Some of Tallahassee’s most powerful lobbyists crowded into the ballroom at the Hilton Fort Lauderdale Marina for “outsider” GOP gubernatorial nominee Rick Scott’s election night party, including those once bankrolling his primary opponent Bill McCollum’s campaign.
Scott, who campaigned as an “outsider,” defeated the attorney general after a brutal primary campaign, not unlike his general race against Democrat Alex Sink.
Scott’s imposing security staff blocked off hallways at the waterfront marina and hotel and even employees complained about the restrictions. One hotel guest trying to leave the property had to plead with Scott’s bouncers to let him leave without walking around the entire hotel to get to his car.
The movers-and-shakers in attendance included Fred Leonhardt, who was on McCollum’s finance committee, and donors who contributed at least $100,000 to Scott’s campaign.
Others on the A-list getting an early foot in the door with Scott included Ron Book, Billy Rubin, Dave Ramba, Jim Eaton, Pat Malloy, Jennifer Green, and U.S. Sugar’s Robert Coker.
Senate President-designate Mike Haridopolos, a handful of other GOP legislators and former RPOF executive director Will McKinley and former RPOF fundraiser are also in the house.
Quinnipiac University’s final pre-election poll, which wrapped up Sunday night, shows Republican Marco Rubio with a 45-to-31 percent lead over indie Charlie Crist in the U.S. Senate race, with Democrat Kendrick Meek at 18 percent.
The governor’s race is too close to call, with Democrat Alex Sink up 44-to-43 percent over Republican Rick Scott in an Oct. 25-31 poll of 925 likely voters that has a 3.5 percent margin of error.
Quinnipiac’s final pre-primary poll in August showed Meek with a 10-point lead over Democratic Senate primary rival Jeff Greene (Meek won by 26.5 points) and Bill McCollum topping Scott by 4 points in the GOP governor’s primary (Scott won by 2.8 percent).
MAXVILLE – Rick Scott urged Tea Partiers at a “Taxed Enough Already Meeting” to vote for him to send a message to Washington Democrats on a sunny afternoon in a field outside Jacksonville.
“It’s over,” the GOP gubernatorial candidate said to a crowd of at least 500.
Standing on a replica of the U.S.S. Dartmouth beside a stack of crates labeled “TEA,” Scott lumped his Democratic opponent Alex Sink in with the Washington officials.
Rick Scott and his mother Esther at a Tea Party rally near Jacksonville
“Who wants to tell Barack Obama that it’s our country, not his?” Scott shouted. “Who wants to tell Nancy Pelosi she’s fired? Who wants to tell Alex Sink to follow the rules?”
Dick Kearley, a plant nursery owner from Hawthorne, said he voted for Scott but still has doubts about the self-funded candidate who has spent at least $60 million of his own fortune funding his campaign.
“I’m trying to make the best of a bad lot,” Kearley, who said is identifies with the Tea Party and participates in some rallies but does not consider himself an official member, said. “Why would you spend so much of your own money to become governor of the state of Florida?
Kearley said he’s not alone in his lack of enthusiasm for the GOP ticket this year.
But, he added, “How bad can it be? Let’s try somebody new. It couldn’t be any worse.”
Scott’s later campaign stops include a rally in Tampa with Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, who supported Scott’s opponent Attorney General Bill McCollum in the primary, as did Kearley.
With barely more than a week until Election Day, GOP attorney general candidate Pam Bondi took time out from campaigning in the Sunshine State for quick trip to Washington DC to rake in some dough for ad time.
Bondi flew into DC briefly for a fundraiser hosted by former Virginia attorney general Jerry Kilgore, Bondi spokeswoman Sandi Copes said in an e-mail.
Bondi surely hopes she fares better than Kilgore did in his last election.
The Republican resigned as Virginia’s attorney general in 2005 to run for governor of the then-red state.
But Kilgore lost to Democrat Tim Kaine, now the chairman of the Democratic National Committee.
The Gelber camp blasted Bondi, who’s never run for office before, for the fundraising trip, setting off a typical finger-pointing volley in the contentious race to succeed Attorney General Bill McCollum. (more…)
After more than two months since GOP gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott defeated him in a brutal primary election, Attorney General Bill McCollum finally came out in support of his one-time foe.
“Florida is facing a critical time. Our state needs conservative leaders who will grow our economy and create jobs. We need merit pay and an end to teacher tenure in our public schools, major litigation reform, smaller government, low taxes and a repeal of Obamacare. With this in mind, I will cast my vote for Rick Scott for Governor. It’s the better choice for Florida,” McCollum’s less-than-enthusiastic statement, released by the Republican Party of Sarasota, read.
McCollum, at one point a shoe-in for the nomination, lost the GOP primary after Scott spent $50 million of his own fortune on campaign ads attacking the former Congressman for being a Washington insider.
McCollum said recently he would not endorse Scott’s Democratic opponent Alex Sink, in part because she supports the federal health care law over which McCollum has sued the federal government.
A federal judge recently allowed McCollum’s lawsuit to proceed.
McCollum was the final holdout among state GOP leaders who at one point pilloried Scott, who was forced out of the hospital chain he founded shortly before Columbia/HCA was forced to pay $1.7 billion in fines to the federal government for Medicare fraud.
House Speaker-designate Dean Cannon essentially gave Gov. Charlie Crist a cease and desist order telling the governor to quit enabling the federal government regarding health care reforms.
Cannon, R-Orlando, accused Crist of “commandeering of state insurance regulatory resources” by allowing executive agencies to begin implementing the federal health care reforms even as the state is suing White House agencies over them.
Cannon’s demands could set up a possible showdown between the executive and legislative branches of government over the health care reforms, which Crist, the independent candidate in the U.S. Senate race, says he supports in part.
Cannon gave Crist until Nov. 15 to tell him how much the state is spending on workers and other resources to comply with the reforms and told him that Crist will need the legislature’s approval before taking any further action.
Cannon complains in the letter to Crist that the Office of Insurance Regulation is jumpstarting new insurance regulations by developing data systems. But that office is overseen by not just Crist. He and the Florida Cabinet – including Attorney General Bill McCollum, who filed the lawsuit over the Patient Protection and Affordable Care act – make up the Financial Services Commission that’s in charge of OIR.
Attorney General Bill McCollum said he is likely to vote for GOP governor candidate Rick Scott but still won’t endorse him.
Scott, who had never run for office before, defeated McCollum after a brutal primary in which Scott spent $50 million of his own money, much of it on negative campaign ads targeting McCollum, who spent decades in Congress and as a lobbyist, as a career politician.
McCollum said he has “big differences” with Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink, the Democrat gubernatorial candidate, primarily about her opposition to his lawsuit against the federal government over health care reforms.
“I cannot vote for her for governor,” McCollum told reporters after a Cabinet meeting this morning.
Although McCollum has refused to endorse Scott, McCollum said he will “probably” vote in the governor’s race.
“And if I do I’m leaning towards voting for Scott. But I haven’t made that decision formally yet. Haven’t decided. I’m weighing it right now,” he said.
He said he hasn’t decided either whether he will formally endorse his former opponent but that he’s offered to meet with Scott “more than once and no meetings occurred to this point.”
GOP governor hopeful Rick Scott released another attack ad slamming Democrat opponent Alex Sink, continuing his negative ad campaign against the chief financial officer.
Scott’s same strategy helped him defeat Attorney General Bill McCollum in the August GOP primary. Scott spent $50 million of his own money in the primary campaign, most of it on ads attacking McCollum.
Sink and the other Florida Cabinet members signed off on the contract based on the recommendations of the state Division of Bond Finance, she said, her investments are in a blind trust so she did not have a conflict of interest on the vote.
How close a business is to where oil actually washed up on the beach won’t be a factor in determining whether it is eligible to be paid for lost revenues, BP claims czar Ken Feinberg has decided.
Today, Kenneth Feinberg, Administrator of the Gulf Coast Claims Facility, announced that geographic proximity to the BP oil spill would not prevent a legitimate individual or business claim from being processed.
“I have heard from elected officials in Florida, including Governor Crist, Attorney General McCollum, CFO Sink and others, about their concerns regarding Floridians’ proximity to the spill and how, regardless of distance, there has been economic impact beyond the areas closest to the spill. After listening to these concerns, I have concluded that a geographic test to determine eligibility regarding economic harm due to the oil spill is unwarranted,” Feinberg said in the statement.
Claimants must “rove damages resulting from the spill itself and not other causes, but “physical proximity from the spill will not, in and of itself, bar the processing of legitimate claims,” he said.
His reversal on proximity is a victory for Florida hotel and restaurant owners, who hired a legal dream team to fight Feinberg and help businesses get their claims paid.
The Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association and state elected officials objected to Feinberg’s inclusion of proximity as a factor in paying claims. They said tourists stayed away from the Sunshine State because they had the perception that oil had contaminated areas of Florida even where it hadn’t.
UPDATE: GOP officials appear to be linking Attorney General Bill McCollum to billions of dollars in losses – on paper – to the state pension fund during the 2008 financial meltdown.
McCollum has steadfastly refused to join other GOP elected officials in their support for Rick Scott, who defeated the attorney general in the August GOP governor’s race primary.
The Republican Party of Florida paid for a series of ads attacking Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink, the Democrat nominee for governor, for her role in the pension fund losses.
“Under current oversight, the fund has lost billions upon billions – and now Alex Sink is actually running ads on her questionable record overseeing SBA,” RPOF spokesman Dan Conston said in an e-mail in response to a reaction to McCollum’s pointed questioning yesterday to refute recent reports that the State Board of Administration made risky investments that endangered the pension fund.
Attorney General Bill McCollum may have finally put to rest speculation that he may eventually endorse Rick Scott in the governor’s race in the spirit of party unity.
Instead, he helped Scott’s opponent Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink, the Democrat candidate for governor, debunk ads bashing Sink for her role in the state pension fund’s loss of billions of dollars in value during the financial meltdown in 2008.
McCollum, who lost the GOP primary bid in a brutal battle against Scott last month, sits with Sink and Gov. Charlie Crist on the board of trustees that governs the State Board of Administration, which handles the pension fund and other investments.
In a public meeting yesterday, McCollum repeatedly asked SBA chief Ash Williams about reports that the pension fund is troubled and that the SBA made risky investments.
Williams assured the trustees the $119 billion fund is sound.
“The SBA is stronger and different then it was only two years ago,” Williams said.
He also refuted allegations that the investments were risky.
“The truth is they are performing,” McCollum said. “They are assets that pay back.”
Add state Sen. Dan Gelber, the Democrat candidate for attorney general, to the list of pols criticizing BP claims czar Ken Feinberg for his handling of payments to Floridians harmed by the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster.
Gelber, a former federal prosecutor from Miami Beach, sent a letter to Feinberg asking him to include the costs of preparing claims to payments to individuals and businesses. Feinberg said he won’t pay for legal or accounting fees associated with the filings.
“Citizens of our state are rightfully frustrated. They see promises from BP actors in commercials suggesting the company is prepared to do the right thing. Yet on the ground, they see obfuscation, and a process that is filled with more chutes than ladders,” Gelber wrote.
Gelber also joined Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink, the Democrat candidate for governor; Gov. Charlie Crist, the independent candidate for U.S. Senate; and Attorney General Bill McCollum, the Republican who lost the primary bid for governor, in demanding that Feinberg pay damages to those located where oil never reached the shore. Feinberg’s consideration of proximity to the oil spill in paying claims has been a major issue of contention since he took over BP’s botched claims process on Aug. 23.
Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink used an update this morning on Florida’s response to the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster to blast BP claims czar Ken Feinberg for paying too little, too late to Panhandle businesses and causing at least one company to close its doors.
“I’m kind of of the mind set that enough is enough,” Sink, the Democrat candidate for governor, said at this morning’s Cabinet meeting. “I don’t know about you all but I’m sick and tired of this. These desperate people through no fault of their own having to shut their business down? That’s horrendous!”
Sink said the owners of Harmony Beach Vacations in Destin sent her an e-mail yesterday telling her they were going out of business because their claim for lost revenues has languished under both BP and Feinberg, who took over the oil giant’s maligned claims process for individuals and businesses on Aug. 23.
GOP gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott’s campaign released two new ads attacking his Democrat opponent Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink accusing her of steering no-bid contracts to her former employer and slamming her for poor oversight of the state’s pension fund.
Sink spent more than two decades as a banker and ended her career as the head of Bank of America’s Florida operations.
One of the ads accuses Sink of steering at least $770,000 to Bank of America and its subsidiaries in her role as a member of the board of trustees that oversees the State Board of Administration. Sink sits on the board with fellow Cabinet members Attorney General Bill McCollum and Gov. Charlie Crist.
Sink has said she did not declare a conflict of interest in voting on matters affecting her former employer because her investments are in a blind trust.
Attorney General Bill McCollum said he is “cautiously optimistic” after an hour-and-a-half long meeting with BP claims czar Ken Feinberg in the Capitol this morning.
Claimants throughout the Gulf Coast have complained that little has changed since Feinberg, appointed by the White House and BP to dole out $20 billion the oil giant is putting into the Gulf Coast Claims Facility, took over BP’s much-maligned claims process more than three weeks ago.
McCollum has repeatedly criticized Feinberg’s system, still in development even after he has written more than $40 million in checks to Floridians for losses caused by BP’s April 20th Deepwater Horizon oil rig blast and ensuing disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. Feinberg’s paid an average of $7,195 in emergency payments to nearly 5,600 Floridians since taking over on Aug. 23.
One of the most contentious issues facing Florida thus far has been Feinberg’s emphasis on “proximity” to the oil spill in determining eligibility for claims and questions about whether perceptions about Florida’s beaches being oily (even when they were not) contributed to a drop in tourism that affected hotels, restaurants and state tax collections.
After hearing that not a single business on Pensacola Beach has received a dime from BP claims czar Ken Feinberg in nearly a month, Chief Financial Officer proposed sending (another) letter to Feinberg urging him to get on it.
“This is just not right,” Sink, the Democrat running for governor against Republican Rick Scott, said before the Cabinet heard an update on the oil spill at this morning’s Cabinet meeting.
Sink suggested ordering Feinberg to show up at the next Cabinet meeting to explain why he hasn’t followed through on his earlier pledge to quickly process claims to help out Panhandle residents whose businesses have floundered since the April 20th Deepwater Horizon disaster. Or, she said, the Cabinet could write a letter to Feinberg urging him to take action. Sink has made repeated requests in writing to Feinberg, BP officials and others demanding they speed up payments to floundering businesses in the Panhandle threatening to shut down because of the spill.
Gov. Charlie Crist agreed to sign on to Sink’s letter to try to get some help to Floridians, especially those in the Panhandle.
“It’s become increasingly difficult for them to be able to hang on,” Crist, the independent candidate in the three-way race for U.S. Senate said.
Attorney General Bill McCollum, whose office has been out front dealing with Feinberg and BP throughout response to the disaster, is supposed to meet with Feinberg this week. McCollum was in Pensacola attending the federal hearing on his lawsuit against President Barack Obama’s administration over health care reforms.
The gubernatorial nominees from the two main parties chatted last night after Democrat Alex Sink phoned Republican Rick Scott to offer her congratulations. Sink’s campaign described it as a “short conversation” in which she expressed hope they could focus on the issues.
Meanwhile, Scott still hasn’t heard from Bill McCollum, his primary rival who refused to say whether he would endorse Scott during their bruising campaign.
McCollum conceded the primary to Scott but has not endorsed the multi-millionaire who spent more than $50 million of his own money to defeat party establishment favorite McCollum.
McCollum’s campaign spokesman said he would endorse every other GOP candidate but failed to include Scott’s name in the list when asked.
“The attorney general is looking forward to being on the campaign trail for campaigns for our Republican slate, including Marco Rubio, Jeff Atwater, Adam Putnam and our new attorney general nominee and Dean Cannon and Mike Haridopolos and our entire legislative slate,” McCollum campaign spokeswoman Kristy Campbell said today.
When asked if McCollum would endorse Scott, Campbell said: “They have not yet spoken.”
When asked again, Campbell repeated her earlier remarks: “I think (Attorney) General McCollum will make comments this week, where he believes the Republican Party needs to focus on in November. I think you could take from that that he’ll make comments today or Thursday he will focus on electing Republican candidates including Marco Rubio and Mike Haridopolos and Jeff Atwater and the entire Republican legislative slate.”
McCollum became the state’s top GOP elected official when Gov. Charlie Crist abandoned the Republican Party to run as an independent in the U.S. Senate race against former House Speaker Marco Rubio.
Republican Party of Florida officials scrapped a unity party planned in Tampa today after the brutal primary season between Scott and McCollum.
Bill McCollum issued a statement shortly after midnight conceding the Republican governor primary to Rick Scott. He doesn’t mention Scott by name but notes “the entrance of a multi-millionaire with a questionable past who shattered campaign spending records and spent more in four months than has ever been spent in a primary race here in Florida.”
In the two weeks leading up to Tuesday’s Florida primaries, most polls showed GOP establishment favorite Bill McCollum rebounding from outsider Rick Scott’s summer surge and regaining a lead in the Republican governor’s primary.
The most notable exception: Democratic firm Public Policy Polling, which on Monday said its weekend polling showed Scott up by 7 points. Scott appears to have won by just under 3 points.
And here’s its rundown of Democratic Senate primary polls. Everyone had this race trending toward Kendrick Meek, who ended up beating Palm Beach billionaire Jeff Greene by 26.5 points. PPP’s day-before poll had Meek up by 24 points.
Public Policy Polling and Quinnipiac University both surveyed Florida Republican voters over the weekend on the Bill McCollum-Rick Scott gubernatorial bloodbath. They came up with vastly different results.
As noted earlier this morning, Democratic-oriented PPP found Scott with a 47-to-40 percent lead over McCollum in the Republican primary. Quinnipiac’s poll shows McCollum with a 39-to-35 percent lead over Scott.
One huge difference: PPP found Republican voters have an overall positive view of Scott, with 46 percent expressing a favorable view and 33 percent unfavorable. Quinnipiac found GOP voters with an overall negative view of Scott — 31 percent favorable and 40 percent favorable.
McCollum’s favorability ratings are underwater in the PPP poll — 38 percent positive and 45 percent negative. In the Quinnipiac poll, McCollum’s favorable/unfavorable score is 39/37.
PPP’s Republican sample was 304 likely voters and has a 5.6 percent margin of error. Quinnipiac surveyed 771 likely GOP voters and has a 3.5 percent margin of error.
Both polling firms find Kendrick Meek with a double-digit lead over Jeff Greene in the Democratic Senate primary.
Surveys by the Democratic-oriented Public Policy Polling firm show Rick Scott with a 47-to-40 percent lead over Bill McCollum in Tuesday’s GOP primary for governor and U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek holding a 51-to-27 advantage over Jeff Greene in the Democratic Senate primary.
The polls were taken Saturday and Sunday. The sample of 324 likely Democratic primary voters has a 5.4 percent margin of error and the GOP sample of 304 likely voters has a 5.6 percent margin of error.
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