Senate District 27: classic gerrymandering

So state Rep. Kevin Rader, D-Delray Beach, is remaining in the Senate District 27 race after some aggressive flirtation last week with the Senate District 30 contest.

But will the treadwear-testing Fort Myers-to-West Palm Beach district survive the 2012 redistricting?

Read about it in this week’s Politics column. Also, catch the latest on state House musical chairs, GOP Second Amendment love and Hal Valeche’s fence-mending with the Rooney family.

Rader: switching Senate races?

Rader didn’t return calls late Thursday and this morning.

At a Florida Alliance for Retired Americans meeting in West Palm Beach this morning, Alliance President Tony Fransetta and Senate hopeful Peter Burkert said Rader is dropping out of the race for Aronberg’s seat and will instead seek the seat of Sen. Ted Deutch, D-Boca Raton, who’s running in a special congressional election to replace retiring Democratic U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler.

Burkert said Rader told him two days ago of his plans.

If in fact Rader pursues Deutch’s Senate seat, it could create internal Democratic tumult. Several big-name Dems, including Wexler and County Commissioner Burt Aaronson, have endorsed state Rep. Maria Sachs, D-Delray Beach, for Deutch’s Senate seat if Deutch wins an April 13 special congressional election.

“I’ve urged him (Rader) to stay in his House seat,” Aaronson said this morning.

Graber with granddaughter

Read about it in this week’s Politics column (third item).

Also: Palm Beach County GOP boss Sid Dinerstein backs a Democrat and a former Connecticut Senate candidate takes a “peripheral look” at a South Florida congressional seat.

Kucinich

He’s the second Democratic keynoter to be scratched this week. The party dumped Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu on Tuesday because local activists were upset by her refusal to commit to blocking a Republican filibuster of health care overhaul legislation.

After Kucinich was announced as the replacement speaker, state Rep. Kevin Rader, D-Delray Beach, threatened a boycott and state Sen. Ted Deutch, D-Boca Raton, County Commissioner Burt Aaronson and state Rep. Maria Sachs, D-Delray Beach, voiced disapproval today.

Kucinich has a long history of criticizing the actions of the Israeli government, voting against congressional resolutions in support of Israel and opposing sanctions against the anti-Israel government of Iran.

His critics have “falsely characterized” those stances as being anti-Israel, Kucinich said this afternoon in an e-mail to Palm Beach County Democratic Chairman Mark Alan Siegel. While defending his position, Kucinich said he didn’t want the controversy to hurt the local party’s money-raising efforts.

Read his complete statement to Siegel after the jump….

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Its original Jefferson-Jackson name was dropped because of qualms about Thomas Jefferson’s slave ownership and Andrew Jackson’s Indian-removal policies. Then the renamed Truman-Kennedy-Johnson dinner’s planned keynote speaker, moderate Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu, was unceremoniously dumped this week because party leaders disliked Landrieu’s stance on health care reform.

Now Landrieu’s replacement — liberal U.S. Rep. and former presidential candidate Denis Kucinich, D-Ohio — is prompting a boycott threat from state Rep. Kevin Rader, D-Delray Beach, because of Kucinich’s voting record on Israel.

State Sen. Ted Deutch, D-Boca Raton, has announced he won’t attend or support the event, calling Kucinich “someone whose position on Israel stands in total opposition to the conscience of this community.”

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Perman

He’s the first Democrat to enter the race for the Democrat-leaning district, which is dominated by southwestern Palm Beach County but also includes parts of Martin, St. Lucie and Okeechobee counties.

Palm Beach County voters can expect two blockbuster state Senate races if trends from recent campaign finance reports hold up.

In two primary battles among candidates hoping to replace Sen. Dave Aronberg, D-Greenacres, the candidates combined to collect more than $305,000 during the third quarter. The four have a total of $826,000 on hand, more than 10 months away from the August primary.

In the race to replace Sen. Jeff Atwater, R-North Palm Beach, Rep. Ellyn Bogdanoff, R-Fort Lauderdale, collected $132,921 from July through September. About 20 percent came from insurers and attorneys.

Read the rest here. The story was printed in the Oct. 15 edition of The Palm Beach Post.

To see how all the bankrolls are shaping up for candidates in contested races on the Palm Beach County and Treasure Coast, click here.

Klein

Klein is planning a “telephone town hall” that he says will reach far more constituents than an in-the-flesh event.

West

“The unwillingness to stand in front of your constituents can only be called cowardice,” said West.

Klein dismissed West’s claim. He said the teleconference has been planned for weeks and was not a reaction to the recent transformation of town hall events from soporific C-SPAN affairs to shout-fests that go viral on the Internet.

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“I’m going to support him. He’s shown himself to be an outstanding legislator and obviously he’ll be very good in the Senate,” Siegel said.

Siegel also spoke glowingly of Rader earlier this week, but said it would be bad for the party if Rader ran for Senate and created a Democratic primary for that seat (Fort Myers attorney Peter Burkert is also running as a Dem) and for Rader’s House seat (several Democrats are likely to run for it now that Rader is leaving).

Rader on Thursday officially announced his plans to run for the seat of Sen. Dave Aronberg, D-Greenacres, who’s running for attorney general. Senate District 27 runs from West Palm Beach to Fort Myers, with roughly equal numbers of voters in Lee and Palm Beach County. In a Democratic primary, however, Palm Beach County has roughly a 2-to-1 advantage.

Rader has announced endorsements from some of Palm Beach County’s big Democratic guns: U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, state Sen. Ted Deutch, County Commissioners Burt Aaronson and Shelley Vana, state Rep. Mark Pafford and Tax Collector Anne Gannon.

Rader, notwithstanding the concerns of Palm Beach County Democratic Chairman Mark Alan Siegel, is expected to give up his House District 78 seat to run in 2010 for the seat of Sen. Dave Aronberg, D-Greenacres, who’s running for attorney general.

“If he files, to tell you the truth, I probably would take a hard look at it,” said Machek, who said he’s already fielded several calls asking him to consider the House race.

Chiropractror Steven Perman, who challenged Machek in a 2006 Democratic primary and finished only 198 votes behind Rader last year, says he’ll also consider running if Rader leaves.

Senate District 27

Rader

Although it would keep a Palm Beach County voice in the state Senate, Palm Beach County Democratic Chairman Mark Alan Siegel isn’t happy about the prospect of state Rep. Kevin Rader, D-Delray Beach, giving up his House seat to try to replace Sen. Dave Aronberg, D-Greenacres, next year.

Find out why after the jump……

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Sounds like Democrats will have a primary to match the Republican duel in Senate District 27, a district that stretches over five counties from Palm Beach to Lee and Charlotte on the state’s west coast currently represented by Democrat Dave Aronberg of Greenacres.

Burkert

On the Republican side, Wellington Councilwoman Lizbeth Benacquisto and former state Rep. Sharon Merchant of Palm Beach Gardens have both opened up campaigns.

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Now Rader is entertaining thoughts of running next year in a state Senate district where he doesn’t live.

He has plenty of company.

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Senate District 27

Rader

Freshman state Rep. Kevin Rader, D-Delray Beach, isn’t ruling out a 2010 run for the West Palm Beach-to-Fort Myers state Senate seat that Sen. Dave Aronberg, D-Greenacres, is giving up to run for attorney general.

“I’ll have to look at the numbers and see if, A, it’s a winnable seat and, B, if I have the time to do it,” Rader said today of the roughly 130-mile-long district. “Campaigning for that seat is very difficult.”

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