Free Republic

Florida is leading the nation in job growth, adding more than 37,000 jobs this month. The Tampa Bay area has added over 25,000 jobs in the last 12 months, third among metro areas in Florida, according to state officials..

Noted party-jumper Charlie Crist has blown a 12-point lead over Florida's incumbent Republican Gov. Rick Scott, narrowing the state's gubernatorial race to a dead heat, according to the Democratic-leaning survey firm Public Policy Polling.

Fox News’ Sean Hannity sat down with Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal on Thursday at the Republican Leadership Conference to talk about the accomplishments conservative governors have made across the U.S. “All of you inherited deficits you turned into surpluses, high unemployment now low unemployment,” Hannity said of Jindal and Govs. Rick Scott (FL), Rick Perry (TX), John Kasich (OH), Scott Walker (WI), and Nikki Haley (SC). “What can the Republicans in Washington learn?” Washington can actually learn a lot from states if they want to—it’s just common sense, Jindal replied. Lawmakers inside the beltway always talk about the things...

Today, Governor Rick Scott announced plans to file a lawsuit establishing the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration’s (AHCA) authority to inspect federal VA hospitals in Florida, and to stop the federal veterans affairs agency from obstructing state actions. Governor Scott said, “As the chief health policy and planning entity for the state that licenses, inspects, and investigates consumer complaints, AHCA should be allowed access to federal VA hospitals to inspect their processes and their facilities. On seven separate occasions at six federal VA hospitals, however, state inspectors have been blocked by federal officials from carrying out their mission of...

BREVARD -- Brevard County will soon be the home of the largest economic development project in the country, officials said. The Economic Development Commission of Florida's Space Coast announced on May 8 that Northrop Grumman Corporation has selected Brevard County for an expansion project that could create 1,800 jobs, with an average annual salary of $100,000. The project was secretly known as "Project Magellan" throughout the due diligence phase, as part of a confidentiality agreement between the company and the Space Coast, officials said. Northrop Grumman plans to invest approximately $500 million in new capital investments at Melbourne International Airport,...

Former Florida Governor Charlie Crist has made no secret of his desire to end the U.S. embargo on Cuba, but he may go even further and take a visit to the communist nation over the summer, according to the Tampa Bay Times. The Times reported that Crist is “eager to learn more about the country as he call for normalizing relations with Florida’s neighbor." Crist’s calls to lift the embargo lines up with polling across the state and the nation that show majorities favor ending the U.S. policy.

Former Florida Gov. Charlie Crist (D) said Tuesday that a “big reason” why he left the Republican Party was because many in the GOP were hostile to President Obama due to his race. Crist, who is running for his old office against Gov. Rick Scott (R), said in an interview with Fusion’s Jorge Ramos that he felt uncomfortable with his previous party affiliation. Republicans are perceived as “anti-women, anti-immigrant, anti-minority, [and] anti-gay,” he said, and they refuse to compromise with Obama. The ex-governor said he feels, “liberated as a Democrat.” “I couldn’t be consistent with myself and my core beliefs,...

With President Barack Obama heading to the Sunshine State on Thursday, he is drawing fire from an old foe in Gov. Rick Scott. Rising to political prominence by opposing Obama’s federal health-care law, Scott went after Obama for taking funds from Medicaid Advantage to fund the law. "Today, President Obama is coming to Florida to raise money and do a campaign-style event,” Scott said. “No one knows specifically what he’s going to talk about, but it’s safe to say he won’t be addressing the 1.3 million Florida seniors who are in danger of losing their health care benefits, doctors and...

HOUSTON, TX – The nation’s leading labor union will plan to spend $300 million in 2014 trying to unseat Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker and four other Republican Governors. More: AFL-CIO to Target Walker, Other Governors People’s World reported that the AFL-CIO announced on Thursday morning during a press conference in Houston that they would spend money trying to unseat Governor Walker. Other Governors that the labor organization is targeting are John Kasich (R-Ohio), Tom Corbett (R-Pennsylvania), Rick Snyder (R-Michigan), and Rick Scott (R-Florida). The American Federation of Teachers backed the AFL-CIO’s plan. President Randi Weingarten said: “In many ways it...

WEST PALM BEACH — Wooing politicians like Gov. Charlie Crist and U.S. Sen. John McCain was a key to the success of his $1.4 billion Ponzi scheme, convicted fraudster Scott Rothstein testified Wednesday in federal court.In a wide-ranging discussion of how he built the scheme and how it imploded in October 2009 that came during his testimony in the trial of lawyer Christina Kitterman, Rothstein was both confident and contrite.

TAMPA -- Some Florida Republicans fear, and some Democrats hope, that a November referendum on legalizing medical marijuana in Florida will drive young and liberal voters to the polls, helping Democratic candidates including gubernatorial challenger Charlie Crist. The initiative, still not certified for the November ballot, is generating charges of political motives from both sides. Some Republicans call it an expensive ploy by Crist's backers to help him win. "It is no coincidence that Charlie Crist's law partner and biggest supporter, John Morgan, is financing medical marijuana," said Gainesville-based GOP consultant Alex Patton. "It's a plan." Some Democrats, meanwhile, say...

The Institute of the Black World 21st Century (IBW), multitudes of people of African descent and people of conscience and goodwill have not forgotten about the tragedy and travesty of the murder of Trayvon Martin. There is a deep seated feeling of injustice and lack of closure as the Justice Department has yet to render a decision whether to pursue civil rights violations in this case --a course which is highly unlikely. And, the “Stand Your Ground Law” which provided George Zimmerman the pretext to profile and ultimately murder Trayvon Martin with impunity is still in place. Despite a courageous...

Former Republican governor turned Democrat Charlie Crist filed paperwork Friday to run for his old job with his new party, a move that will turn the race into one of the most watched in the nation. Crist is now the front-runner to represent Democrats against Republican Gov. Rick Scott, one of the most unpopular chief executives in the country. Scott, though, will be well-financed and is expected to spend as much as $25 million in attack ads against Crist. For Crist, he is hoping to revive a political career that seemingly crashed when he left the GOP and lost an...

Congresswoman and Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz told the 650 Democrats at the dinner that Scott was the worst governor in Florida history. She then paused and said he was the worst governor in the nation's history. "I trust Rick Scott to lead this state as much as I trust Ted Cruz to read bedtime stories to my daughter," said Wasserman Schultz, referring to the Sen. Cruz, R-Texas, reading Dr. Seuss' "Green Eggs and Ham" during a filibuster earlier this month.

Just days after comparing the tea party to the Ku Klux Klan, Florida’s most-outspoken Democratic Congressman, Alan Grayson, addressed the state party faithful Saturday and likened some Republicans to Confederate flag-waving “bigots.” Grayson made his comments during a mock reading of a fake Republican Party agenda in which he suggested conservatives were also gay marriage-bashing gun nuts. “At 8:30 a.m., the morning breakout sessions,” Grayson said, reading the made-up GOP agenda. “Ballroom A: the bigots. Ballroom B: the paranoids. And Ballroom C, the largest group of all: the gullible.” The speech, largely applauded by the attendees of the Florida Democratic...

Weeks have passed since George Zimmerman was acquitted of killing Trayvon Martin in mid-July, but a group of young activists known as the Dream Defenders only recently ended their occupation of the state capitol building in Tallahassee, where they called for a special session of the legislature to repeal Florida's so-called "stand your ground" (SYG) law, confront racial profiling, and end the school-to-prison pipeline. They were right to do so for four main reasons: •the "stand your ground" law is badly flawed, and the evidence is overwhelming; •it was directly implicated in Zimmerman's acquittal, even though Zimmerman's lawyers did not...

The death of Trayvon Martin was an avoidable tragedy, and some of the things that happened following the incident are also avoidable if we heed to the lessons learned by two of Sanford’s top cops.Born and raised in Sanford (Fla.), former Sanford Police Chief Bill Lee was in his position 11 months when the shooting death of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman occurred. Leveraging his three decades of law enforcement experience, Chief Lee was at the helm of a department with budget woes. Two months before the Zimmerman/Martin incident occurred, Lee had hired another law enforcement veteran with 30...

More than two weeks after George Zimmerman was acquitted charges for the fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin, a group of protesters continue to stand their ground in the hallway near Governor Scott’s office in Tallahassee. “We’ve really made ourselves at home here waiting on the governor to show some leadership,” said Philip Agnew, the director of the Dream Defenders, the protesters that remain in Tallahassee. The protesters, after Governor Rick Scott continues to deny their demands to call a special legislative session, have taken matters in their own hands by holding a People’s Session. Rev. Jesse Jackson gave the protesters...

Florida Gov. Rick Scott is asking civil rights leader Jesse Jackson to apologize for “reckless and divisive” comments following the jury verdict in the George Zimmerman murder trial. Jackson on Tuesday called Florida “the Selma of our time.” The remark follows Jackson saying Florida was an “Apartheid State,” after a jury earlier this month found Zimmerman not guilty on all charges in the shooting death of black teenager Trayvon Martin. “Jesse Jackson owes every Floridian an apology for his reckless and divisive comments,” the Republican governor said in a statement. “It is unfortunate that he would come to Florida to...

TALLAHASSEE - Florida Gov. Rick Scott sharply criticized Jesse Jackson on Wednesday over comments he made this week while joining a Capitol protest. Jackson spent time with a group upset with the verdict in the George Zimmerman trial. They've refused to leave the Capitol until Scott calls a special session and asks legislators to overhaul the state's "stand your ground" self-defense laws. Scott has refused the request. Jackson, the veteran activist, criticized Florida as the "Selma of our time," referred to it as the "Apartheid State" and made a comparison of Scott to former Alabama Gov. George Wallace. Selma, Ala.,...