primary, people will move to the middle. He’s clearly not doing that, to say the least,” Crist said of his Republican rival. But to the horror of many Democrats, DeSantis could become the first Floridian to win a governor’s race by more than 1 point since 2006. That kind of showing might lift Rubio in the U.S. Senate election while helping the GOP win as many as 20 of the state’s 28 U.S. House seats. Should DeSantis win big as expected, his allies believe he would have the political capital to launch a successful presidential campaign in 2024 — whether Trump runs or not. “It’s shocking, and it’s scary,” state Democratic Party Chair Manny Diaz said about DeSantis’ repeated willingness to use the power of his office to attack political rivals, whether individual opponents or iconic corporations like Disney. DeSantis, who declined an interview request, has found success by bucking the conventional wisdom before. He beat Democrat Andrew Gillum four years ago by 32,436 votes out of more than 8.2 million cast, a margin so narrow that it required a recount. But in the four years since then, Republicans have erased a voter registration advantage that Florida Democrats had guarded for decades. When registration closed for the 2018 election, Democrats enjoyed a 263,269-vote advantage. As of September 30, Republicans had a lead of 292,533 voters — a swing of nearly 556,000 registered voters over DeSantis’ first term. “We’re no longer a swing state. We’re actually annihilating the Democrats,” said Florida GOP Chairman Joe Gruters, a leading DeSantis ally. And while he says his party has focused on traditional kitchen-table issues, such as gas prices and inflation, Gruters leaned into cultural fights — especially the Florida GOP’s opposition to sexual education and LGBTQ issues in elementary schools — that have defined DeSantis’ tenure. “I don’t want anyone else teaching my kids about the birds and the bees and gender fluidity issues,” Gruters said. Strategists in both parties believe Florida’s political shift is due to multiple factors, but there is general agreement that Republicans have benefited from an influx of new voters since DeSantis emerged as the leader of the GOP resistance to the pandemic-related public health measures. Every day on average over the year between 2020 and 2021, 667 more people
Florida recount chugs along as more irregularities surface
Florida’s election recount is chugging along as more irregularities are uncovered and a judge asked the warring sides to “ramp down the rhetoric,” saying it erodes public confidence in the election for Senate and governor. One county revealed Monday that it had allowed some hurricane-displaced voters to cast their ballots by email — a violation of state law. Another had to restart its recount after getting about a quarter finished because someone forgot to push a button. Palm Beach said it won’t finish its recount by the Thursday deadline. And in oft-criticized Broward County, additional sheriff’s deputies were sent to guard ballots and voting machines, even though a judge said no Republican who has publicly alleged fraud in the county’s process — a list that includes President Donald Trump and Gov. Rick Scott — has presented any evidence to law enforcement. “An honest vote count is no longer possible” in Florida, Trump declared Monday, without elaborating. He demanded that the election night results — which showed the Republicans leading based upon incomplete ballot counts — be used to determine the winner. Trump went on to allege that “new ballots showed up out of nowhere, and many ballots are missing or forged” and that “ballots (are) massively infected.” It was unclear what he was referring to. State law requires a machine recount in races where the margin is less than 0.5 percentage points. In the Senate race, Scott’s lead over incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson was 0.14 percentage points. In the governor’s contest, unofficial results showed Republican former Rep. Ron DeSantis ahead of Democratic Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum by 0.41 percentage points. Once the recount is complete, if the differences in any of the races are 0.25 percentage points or less, a hand recount will be ordered. All 67 counties face a state-ordered deadline of Thursday to finish their recounts. Trump’s comments came just hours before Broward Chief Circuit Judge Jack Tuter held an emergency hearing on a request by Scott’s lawyers that deputies be put in charge of ballots and voting machines that aren’t being used until the recount is over. An attorney for Election Supervisor Brenda Snipes described layers of security including keycard and password access to rooms where ballots are kept, secured by deputies and monitored by security cameras and representatives of both campaigns and parties. Scott’s lawyers had alleged in court documents that Snipes was engaging in “suspect and unlawful vote counting practices” that violate state law and that she might “destroy evidence of any errors, accidents or unlawful conduct.” The judge said he could see no evidence of any violations, and said “I am urging because of the highly public nature of this case to ramp down the rhetoric.” “If someone in this lawsuit or someone in this county has evidence of voter fraud or irregularities at the supervisor’s office, they should report it to their local law enforcement officer,” Tuter said. “If the lawyers are aware of it, they should swear out an affidavit, but everything the lawyers are saying out there in front of the elections office is being beamed all over the country. We need to be careful of what we say. Words mean things these days.” Scott’s motion was supported by lawyers representing the state Republican Party and opposed by Snipes’ office, Nelson’s campaign and the state Democratic Party. After Tuter told all sides to meet to discuss a compromise, they agreed to add three deputies to the elections office. Meanwhile, Elections Supervisor Mark Andersen in heavily Republican Bay County told the Miami Herald on Monday that he allowed about 150 people to cast ballots by email, which is illegal under state law. The county was devastated by a Category 4 hurricane in October, and Scott ordered some special provisions for early voting there. Manatee County, south of Tampa Bay, had to restart its recount Monday because a needed button on the machine wasn’t pushed. The error was caught after about a quarter of the county’s nearly 165,000 votes had been recounted, said Michael Bennett, the county’s Republican elections supervisor. It shouldn’t affect the county’s ability to meet Thursday’s deadline. In Palm Beach, Elections Supervisor Susan Bucher said the county’s 11-year-old tallying machines aren’t fast enough to complete the recount by Thursday. The county is doing the Senate race first and will then do the governor. If the deadline is not met in a race, the results it reported last Saturday will stand. Republished with permission from the Associated Press.
Birmingham’s own Randall Woodfin scores with underdog pick in Fla. gubernatorial primary
Earlier this week, Andrew Gillum, the former mayor of Tallahassee, Fla., pulled off quite the upset when he defeated former Congresswoman Gwen Graham, among others, and won the Democratic nomination for Governor. Birmingham’s very own Randall Woodfin weighed-in on the race, just a week before Election Day, where he gave Gillum his public endorsement. “Every now and then I get the opportunity to be vocal about the candidates I support who running for other offices across this nation. Andrew Gillum is one of those candidates,” Woodfin said in a video he posted on Twitter. Woodfin continued speaking directly to camera, saying, “As a candidate running for the Governor of Florida. Floridians, he is your choice. He cares about the same exact things you care about. The future and investment in the education of children. Equal pay and rights for women and others. Investing in infrastructure. The economic delveopment that really works for all of the residents of Florida. For all the concern we have. For all the passion and hope we have for the future of Florida, put it in Andrew Gillum’s hands to lead your state. You can count on Andrew to make a difference in you and your family’s life. Vote Andrew Gillum next Tuesday.” As Woodfin pointed out in his tweet, Gillum is a fellow mayor, but what he failed to mention is that Gillum is a Bernie Sanders — the liberal senator from Vermont — backed candidate. Just like he was. Interestingly, both young politicians — Woodfin, 37, and Gillum, 39 — were early Hillary Clinton supporters during her 2016 presidential campaign. Like Woodfin, Gillum also managed to pull off a surprise upset at the polls. Thanks to a strong grassroots efforts he bested four other Democratic opponents, all of whom outspent him handily. Woodfin went back to Twitter to send his public congratulations. “Huge congratulations to my friend, fellow mayor, and future GOVERNOR of the great state of Florida @AndrewGillum. Incredible victory brother! Bring it home on November 6th! #OurRevolution #FloridaPrimary,” Woodfin tweeted. Woodfin’s not the only one recognizing Gillum on Twitter. In the days since his victory, he’s also drawn attention from the Oval Office. “Not only did Congressman Ron DeSantis easily win the Republican Primary, but his opponent in November is his biggest dream….a failed Socialist Mayor named Andrew Gillum who has allowed crime & many other problems to flourish in his city. This is not what Florida wants or needs!” tweeted President Donald Trump. Not only did Congressman Ron DeSantis easily win the Republican Primary, but his opponent in November is his biggest dream….a failed Socialist Mayor named Andrew Gillum who has allowed crime & many other problems to flourish in his city. This is not what Florida wants or needs! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 29, 2018
Blake Dowling: Wise Kim meets Leon County
The “Leon Consulate of Florida” was overthrown this week, thanks to the chumps at the Moroccan Islamic Union-Mail. I suppose they meant Leon County, since this hacking wing of ISIS hasn’t quite mastered English. What they refer to is the Leon County (North Florida) website; it was indeed hacked for a couple of minutes, replaced with this creepy message: County officials responded immediately that the attack was only “surface level” and all sensitive data was protected behind a firewall. Perhaps the county needed a little distraction from the FBI-fueled barrage of media coverage over the past couple of weeks. Good job Kim. If you check out the Facebook page — although I would not recommend it, as the National Security Agency and FBI might be tapping on your door, or you might make a list you would rather not be on — you will see a warning to all that this group is going to be attacking “the most important sites in the world” over the next few days. So look out Andrew Gillum, Chris Christie, John Morgan and Tmz.com — this means you. Tighten up those websites. Apply patches, run updates, don’t host sites in an unsecured location etc. Although it appears this particular hack did squat in our Capital City, what happens when one actually wreaks havoc? In last week’s Petya ransomware attack, a few firms got hit hard. Reckitt Benckiser (Britain), the maker of Norofen tablets, Durex condoms, and other quality products, are still partially down as of this writing. They got pummeled; manufacturing, shipping, ordering, all disrupted. The global tab for this attack could reach $100 million, the company estimates. Some firms pay ransom to try and get their data back, but the bitcoin payments were made and (poof) nada. So, unlike similar recent attacks, this one appears to have launched just to create chaos and digital destruction in a specific area. We will see a lot of this in the near future as nation-states wish to wage cyberwarfare with one another versus more traditional combat. Besides Wise Man Kim, no one else seems to want WW3, but if it came down to that, here are the current Top 5 militaries most likely to come out on top. A local CBS affiliate is about to enter my office for a quick segment about cybersecurity, so allow me to wrap this up with some ways to protect your business or organization from hackers and threats. Step 1: Strong password. Step 2: Antivirus and antispam solutions. Step 3: Firewall. Step 4: Robust backup. Step 4: Don’t piss off CNN. Step 5: Training. Steps 1 through 4 used to be enough, but people aren’t getting the message. Users are still clicking where they shouldn’t, so they must be trained, followed up by intrusion testing (try this test for your staff). Next, more training; even then, you won’t be 100 percent protected, but you will minimize risk. As far as best practices go, that is a good path. In closing, I hope Wise Kim gets back to his party island and stops with the missile shenanigans, that will only end badly for him and the world. I hope CNN gets back to broadcasting news, and that no one else gets subpoenaed in Tallahassee for CRA-Gate. We need some good news in our region (like local hero Walter, nice work sir: That’s it for today, have an awesome weekend. ___ Blake Dowling is CEO of Aegis Business Technologies, enjoys the Allman Brothers Band, the writings of Hemingway, and any movie with Pauly Shore. He can be reached at dowlingb@aegisbiztech.com.
