West

West ranks 54th out of 87 freshmen for agreeing with the limited-government, supply-side group’s agenda.

As reported earlier this year, West agreed with the Club For Growth on economic and fiscal issues 64 percent of the time in 2011. That compares to a 71 percent score for the average freshman and a 69 percent score for the average Republican House veteran.

West didn’t go along with all the spending cuts the Club For Growth advocated in 2011 and voted for a debt ceiling increase that angered many tea partiers.

Leder

Romney visits the Tampa home of Dick and Cornelia Corbett on Wednesday afternoon, then heads to Coral Gables for a reception at the Biltmore and a dinner at the home of Phil and Pat Frost. There’s also a Romney reception and private lunch in Jacksonville on Thursday before the presumptive Republican nominee arrives in Boca for a Thursday evening reception at Woodfield Country Club and then dinner at Leder’s nearby home.

In each city, Romney’s schedule includes a general reception for $2,500 donors, a VIP event with a photo opportunity for $10,000 contributors and a private meal for those who pony up $50,000.

Leder is the co-founder of Sun Capital Partners, a private equity firm based in Boca Raton.

Leder has given $125,000 to the pro-Romney superPAC Restore Our Future and showered contributions on a variety of Republican candidates, including Sen. Marco Rubio and Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown. In Florida’s 2012 Senate race, Leder gave $5,000 to Adam Hasner‘s GOP campaign before Hasner switched to a U.S. House race; Leder recently gave $2,500 to Rep. Connie Mack‘s Senate bid.

Leder also gave $4,800 to Charlie Crist‘s 2010 Senate bid before Crist bolted the GOP. And he has contributed to South Florida Democratic U.S. Reps. Ted Deutch and Debbie Wasserman Schultz and former Democratic Rep. Ron Klein.

Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson wants Florida TV stations to stop running a new ad that says Nelson’s 2010 vote for the federal health care law will hit seniors with $500 billion in cuts to Medicare.

Nelson’s attorney sent TV stations a letter saying the ad produced by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is untrue and stations have “a duty to protect the public from the spread of false information and deliberate deception.”

In Palm Beach County, WPTV Channel 5 says it will continue running the ad.

“We reviewed the content of the letter and determined that we will continue to air the spot as ordered by the client,” said WPTV Vice President and General Manager Steve Wasserman.

The health care bill calls for overall Medicare spending to increase over the next decade. But it projects that future spending will grow at a slower rate than projected before the bill was passed, resulting in savings of about $500 billion.

In an evaluation of the health care bill shortly before it passed in 2010, Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas W. Elmendorf said of the projected Medicare savings that it was “unclear whether such a reduction in the growth rate of spending could be achieved, and if so, whether it would be accomplished through greater efficiencies in the delivery of health care or through reductions in access to care or the quality of care.”

Rick Scott’s chief-of-staff, Steve MacNamara, resigned Saturday after a brief meeting with the governor, concluding that ”media attention” focused on him had begun to “interfere with the day-t0-day operations of this office.”

MacNamara will leave July 1. Scott announced the veteran capital insider will be replaced by Adam Hollingsworth, who leads the right-of-way division for Flagler Development Group.

Hollingsworth is a former chief-of-staff to ex-Mayor John Peyton of Jacksonville. He left the mayor’s office to work for the Florida Republican Party in advance of Scott’s election, and also served on the incoming governor’s transition team.

“I’m grateful for Steve’s invaluable assistance in helping advance my agenda to strengthen education, create jobs and lower the cost of living for Floridians,” Scott said in a statement Saturday, while praising MacNamara for guiding a generally successful agenda for the governor through the Legislature this spring.

Scott added, “I believe Steve has had a tremendous impact on me and Ann as well as my administration and our state. I respect his efforts and ideas.”

MacNamara’s departure comes at least a few months ahead of his planned exit, but was hastened by media reports questioning his awarding no-bid contracts — one worth $5.5 million — to close associates while he worked for Senate President Mike Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island. Former associates also accused him of being an overly controlling presence in the governor’s office.

Last week, a complaint against MacNamara also was filed with the state’s Commission on Ethics, accusing him of using governor’s office staff to assist him in inquiring about a college presidency opening in Montana. MacNamara and his wife own property in Montana, and influenced Scott and his wife, Ann, to buy near them. 

MacNamara left the Senate presidency job last June to join Scott, taking over as the new administration’s approval ratings tanked with Floridians, angered by deep budget cuts worsened by the governor’s difficulties connecting with the public.

MacNamara immediately attempted to soften the governor’s image — with Scott most days going without a necktie, suddenly visiting editorial boards he had shunned, and adopting a more cooperative approach with the Legislature.

Scott’s approval ratings remain lousy among Floridians, according to polls. But in his resignation letter, MacNamara pointed with pride toward his work helping Scott repair his first-year image.

“It is my belief that I have helped Floridians begin to know the real Rick Scott,” MacNamara wrote Saturday. “A man who listens to them, who tries to understand their issues and concerns, and works diligently to solve their problems.”

Before joining the governor’s office last June,  MacNamara directed wholesale housecleaning in the Senate administration, forcing out a number of longtime staff directors.  Some of the contracts MacNamara steered to associates and friends were part of his effort to improve the efficiency and transparency of Haridopolos’ office, qualities he also said he brought to Scott’s administration.

But MacNamara also drew controversy. Several Scott agency heads left over the past year, later citing MacNamara’s hands-on approach as interfering with their ability to lead, sometimes over seemingly petty matters.

 Doug Darling, chief of the Department of Economic Opportunity, a key agency for the job-promoting Scott, abruptly quit in January after MacNamara countermanded his order denying the state’s film commissioner a trip to the Sundance Film Festival.

MacNamara earned $189,000 as chief-of-staff.

He previously was chief-of-staff to former House Speaker John Thrasher, and served as an agency head under former Republican Gov. Bob Martinez. MacNamara is a tenured professor in communications at Florida State University, but helped shape Scott’s views of higher education as being rife with waste and overpaid administrators.

Although he didn’t comment directly on the accusations that have lately hounded him, MacNamara closed his two-page resignation letter by hinting that he was the target of those losing out on government contracts under the belt-tightening Scott. He also suggested that Scott would continue to defy these critics.

“As you continue to cut government waste,” MacNamara wrote, “those vendors of goods and services will work diligently to twist the story and bring about public pressure to stop these cost savings. Good luck with that!”

Gov. Rick Scott gets something like good news on his approval ratings in a new survey by Suffolk University and WSVN-TV-Miami.

The poll shows 42 percent of voters like the job he’s doing as governor — compared with 44 percent who disapprove. The disapproval rating is better than the chilling 54 percent marks Scott earned in late April in two separate surveys, Public Policy Polling and Rasmussen Reports.

While PPP found Scott’s approval still hovered low — at 34 percent, Rasmussen gave Scott better numbers — 43 percent backing from voters.

The Post reported earlier this week that the Republican Party of Florida has paid almost $1 million since March for a TV campaign, promoting the governor’s push for $1 billion more for public schools and helping state unemployment fall to a three-year low behind what the ads label Scott’s “pro-business initiatives.”

But with his barnacle-scraping approval ratings, Scott is likely to emerge this election season as a candidate Democrats and their allies seek to tie to presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney.

“Rick Scott’s not on the ballot, but the philosophy he espouses will be, and that’s what will be our focus,” said Rich Templin, a spokesman for the Florida AFL-CIO, which represents 500,000 workers in the state.

Gov. Rick Scott traveled to Tampa and Orlando on Friday to tout the new rewrite of state auto insurance laws, even as critics continue to question whether a glitch in the new measure could prompt battles between health care providers and insurers over payments.

Scott was in West Palm Beach earlier this week promoting the measure (HB 119) that he said will go a long way toward reducing accident fraud and high insurance premiums, which have plagued Florida’s mandatory, no-fault personal injury protection (PIP) coverage.

“This was done for the benefit of consumers and not for the benefit of insurance companies,” Scott said at the event, held at the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office.

But Russel Lazerga, a Dania Beach lawyer who represents hospitals seeking to recover PIP claims, said he expects the new law will only force more health care providers into court to receive payments.

The PIP bill was hastily cobbled together in the waning hours of the 2012 session and includes conflicting language that raises questions of whether insurers could be considered exempt from paying claims between July 1 and Jan. 1, 2013 to hospitals, chiropractors, dentists, doctors and others.

 ”I see a mountain of red tape ahead,” Lazerga said.

Lazerga, who said he has helped 350 hospitals and other medical facilities receive $20 million in disputed insurance payments over the past 15 years, said insurance companies can use the flaw in the new law as a “heavy-handed negotiating tool,” when hospitals submit claims.

Hospitals could choose to accept lesser payments, Lazerga said, rather than take chances on the insurance company refusing to pay anything — with insurers banking on the law’s gap to help them win in court. Also, it’s possible that medical providers will end up suing each other to collect a larger portion of a $10,000 PIP claim — especially if one of the competing providers is in a profession whose reimbursement status is clouded because of the flaw in the new law.

The changes are the state’s latest attempt to overhaul the $10,000 PIP coverage required since the 1970s. The system, intended to reduce lawsuits and get payments issued quickly for treating injured motorists, has been plagued by frequent complaints about fraud, staged accidents and high insurance rates.

The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration this week sought to resolve the new law’s problems by issuing a memo saying that it considers all providers still eligible to receive insurance payments. Changes to eligibility outlined in the law would not take effect until Jan. 1, according to AHCA’s memo.

 In the memo, AHCA’s general counsel, Stuart Williams, acknowledged the conflict “would place the agency in a conundrum.” But he concluded, the “agency believes that the (law) applies the same effective date of January 1, 2013 to both the new licensure requirement and the…exemption.”

But whether a state agency can correct a conflict in law with a simple memo is a deeper question, said Mark Seidenfeld, an administrative law expert at Florida State University.

“A memo, executive order or rule issued by an agency can influence a court in deciding the intent of the new law,” Seidenfeld said. “But there’s no guarantee. You can be sure, though, this is going to be challenged in court.”

Palm Beach County’s Business Political Action Committee has endorsed Delray Beach Mayor Woodie McDuffie for elections supervisor over incumbent Susan Bucher while supporting two other countywide elected officials who face challenges: Property Appraiser Gary Nikolits and Clerk ‘n’ Comptroller Sharon Bock.

BIZPAC tends to favor Republicans in contested partisan races, but the group endorsed state Rep. Joseph Abruzzo, D-Wellington, for a new west-county Senate seat over Republicans Melanie Peterson and Geoff Sommers.

Read BIZPAC Chairman John R. Smith‘s discussion of the group’s endorsements here.

Nearly 58,000 pieces of mail touting a key component of Rep. Connie Mack‘s Senate campaign were sent to voters around Florida at taxpayer expense this month, a violation of congressional rules that Mack blamed on a vendor error but GOP primary rival George LeMieux called “a coordinated campaign effort.”

Mack and other members of Congress are allowed to send “franked” mail to their constituents at taxpayer expense. But about two-thirds of a recent 90,000-piece mailer from Mack’s office touting his “Penny Plan” to reduce the federal deficit went to addresses outside his Fort Myers-area district.

Mack campaign spokesman David James said a New Jersey-based subcontractor who also does work for Mack’s campaign mixed up mailing lists and sent the congressional mailer to a list that included voters outside Mack’s district.

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Florida Supreme Court justices hammered a lawyer representing a Royal Palm Beach homeowner this morning in a seminal foreclosure case that could have far-reaching effects on other civil litigation.

The justices heard oral arguments in the unusual case involving Roman Pino, a drywall hanger whose lawsuit has already been settled. It’s the first foreclosure case to come before the state’s high court since the housing collapse.

Pino’s case against the Bank of New York Mellon focuses on whether lenders or other plaintiffs can escape penalties after filing bogus documents with the court simply by voluntarily dismissing the lawsuits. A voluntary dismissal allows the bank to refile at a later date.

The Palm Beach County homeowner accused the bank of using false documents in its foreclosure proceedings against him. Pino and the bank have since settled the case, but his lawyers want the high court to decide whether trial court judges have the ability to overturn voluntary dismissals.

The justices peppered Amanda Lundergan, a lawyer with the Tom Ice law firm that represented Pino, with questions during oral arguments this morning. They seemed to have trouble understanding what harm Pino had suffered.

“What it seems like to me, you’re just looking for a ‘gotcha’ to get out of the mortgage. Am I wrong?” Chief Justice Charles Canady said.

“Absolutely wrong,” Lundergan said. “This is not about Mr. Pino. This is about the bank and the fraud that was committed.”

But Bruce Rogow, who represents the bank, said Pino’s lawyers are essentially asking the judges to change court rules about voluntary dismissals and that the foreclosure case could have far-reaching effects.

“We have not had problems. This is, because it’s a mortgage foreclosure case, because there are a lot of those cases, it has attracted a lot of attention. But I think we have to look at this in the universe of general civil litigation. And this has not been a problem in general civil litigation,” Rogow said.

In Pino’s foreclosure case, his lawyers challenged a document created by the Law Offices of David J. Stern and sought to question employees about its veracity. On the eve of those depositions, the bank moved to dismiss the case, blocking the court’s ability to address any sanctions.

Ice made headlines with the Pino case in 2010 when he was featured in a national magazine article about Florida’s so-called “foreclosure mills” and the discovery of allegedly fraudulent documents.

The robo-signing scandal was just breaking at the time, Florida’s foreclosure “rocket dockets” were full speed ahead, and David J. Stern’s Plantation-based firm was a foreclosure empire handling more than 100,000 cases statewide. It has since closed after losing most of its clients in the wake of the scandal.

Democrat Patrick Murphy‘s campaign today released its own poll that shows him tied with Republican U.S. Rep. Allen West, R-Plantation, in the new Palm Beach-Treasure Coast district where the two are running.

The survey by veteran Democratic pollster Keith Frederick shows the race tied at 45 percent apiece, with 10 percent undecided. The same poll shows Republican Mitt Romney leading President Obama by a 49-to-46 percent margin in the district.

West represents Palm Beach-Broward congressional District 22, but when redistricting gave that district a Democratic tilt, he announced he would run in the new District 18, which is fairly evenly split between Republicans and Democrats.

West campaign manager Tim Edson scoffed at Murphy’s poll, but declined to offer any information on polling the West campaign has done.

“We do not discuss strategy or internal survey numbers,” Edson said. “This ‘poll’ is a pathetic commentary on Patrick Murphy and his campaign. If he is going to concoct poll numbers, he should at least show himself in the lead.”

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is launching a Florida ad campaign that targets Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson and Democratic congressional hopefuls Lois Frankel and Alan Grayson on health care.

The Chamber wouldn’t reveal what it’s spending, but Chamber Political Director Rob Engstrom said it will be “enough resources to be able to move public opinion in a significant way.”

Nelson and Grayson voted for the federal health care law in 2010. A recent Quinnipiac University poll showed 53 percent of Florida voters want Congress to repeal it.

When former West Palm Beach mayor Frankel announced her candidacy last year, she wouldn’t say whether she would have voted for the health care law. The Chamber ad highlights Frankel’s straddle, then points out she submitted a resolution to the U.S. Conference of Mayors in 2008 supporting a single-payer national health insurance plan.

The anti-Nelson ads will air in Tampa, Orlando, Jacksonville, Tallahassee and in the Panhandle but not in South Florida.

The anti-Frankel spots will run on broadcast and cable TV in the West Palm Beach market, but not the pricier Miami/Fort Lauderdale market. Frankel is running for a Palm Beach-Broward congressional seat against fellow Democrat Kristin Jacobs. The winner will face Republican Adam Hasner.

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A state agency issued a memo Tuesday aimed at fixing a flaw in Florida’s new auto insurance law which Gov. Rick Scott already has hailed as one of the top accomplishments of the 2012 Legislature.

The state’s Agency for Health Care Administration said in the three-page memo that it intends to eliminate a six-month gap in eligibility for health care professionals that potentially would allow insurance companies not to pay some personal injury protection (PIP) providers such as doctors, chiropractors, medical schools and dentists.

Under the law signed by Scott last week, these providers were to lose their eligibility July 1.

Later in the act, providers’ eligibility is restored — but not until Jan. 1, 2013, a glitch that raised concerns about whether insurance companies might have legal standing to stiff health care professionals who treat accident victims covered by the $10,000 mandatory PIP policies Florida motorists carry.

The PIP system has been plagued by fraud and excessive billings, lawmakers and investigators have said. Scott pushed hard for the changes included in this year’s legislation (HB 119), although critics say the new law is too favorable toward insurance companies and doesn’t do enough to reduce PIP rates for consumers.

For its part,  AHCA is attempting to make the new law workable with its memo,  tamping down concerns about the flaw with the dates.

 In the memo, AHCA’s general counsel, Stuart Williams, acknowledged the conflict “would place the agency in a conundrum.” But he concluded,  the “agency believes that the (law) applies the same effective date of January 1, 2013 to both the new licensure requirement and the…exemption.”

 But whether a state agency can correct a conflict in law with a simple memo is a deeper question, said Mark Seidenfeld, an administrative law expert at Florida State University.

“A memo, executive order or rule issued by an agency can influence a court in deciding the intent of the new law,” Seidenfeld said. “But there’s no guarantee. You can be sure, though, this is going to be challenged in court.”

Although not directly related to the problems with the new law, Miami personal injury attorney Marlene Reiss said she is already planning to sue to have the measure overturned as unconstitutional.

Reiss contends the new law undermines a 38-year-old Florida Supreme Court ruling that endorsed the state’s PIP law as effectively balancing a motorists’ reduced rights to sue with the promise of swift payments of medical claims.

Rick Scott will be the featured speaker next week at a Boca Raton Republican Club fund-raiser, underscoring the political crosswinds buffeting the governor these days.

Polls show Scott remains unpopular with most Floridians – a position Florida Democrats hope to exploit in coming weeks by tying the governor to presumptive presidential nominee Mitt Romney. The state GOP poured almost $1 million into TV advertising the past six weeks, trying to bolster the governor’s image.

 But narrow the audience to just Republicans — and Scott’s holding his own. He even draws praise for attending plenty of state GOP events, like the $50-per-person fund-raiser planned the evening of May 15 at the Marriott at Boca Center.

Palm Beach County Republican Chairman Sid Dinerstein told the Post for a Sunday story on Scott’s political standing that Democrats will be mistaken if they think he’ll hurt Romney in the state. Dinerstein said Scott’s draw among Republicans was evident at last weekend’s state GOP meeting in Tampa, where the governor drew a standing ovation that refused to quit.

“He couldn’t get people to sit down,” Dinerstein said. “They love him. He’s done the Lincoln Day dinners. He’s been a partner in our fundraising. If the Democrats want to use him against Romney, I say bring it on.”

Obama’s new “Go” ad, above, and Reagan’s 1984 “It’s Morning In America” spot.

President Obama‘s reelection campaign isn’t declaring that “it’s morning in America” as Ronald Reagan did in 1984, but a new 60-second ad airing in Florida and eight other swing states proclaims that “we’re coming back.”

Reagan’s memorable reelection ad highlighted America’s recovery from recession and concludes: “Under the leadership of President Reagan, our country is prouder and stronger and better. Why would we ever want to return to where we were less than four short years ago?”

Obama’s ad puts the comparison to the previous administration at the beginning. The first quarter of it details the economic meltdown that took place in 2008 — “all before this president (emphasis in the ad) took the oath.” Later, the narrator says, “We’re not there yet. It’s still too hard for too many. But we’re coming back.”

The ad also trumpets the killing of Osama bin Laden, the withdrawal of troops from the unpopular war in Iraq and the auto industry bailouts as successes.

Neuhoff

“If we take a look at President Obama’s leadership and we see that he has been calling to tax the top 2 percent, to have them pay their fair share, this similar thing can happen here in the county by looking at millage rates for specific properties – perhaps the top 2 percent of those properties,” Neuhoff said at a candidate forum last week.

While the idea might appeal to primary voters in the heavily Democratic district where Neuhoff is running, it appears to run afoul of the Florida constitution.

Neuhoff is running against term-limited Commissioner Burt Aaronson‘s chosen successor, Mary Lou Berger, and attorney Steven Meyer in the south-county District 5 Democratic primary.

Read about it in this week’s Politics column.

After vetoing a tuition increase for FSU and UF, signing off on a controversial new state university and axing $300 million from the universities’ budgets, Gov. Rick Scott launched a possible remake of Florida’s higher ed system with a new “Blue Ribbon” panel announced today.

“The state has a vested interest in ensuring its higher education system produces world-class talent to serve as engaged citizens and meet the demands of Florida’s emerging knowledge-based economy. It’s time to assess the progress of prior reform efforts and identify strategies to improve efficiencies and enhance the system’s effectiveness as an economic catalyst.” Scott said in a statement announcing the “Blue Ribbon Task Force on State Higher Education Reform.”

Dale Brill, president of the Florida Chamber of Commerce Foundation, will chair the seven-member panel. The other six members will be chosen by House and Senate leaders and Board of Governors Chairman Dean Colson and Vice Chairman Mori Hosseini. The panel is slated to deliver its recommendations to Scott in November.

Scott last week vetoed a measure that would have given the University of Florida and Florida State University the ability to raise tuition as high as they want. The university presidents insisted the unprecedented authority was necessary to bring tuition at the institutions more in line with the higher-ed market.

But in his veto message, Scott said schools first need to reduce costs and administrative salaries and prove that their degrees equate to jobs for students.

State university system Chancellor Frank Brogan said Florida’s already “traveling toward a new frontier of accountability” and he hopes the Blue Ribbon panel will rely on work already done by the Board of Governors that will create “the most accountable public university system” in the nation.

“In particular, the Board’s Strategic Plan and Annual Accountability Report provide more than 60 System-wide comparative data points at-a-glance. I am confident that these products taken together can provide the strongest possible foundation for this group’s discussion,” Brogan said in a statement.

Board of Governors Chairman Dean Colson reacted with a cautious response that stopped short of an endorsement.

“Additional support for Florida’s public universities is always welcomed, especially if it accelerates the achievement of the Board’s goals and metrics for our university system,” Colson said in a statement. “During the past two years, the Board of Governors has laid out a comprehensive vision through three significant work products: a new 2025 Strategic Plan1, transformed metrics in the Annual Accountability Report2, and a three-year work plan template3 that each university will present annually. We look forward to a meaningful dialogue that bolsters a shared vision for the State University System.”

Atheists are accusing Department of Children and Families Secretary David Wilkins of breaking the law with a prayer he sent to the agency’s workers yesterday asking God to help his workers “find their identity in You.”

Wilkins, a Baptist who is also the Florida’s chief operating officer, sent the missive to DCF workers yesterday after offering the prayer at a National Day of Prayer event – also attended by his boss, Gov. Rick Scott – in the Capitol.

“This message from a Department head to all subordinates is shocking and unconstitutional,” Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation wrote in a letter to Scott and Wilkins’ general counsel yesterday. “The message gives the appearance of government endorsement of Christianity. Civil servants should not be subject to such ridiculous calls to religion in the workplace.”

Wilkins’ prayer refers to the Old Testament without mentioning Jesus Christ and basically asks God to protect the state’s children and families and help them to be better people.

“Help them to grow into a complete understanding of their authority in You, Lord, while retaining a submissive and humble spirit. We pray that the fruit of the Spirit, which is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control grow in them daily. We pray that they find their identity in You and view themselves as Your instrument, and that they will know that they are fully complete in You, and You alone,” part of his prayer reads.

The memo is part of an “ongoing dialogue the Secretary has with employees” to share information about his public appearances and agency activities, Wilkins’ spokesman Joe Follick said.

“Neither this message or any of the Secretary’s daily actions on behalf of the agency’s 13,000 employees and providers ever carry any attempt to impact every American’s right to believe and follow their faith of choice.
We are proud to have the nation’s best social services team working to improve this state and are proud that among our employees are men and women of all faiths,” Follick said.

But sending the prayer to employees is unconstitutional because it violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment prohibiting government sponsorship of religious messages, Gaylor argued.

“Government officials may of course attend private functions on their own time as private citizens. It is a misuse of office, however, for government actors to use their position to disseminate their religious messages spawned by the National Day of Prayer. A state department head may not use state resources to promote such a sectarian message,” Gaylor wrote. “Governor, you have taken the oath of office to uphold the secular U.S. Constitution and the Constitution of the State of Florida, and you must ensure that your office and public officials under your oversight do not abuse their position to further their personal religious beliefs.”
Read Wilkins’ entire prayer after the jump.
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The first meeting of all three candidates for Palm Beach state attorney was a civil event with discussions of qualifications and such issues as mandatory-minimum sentencing laws.

The Post‘s Stacey Singer offers a wrap-up here of Thursday’s forum at the nonpartisan Voters Coalition.

Republican Dina Keever and no-party candidate Robert Gershman also got in a few digs at Democrat Dave Aronberg, the former state Senator who is backed by the Democratic Party establishment and some big-name Republicans.

“I am not backed by the Democrats. I am not backed by the Republicans. I am truly independent,” said Gershman, who switched his registration from Dem to no party after party leaders discouraged him from challenging Aronberg.

“I am not looking at this position as a steppingstone to something else,” said Keever in an apparent reference to Aronberg, who capped his 8-year Senate career with a failed 2010 bid for Florida attorney general before launching the bid for county prosecutor.

Wexler

Rader, a former state House member from Delray Beach, is running against current Democratic state Reps. Mack Bernard and Jeff Clemens for the Riviera Beach-to-Boynton Beach Senate district.

About one-third of the district’s voters are black and many of them are represented in the House by Bernard, who is black. Many of the district’s coastal precincts are now represented in the House by Clemens.

The district also includes the Democrat-leaning condos of Century Village, Cypress Lakes and Golden Lakes, which have been represented in Congress by Wexler and now Deutch. The condos were part of an old Senate district where Rader won a 2010 primary but lost in the general election to Republican Sen. Lizbeth Benacquisto.

Rader, who had been challenging Democratic state Sen. Maria Sachs in a Palm Beach-Broward district, jumped into the District 27 race this week.

Says Wexler in a statement released today: “I am proud to endorse Kevin Rader and look forward to actively helping him win this election. Kevin is the Democrat we need in the State Senate!”

With Gov. Rick Scott still mulling a lawmaker’s request for a law enforcement investigation, supporters of three Florida Supreme Court justices said Thursday no laws were broken when court staff  helped justices file qualifying papers with elections officials.

Attorney Barry Richard, who represented George W. Bush before the court following the 2000 presidential election, submitted a legal opinion to Dan Stengle, legal counsel for Justices Fred Lewis, Peggy Quince and Barbara Pariente.

He denied that justices using court employees to notarize filing papers amounts to what opponents call a criminal misdemeanor. State law prohibits candidates from using the services of a public employee during working hours ” in the furtherance of his or her candidacy.”

“The act of affixing a notary seal to qualifying documents does not indicate that the notary endorses the candidacy of the person filing the documents,” Richard wrote. “It simply certifies that the notary has witnessed the signature and has confirmed the identity of the person signing.”

Rep. Scott Plakon, R-Longwood, has asked Scott to order the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to look into the controversy surrounding the justices qualifying.

The issue played out publicly last month. The court took an hourlong recess during arguments in the state Senate redistricting case to allow justices to complete their qualifying papers for merit retention this fall.

With the help of court staff,  the documents were filed with election officials only minutes before the deadline.

Since then, the issue has been seized on by opponents of the three justices, already tarred as a liberal-leaning bloc by a tea party-linked political committee called Restore Justice 2012. The campaign is seeking to make the trio the first Florida justices ever ousted in a merit retention campaign.

Plakon said Thursday that to him, the case was an obvious violation. “Every candidate learns early on, you don’t use your staff for anything political,” Plakon said. “No one should be above the law.”

But Stengle, the justices’ legal counsel, also advanced an additional level of defense. He questioned whether the justices are really candidates.

 “Florida’s district court of appeal judges and Supreme Court Justices are not elected, but appointed through the merit selection process,” Stengle said. “Every six years, they are required by the Florida Constitution to participate in the merit retention process so that citizens of Florida may evaluate their job performance. Any documents that they are required to file by virtue of their positions as appellate judges or justices to qualify for merit retention are part of routine court business.”