National Democrats launched an attack on U.S. Rep. Allen West today, blaming him for the failure of the Congressional “super committee” to reach a consensus and accusing the Plantation politician of “demanding more tax breaks for billionaires.”
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee unleashed the robo-calls today, and the campaign also includes live telephone calls, online ads and a website for voters to fill out letters to the editor today, according to a release issued by the DCCC. The calls are supposed to start going out to voters in West’s district that includes Palm Beach County today.
Democrats have targeted West in his reelection bid. The tea party favorite is being challenged by Democrat Patrick Murphy.
Here’s the script of the robo-call:
Hi, this is Rick calling on behalf of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee calling about Congressman Allen West and Republicans forcing the Super Committee to fail.
Americans demanded a bipartisan, big, bold, and balanced plan to reduce the deficit and grow our economy – but that’s not what we got. The Super Committee failed because Republicans insisted on extending the Bush tax breaks for millionaires and refusing to include a jobs proposal – while ending the Medicare guarantee! That’s something that Democrats stand strongly against.
By rejecting a balanced approach, Republicans chose to protect the wealthiest one percent at the expense of seniors and the middle class. Now they’re even talking about raising the payroll tax.
Please call Congressman West at 561-655-1943 and tell him it’s time to focus on us.
A federal court has turned down Gov. Rick Scott’s request for expedited review of four of Florida’s most contentious election law changes, blaming Scott’s administration itself for delays.
Secretary of State Kurt Browning asked the three-judge panel to decide whether the four election law changes violate the federal Voting Rights Act and earlier this month asked the panel to also rule on whether the act is unconstitutional and speed up its review. Browning said a decision is needed before the Florida’s early Jan. 31 presidential preference primary or the state could be in trouble for not having the same set of elections laws in all 67 counties. Five counties – Collier, Hardee, Hendry, Hillsborough and Monroe – require federal preclearance of voting rights laws. The rest of the counties have already implemented the changes, but the five counties cannot until federal officials or a federal court approves.
In a 12-page memo issued today, the judges chastised Florida for dragging out the process by side-stepping Department of Justice review. The court said Browning waited three weeks after Scott signed the law before sending it to the Justice Department for approval, removed four provisions of the law from the department’s review after 50 days and later asked the court to expedite its review.
“Thus, the present state of affairs is, at least to an extent, a matter of Florida’s own choosing,” judges wrote. “The Court is neither willing to rush to judgment on the complex statutory and constitutional issues raised in this case nor inclined to impose unreasonable litigation burdens upon the United States and Defendant-Intervenors simply because Florida chose to schedule its primary election early in the election season.”
Browning’s proposed schedule would have given the parties only 28 days to prepare for arguments and allowed the court just two to three weeks to hold hearings and draft an opinion, the judges wrote.
“The Court finds this extraordinarily abbreviated schedule to be unworkable,” they wrote. (more…)
UPDATE: Florida Republicans call the Dems new website “desperate.” This from Republican Party of Florida spokesman Brian Hughes: “With the most recent state reports showing RPOF outraised Florida Democrats by 5-to-1, it’s no surprise they are desperate to raise money. But this lame website demonstrates a level of desperation that is even worse than we thought possible. Instead of touting their anointed leaders, Barack Obama or Debbie Wasserman Schultz, they recycle ridiculous, cheap attacks. This tactic is more evidence why Floridians reject Democrats on Election Day.”
The Florida Democratic Party launched a new website today blaming Gov. Rick Scott and his fellow Republican lawmakers for the state’s dire economic straits.
The website accuses “Rickpublicans” of ethical lapses and causing teacher layoffs, among other things, and blasts Scott for “backsliding” on his campaign pledge to create 700,000 jobs over seven years as governor.
And the Dems remind viewers that Republicans have had a stranglehold on the state legisalture and governor’s mansion for more than a decade.
The site gives this definition of a “Rickpublican:” [rick-puhb-li-kuh´n]
noun
1. Proper name for Florida Republicans wrought with greed and corruption who are hell-bent on selling out to the corporations and special interests while leaving Florida’s middle class families out-to-dry.
The Dems also use “Six Degrees of Separation” to link half a dozen GOP politicians – including Palm Beach County’s Adam Hanser and U.S. Rep. Allen West – to Scott, whose popularity among voters remains dim.
Sen. Chris Smith, whose district includes part of Palm Beach County, will head up the Senate Democratic caucus next year as the minority party tries to make inroads in a post-redistricting era.
With a 28-12 partisan split, Smith takes the reins of a caucus from Nan Rich in a GOP-dominated chamber. But by working with moderate Republicans, Democrats have helped put the brakes on conservative issues such as House Speaker Dean Cannon’s Supreme Court overhaul and a thorny immigration bill.
“Our numbers are few but we’ve been able to build coalitions,” the Fort Lauderdale lawyer said.
In a typical election year, Smith’s priorities would be to regain the two seats lost to Republicans last year – including former Sen. Dave Aronberg’s District 27 seat won by Lizbeth Benacquisto – or capture others.
But redistricting and the presidential elections leaves much of the 2012 work up in the air, Smith said.
“It changes so much with the political landscape. I’m sure two years ago Nan didn’t know the tea party was going to be so front and center. So who knows what’s going to happen in ’12. Hopefully after the Obama reelection the tea party will realize their five minutes of fame are up, we’ll be able to get down to some serious agenda of governing the state,” he said.
“I believe I’ll be the appointee,” said Smith, a Gainesville-area former prosecutor who most recently was Alex Sink’s running-mate in her losing bid for governor.
His bid to replace Florida Democratic Party Chairwoman Karen Thurman, who is retiring, got a boost yesterday when an officer of the Alachua County party stepped down to make room for Smith.
Smith would have to be elected the chairman of the county executive committee or state committee man before he can be eligible to run as head of the FDP.
Once that happens, Smith said he’ll continue to build support from activists, donors and other county leaders.
“It’s a process that’s ongoing. It sometimes appears slow and ponderous but it’s an important process that allows people to have input about their concerns,” Smith, 61, said.
After getting trounced in the Florida House and Senate races and a GOP sweep of the Cabinet, state Sen. Jeremy Ring is demanding that Florida Democratic Party Chairwoman Karen Thurman resign.
“With the momentum of all the losses on the Democratic sides, there needs to be new leadership. Karen Thurman needs to resign. Immediately,” Ring, D-Margate, said of the Florida Democratic Party chairwoman early today.
Republicans swept the Cabinet seats and won a veto-proof majority in both the state Senate and ultimately recaptured the governor’s seat after Palm Beach County’s election returns left Rick Scott’s victory in the lurch overnight.
Ring, a moderate Democrat who frequently votes with Republicans, said the “election activities of the Republicans trumping the Democrats” at polling places he visited on Election Day demonstrate that his party is in a shambles.
“Whether it was hundreds of more signs and volunteers and palm cards and all the precincts covered, I didn’t see any coordinated effort on the Democratic side yesterday,” Ring said.
Ring was among several prominent Democrats who tried to oust Thurman when she was reelected as chairwoman two years ago.
Those efforts failed because no replacement could be found, Ring said.
He blamed Thurman for that.
“Part of any leader’s job is not to only raise money and recruit candidates but they should recruit their successor…part of her job is to have a succession plan. Clearly there isn’t one,” he said.
Villalobos previously broke ranks with his party by endorsing Republican-turned-independent Gov. Charlie Crist in his bid for U.S. Senate.
Sink’s banking on her business background and reputation as a fiscal conservative to sway Republican voters away from her GOP opponent Rick Scott who defeated Attorney General Bill McCollum in a nasty primary last month.
Villalobos has plenty of reasons to shun his party. Former Gov. Jeb Bush joined Villalobos’ fellow GOP senators four years ago in a campaign to unseat the incumbent by backing his opponent in a brutal primary. Villalobos won.
The Democratic Governors Association gave Florida Democrats a $2 million cash infusion to aid Alex Sink in her race against Rick Scott, Politico is reporting this morning.
According to Politico, the DGA wired the cash into the Florida Democratic Party’s account and will be spent on television ads.
Democrats nationally are eying the Florida race with the hope that Chief Financial Officer Sink can score a coup for Democrats, who’ve been out of the governor’s mansion since former Lt. Gov. Buddy McKay lost to Jeb Bush in 1998. Sink’s husband Bill McBride made a losing against Bush four years later.
Scott spent more than $50 million of his own money – much of it on advertising – to defeat Attorney General Bill McCollum in the GOP primary last month.
“Bud” Chiles will officially drop out of the governor’s race tomorrow and is throwing his support behind the Democratic nominee, Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink.
Chiles – the son of Florida’s last Democrat governor, the late Lawton Chiles for whom he was named -could have been a spoiler in the governor’s race for Democrats who feared the independent candidate could be the Ralph Nader of Florida elections by pulling votes away from Sink. Many Democrats blamed Al Gore’s 2000 election loss to President George W. Bush on Green Party candidate Nader. Gore lost by 537 votes; Nader received 97,421.
Meek said Sachs, a Delray Beach lawyer, signed an endorsement pledge for him in December and called the switcheroo “strange” especially because Palm Beach County Democrats virtually anointed her to fill U.S. Rep. Ted Deutch’s seat when he left the state senate to go to Washington.
“She spoke very passionately two weeks ago of her support of my candidacy, felt that I should be the next U.S. Senator of Florida,” Meek said at a roundtable with reporters this morning.
A few days after independent gubernatorial candidate Michael E. Arth snuck into a photo with Republican Rick Scott, one of Arth’s supporters was removed today from Democrat Alex Sink’s event in West Palm Beach.
Melinda Clark, 58, of West Palm Beach, attend the event after receiving an e-mail from the Palm Beach County Democratic Club. She said was wearing an Arth button but minding her own business when she was asked to leave by John Kazanjian, president of the Palm Beach County Police Benevolent Association, which was hosting the event. She said she was slightly pushed while she was escorted out of the hall.
“I was asking to be noticed, for sure. But this just confirmed that the corporate monolith has taken over anything resembling a democracy. This is now about the wealthy and the well-connected,” said Clark, who compared the situation to former President George W. Bush packing his town hall events with supporters.
“It’s incredible to me that the police, as benevolent as they are, escorted a little 58-year-old grandmother out of the meeting instead of protecting my democratic rights to be there.”
The details of Clark’s story are disputed by Sink’s campaign and Kazanjian, who do a little finger-pointing of their own.
State Sen. Dave Aronberg agreed to his colleague Sen. Dan Gelber’s request for debates before the primary election…sort of.
Aronberg and Gelber are in a heated Democratic primary for attorney general, and Aronberg’s taken off the gloves and attacked his opponent for Gelber’s former law firm’s representation of BP.
Gelber says he resigned from Akerman Senterfitt, the state’s largest law firm that recently was retained by BP, days before Aronberg demanded it.
Gelber then sent Aronberg a letter asking for 11 debates before the Aug. 24 primary.
Aronberg responded today calling a request for that many debates – nearly three a week – a “political stunt” and dragging BP into the debate arena.
“The next Attorney General will probably spend the better part of this decade involved in litigation of the state versus BP, Halliburton and other parties who might share liability for this disaster. Therefore, as we work together to agree on our debate schedule, I want to insist that at least one of the debates be held there so the citizens of that region can hear our plans for fighting for them as their Attorney General,” Aronberg wrote in a letter to Gelber.
Aronberg also agreed to a debate outside of South Florida, home to both Democrats, in Tampa Bay or Orlando.
It’s an open Democratic primary in state House District 86, which includes much of Boynton Beach and Delray Beach.
Carole Penny Kaye hopes that her work for immigration law reform will help her connect with some of the groups in the district. Since she earned her law degree in 1997, Kaye said, “Advocacy work has been the driving pass.on in my life. I have support in the Haitian community, but we have to get them out to vote.”
…
Lori Berman says her first priority would be to improve the state’s economy. Toward that end, she wants to see the state’s schools produce more graduates with skills desirable to the biotech and other new industries.
Rep. Joe Abruzzo tell us he’s signing up to raise money for the 527 political advocacy group known as Florida Mainstream Democrats and knows at least one Democrat who his money won’t be helping: state Rep. Rick Kriseman.
“Rick Kriseman is about as mainstream as Dennis Rodman,” Abruzzo said.
The group hasn’t spent anything this year beyond consulting and web site management, but clearly it’s created quite a stir.
Here are the new productions from the top Democrats running for U.S. Senate in Florida. Palm Beach businessman Jeff Greene showcases his family while state Rep. Kendrick Meek says he’s the real Democrat in the race.
On a related side note, The Hill is reporting that the Democratic National Committee has shifted $333,333 to the Florida Democratic Party as party of the national party’s $50 million get-out-the-vote campaign for the fall.
In a tongue-in-cheek hint of what will likely take place during a budget debate on the floor tomorrow, House Democratic Leader-to-be Ron Saunders filed an amendment on a transportation bill that sweeps nearly $150 million from road projects to fill a $3.2 billion spending gap.
The veteran Key West lawmaker’s amendment renames the transportation bill the “Job Killer Act of 2010.”
Look for Democrats to try to amend the budget mainly in the House but without much success.
As evidence, House Majority Leader Adam Hasner offered his own amendment to counter Saunders’.
Hasner, R-Delray Beach, wants to name the bill (HB 5503) the “Protecting Healthcare and Education Funding Act of 2010.”
The Senate is expected to debate and amend its budget and pass it out so they can cancel session on Thursday and get in a longer Easter weekend.
Capitalizing on the scandal erupting over the state GOP’s credit card spending, national Democrats released a video take-off of the MasterCard “Priceless” television campaign.
“Getting your personal bills paid for by the Republican Party of Florida like Marco Rubio: Priceless,” the Democratic National Committee video mocks.
The state GOP may get some unwanted mail as a result of the “Priceless” satire.
“Want your bills paid for by the Republican Party of Florida? Just send them in. 420 E. Jefferson Street, Tallahassee, Florida 32301,” it concludes.
The DNC ad targets Rubio at a time when the once-long-shot candidate’s popularity is soaring while his GOP primary opponent Gov. Charlie Crist’s is on the wane.
The Florida Democratic Party and Republican Marco Rubio have enjoyed an uneasy alliance in the past few months over a common enemy. Numerous times, Rubio and the Democrats have sent out e-mails within minutes of each other with mirror-image attacks on Republican Gov. Charlie Crist.
But today Democrats are turning their sights on Rubio, whose primary campaign against Crist been gaining momentum. By our count, it’s the first Democratic press release dedicated solely to Rubio since May 5, when Rubio formally announced his candidacy (just a few days before Crist’s own announcement).
The press release today hammers Rubio for receiving a $135,000 equity loan from a politically-connected bank. The loan came after Rubio bought a West Miami home for $550,000 in 2005 and had it valued at $735,000 a month later. The peg for the release is Rubio’s opposition to President Obama’s so-called Financial Crisis Responsibility Fee.
The aim of the White House plan is to recover projected losses from the government’s bank bailout. Rubio called it a “bank tax.”
We’ve got a feeling Rubio’s camp is giddy about the turn of events. From Rubio spokesman Alex Burgos:
“When the time comes to debate Democrats, we will have had plenty of experience highlighting the policy deficiencies they share with Charlie Crist on out-of-control stimulus spending, cap-and-trade, higher taxes and policies that trade individual freedom for more government.”
Speaking about the economy this afternoon at a Boca Raton fundraiser, Vice President Biden said Florida’s economiy is “still in trouble.”
Florida, Arizona and California, Biden said, “got killed when this bubble burst, and you’re still getting killed.”
But nationally, Biden said the economy was improving, according to a pool report of the fundraiser.
“We’re getting to the end of this toboggan run,” Biden said. “We’re no longer talking about a depression. We’re talking about the shape of a recovery.”
“We inherited a God-awful mess,” he said
Biden spoke for about 30 minutes and then took questions behind closed doors for another half-hour
Among the crowd of about 60 people — who paid between $1,000 and $30,000 to attend — were state Sens. Ted Deutch, D-Boca Raton, and Jeremy Ring, D-Parkland; Fort Lauderdale attorney Mitchell Berger; and Palm Beach County Democratic Chairman Mark Alan Siegel.
The fundraiser, for the Democratic National Committee and Organizing for America, was held at the home of Mark Gilbert.
President Barack Obama tapped Palm Beach Democratic supporter and Hillary Clinton pal Elaine Schuster to represent the U.S. at the General Assembly of the United Nations.
The nomination must be approved by the U.S. Senate.
The Schusters, who also own a home in Boston, are philanthropists who have held fundraisers for Democratic candidates at their Jungle Road home. In 2007, they donated $5 million to Brandeis University’s Institute for Investigative Journalism, which was renamed after them.
National Democrats launched an attack on U.S. Rep. Allen West today, blaming him for the failure of the Congressional “super committee” to reach a consensus and accusing the Plantation politician of “demanding more tax breaks for billionaires.”
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