Free Republic

Florida Governor Rick Scott has opened the door to illegal aliens voting in Florida elections. He has decided that Florida will not appeal a ruling that limited the state’s ability to remove illegal aliens and non-citizens from Florida’s voter rolls. Even Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi opposes Scott’s abandonment of the appeal. But do non-citizens and illegal aliens actually vote in Florida elections? Yes, hundreds of times, and more. Meet Yvonne Wigglesworth. Wigglesworth was but one of hundreds of non-citizens found by local news media investigative reports as having voted in multiple Florida elections. Wigglesworth is not a citizen. John...

While Miami-Dade residents were strike recently with new, rare fee hikes on vital east-west arteries, Gov. Rick Scott was rewarding his farming regressive supporters with $9 million to build and urge their toll-free roads. So while down south we compensate a way, a folks adult north who minister reduction to state revenues get a giveaway ride. Poor timing? Irony? A giggle to go with a slap to a pockets of Miami-Dade’s toll-payers? The governor’s proclamation from Tallahassee was all those things — and came by approach of press releases finished with difference of regard from a prolonged register of who’s...

A Tallahassee judge opened the door Monday for a new complaint against Gov. Rick Scott that alleges the governor intentionally withheld public records in violation of state law....

The Republican Party of Florida (RPOF) released a poll from On Message on Monday which gives a good indication of how Gov. Rick Scott was able to defeat former Gov. Charlie Crist in last month’s Florida general election. The poll of Floridians who voted in November shows Scott did better than expected with Hispanic voters while also taking a majority of male voters and seniors. Scott won the election 48 percent to 47 percent and did well with Hispanics, running almost dead even with Crist. The poll shows 49 percent of Hispanic voters backed the Democrat while 47 percent supported...

There's a meme that's been going strong on Reddit's Florida page all summer. It shows Rick Scott and Charlie Crist side-by-side with the caption "Giant Douche Versus Turd Sandwich." That South Park reference seemed to resonate especially in Democrat-rich South Florida. As Riptide noted yesterday, local Facebook feeds and Twitter updates were rich with cynical "Why bother?" messages because of the matchup. Sure enough, Miami-Dade had the worst turnout in Florida yesterday, with Broward not far behind. In a razor-tight election, the result of that voter apathy in those left-leaning bastions became clear by around 10:30 last night: Gov. Rick...

I’d almost forgotten to write this column. I’m sitting here watching election returns, and I am just stunned. Massachusetts? Maryland? MARYLAND?!?! Forget the Senate for a minute, or the massive Republican majority in the House, and think about the fact that Republicans did so well in the gubernatorial races across the country. In Michigan, after passing a “Right-To-Work” law, Gov. Rick Snyder wins handily. Union money and muscle plus President Obama campaigning against him couldn’t sink a man with the Twitter handle @OneToughNerd. Speaking of unions, no one had a bigger target placed on their back by the unions than...

Charlie Crist is quietly running a last-minute radio ad from President Barack Obama on Florida radio stations with large African-American audiences. “Don’t let anyone or anything keep you from voting,” the president says in the ad.

The Associated Press declared Scott the winner Tuesday night with nearly all precincts reporting. He held nearly 49 percent of the vote to Crist’s nearly 47 percent. WTSP-TV reports that Crist will not be giving a concession speech and will be calling for a recount.

Florida Republican Gov. Rick Scott has won re-election, turning back former Republican Gov. Charlie Crist -- who was trying to return to office as a Democrat. The Associated Press declared Scott the winner Tuesday night with nearly all precincts reporting. He held nearly 49 percent of the vote to Crist's nearly 47 percent.

What is going on in Florida???? I just saw a crawl that Charlie Crist was up 57-40 with 21% of the vote in. 21% is significant. Someone from Florida tell me something to make me feel better about this.

PPP's final polls for Governor in Florida, Michigan, and Illinois find incredibly tight contests in all three states. Florida is the closest. Rick Scott and Charlie Crist both have 44%, with Libertarian Adrian Wyllie polling at 6%. PPP usually has a policy of not releasing poll results to the decimal, but when we find a tie on our final poll of the cycle somewhere we make an exception. Crist is at 44.0% to 43.8% for Scott- in terms of raw respondents to the poll that's 526 for Crist and 524 for Scott. Wyllie may be playing a spoiler role for...

A new poll from the Florida Chamber of Commerce Political Institute shows Gov. Rick Scott with the lead over former Gov. Charlie Crist. The Florida Chamber is backing Scott for another term. The poll of likely voters, taken by Cherry Communications, shows Scott ahead with 44 percent and Crist at 39 percent, outside the margin of error. Libertarian Adrian Wyllie takes 4 percent

If on national TV you pass along from a "friend" an extremely damning charge about someone's morality, do you have an obligation to identify that "friend" or provide some sort of substantiation for the charge? Nicolle Wallace apparently doesn't think so. On today's Morning Joe, speaking of Rick Scott and Charlie Crist, Wallace blithely passed along the charge from an unnamed "friend" from Tallahassee that "these are two guys who are the least tethered to any sort of moral compass that have ever run against each other." View the video here.

Evangelical Environmental Network, a ministry “dedicated to the care of God’s creation,” Wednesday will start running statewide ads on Christian radio stations urging state leaders to take action on climate change. Along with the ad, which you can be heard here[see linky below], the group is organizing events across the sate starting Wednesday, including a tele-town hall, a prayer breakfast in Jacksonville, and a Miami event Thursday focused on climate change’s impact “particularly on Hispanic communities.” A group spokesman would not say how much the group is spending on the ads, but said it was “six-figures.” In May, the group...

...Gov. Rick Scott and former Gov. Charlie Crist arrived at WSCV-Telemundo 51 in Miramar Friday for their first of three televised debates.... ....Scott criticized Crist for "sitting on his hands" and "doing nothing" while he was governor as well as making decisions based on "political expediency." When it came to Medicaid, Crist said he’d support its expansion -- a promise he has made repeatedly on the campaign trail. Scott, on the other hand, said he’d oppose such an expansion, saying the state couldn’t afford it, but vowed he was committed to helping Floridians get jobs -- a step he says...

Democrat Charlie Crist holds a sizable 53-29 percent lead over Gov. Rick Scott among Hispanic voters, according to a new poll that indicates this fastest growing segment of the electorate doesn’t like Republican positions on immigration, Medicaid and the minimum wage.

Republican-turned-Democrat former Gov. Charlie Crist said Tuesday that current Republican Gov. Rick Scott “has no integrity” and his policies are driven by “the almighty dollar.” Crist made the remarks while discussing his campaign to seek his old job with his new party during an hour-long interview with Associated Press reporters that covered education, the environment and claims by Scott. The gubernatorial campaign has been one of the most negative in Florida history. …

An op-ed from Matt Chen of the Broward Republican Executive Committee: Early voting will begin next week. By Election Day one would presume the demonized homophobic and racist Rick Scott will end up with 95% of the substantial South Florida Gay vote going to Democrat Charlie Crist. Not so, my friends. Sure that's hard to understand when the Florida Agenda perpetually portrays the GOP as virulently and violently homophobic. But Gay Democrats have routinely been stunned to find out that 25-35% of Gay voters routinely vote Republican, according to exit polling.

In August 2011 Gov. Rick Scott first made it plain he likes toll lanes on major highways and wants more of them. They speed up traffic, he said. In October 2011, PolitiFact Florida checked out his assessment, rated it "mostly true." So it was a little surprising to see the Florida Center for Investigative Reporting (FCIR), whose stated purpose is "to expose corruption, waste and miscarriages of justice," expose Scott's commitment to toll lanes. Don't get me wrong, I think it's great this news is well and truly in front of the public again. And shame on all of us...

In the next decade, Florida’s biggest cities will add toll lanes to the state’s busiest highways. Nobody knows exactly how much it will cost. Maybe as little as $3 billion. Maybe double that. What’s clear is that when the toll lanes across the state are complete, they will become one of the largest infrastructure projects in state history. There’s little debate that the toll lanes, also called express lanes or managed lanes, make commutes quicker for those willing to pay as much as $10 to use them. But there has been little debate about the need for the projects —...