FOLIO
THE AUG. 30 PRIMARY IS DAYS AWAY. And unless you’re a political junkie, you may not have a complete understanding of who is in the running in many of the races. Hell, even if you are a political junkie, that may be the case.
By the time you finish this piece, or stop reading it to get another beer, you will have a more complete understanding of the U.S. Senate and House races, the State House races, the public defender and state attorney races, and the pension tax referendum.
Consider this the equivalent of Corrine Brown’s “Quick Picks,” which she likened last year to a “cheat sheet at a dog track.”
Except in this case, the candidates aren’t helping to pay for printing costs. And I wouldn’t endorse many of these candidates at gunpoint.
It’s up to you, the fearless reader, to determine my bias in this or that race, and to leave snarky comments. The Marxists call that division of labor.
THE SENATE
The top of the ballot features the Senate races. Such as they are.
On the GOP side, Marco Rubio opted to run for re-election right before the qualifying deadline, clearing the field of everyone except Manatee homebuilder Carlos Beruff.
Rubio is what he is: a conservative right out of central casting. He might appear with Trump at an anti-LGBT rally, after a presidential campaign in which his pre-rally soundtrack would have fit better at a foam party than a GOP event, but the idea is that — right wing as he might pretend to be — he’s not quite as embarrassing as Carlos Beruff, his main opponent, who’s like a low-rent Trump without the charisma.
That is to say, Beruff will say completely stupid shit also. But he’ll bore you to death doing it.
On the Democratic side, you have a similar dynamic.
Patrick Murphy is a nice guy who became a Democrat this decade, yet still has rousing endorsements from Obama and Biden. He’s nominally progressive, but it’s the sort of checklist progressivism you might see from Hillary Clinton.
His opponent, Alan Grayson, is a nice guy unless reporters bring up those nettlesome accusations about Grayson’s hedge fund profiting off of unrest in the third world or domestic violence from his ex-wife, Lolita. Then, shit gets real, and Grayson will cuss you out, calling you — if you’re as lucky as a Tampa reporter months back — a “shitting robot.”
THE HOUSE
Onward to the House races.
In Congressional District 4, there are two-and-a-half plausible candidates to succeed Ander Crenshaw: Former Jax sheriff John Rutherford is one; Hans Tanzler III, son of a bygone mayor who’s best known for serving on the St. Johns River Water Management Board, is another; and Lake Ray, former Jacksonville councilman and current state legislator, is another.
The polls say Rutherford is ahead. Tanzler has more than held his own in the fundraising race, however, and is all over TV with ads saying Rutherford wants to take your guns away and invite jihadis and illegals to live in your guest room. Ray, meanwhile, has run a mostly grassroots campaign, which works better in races for City Council than it does in contests sprawling across three counties.
These guys, and the field, have had some tepid debates in which all but Rutherford tried to get to the right of None Dare Call It Treason. The most interesting thing in the whole contest: A Duval GOP straw poll event in which Ray, the most recent former party chair, was left off the ballot.
Ray and his myriad progeny claimed the fix was in. Confrontations — in the building and in the parking lot — spiced up the night. In the end, there was a write-in blank and Rutherford “won.” However, it was a paid event, and winning means stuffing the room with people looking to give money to that same local GOP who couldn’t even get a straw poll ballot right.
CONGRESSIONAL DISTRTICT 5
On the Democratic side in CD5, CorrineBrown is up against 22 counts in federal court and two Dems on the ballot.
Al Lawson is the Tallahassee candidate in the race, and he’ll make a great congressman for the area, once he figures out what’s actually here. His big talking point: the problems at “that apartment complex Marco Rubio visited.” Lawson was in the legislature for a long time, representing those Blue Dog counties out west for which radar detectors were invented. He can’t hit Brown too hard on corruption, though; after all, wasn’t too long ago that Corrine was a featured guest at a Lawson fundraiser.
L.J. Holloway is an attorney from Jacksonville. She hasn’t been able to raise money but she may have the most pedantic presence of any candidate in this cycle. She hasn’t been able to get meaningful traction, but in a race where most surveys are finding Brown and Lawson in a dead heat, it’s worth watching to see if the percentage points Lawson gets in Jacksonville end up swinging the race to her.
That result would lose Jacksonville a congressional seat. And the 23 years of seniority Brown has in D.C., which, along with the 15 years Crenshaw is ceding by retiring, means that we are pretty much Congressionally screwed through the next decade.
HOUSE DISTRICT 11
Speaking of getting screwed, the state senate races in this area were all decided in June, as no one challenged the incumbents — in or outside their parties.
The state house races will largely be decided in the primary.
In House District 11’s race to replace outgoing Janet Adkins, it’s Sheri Treadwell’s race to lose. Treadwell has had the most active fundraising and checks all the boxes that Republicans in Nassau County want checked. Like every Republican in these races, she hates ISIS and Common Core and loves the second amendment.
Donnie Horner, meanwhile, once worked for Alvin Brown, as a PAC mailer is reminding people. He also has a bunch of tweets lauding Obama and Bill Clinton in the past. He’s become a conservative Republican in recent years, but left unanswered is what the catalyst for that ideological shift was.
The third plausible candidate, Cord Byrd, is a lawyer with a major affinity for gun rights. The only question at this point: Does he finish second or does Horner?
HOUSE DISTRICT 12
In the Arlington/Southside HD12, ClayYarborough has the most money, the best grassroots, and the clearest path to victory; up in Arlington, the old Republicans are unmoved by his concern for Muslims like Parvez Ahmed being put on the Human Rights Commission or his censoring pictures of naked pregnant women at local museums.
Clay is opposed by the only guy on the City Council with him who was farther right than he was: Don Redman, who turned heads at a recent forum by suggesting that he would take federal money and embrace Obamacare. While he was on the council, Redman asked the aforementioned Ahmed to “pray to yer God” at a council meeting, which got some great earned media for Jacksonville. Both Clay and Don go to the same church. One will, after Aug. 30, have more time to volunteer there.
There are two other candidates worth mentioning: Terrance Freeman, a council assistant to Aaron Bowman from JAX Chamber, has been endorsed by everyone from the Chamber to the Fraternal Order of Police. Freeman has managed to move from helping Bowman sell the HRO in his council role to not being able to articulate a position on it at forums. Would you buy a used car from this man? Many Jacksonville political insiders would not.
Mark MacLean is on the ballot, but his fundraising stalled out months back, and he’s not going to be a factor.
HOUSE DISTRICT 13
In HD13, which contains San Marco, parts of the Southside, and the urban core, Democratic incumbent Reggie Fullwood faces 14 federal counts and about that many opponents.
Fullwood’s most serious Democratic competition is Tracie Davis, who lost a race for Duval Supervisor of Elections last year, and who is running despite being friends with Fullwood.
As Corrine Brown likes to say, “Politics is not a friendship business.”
An incumbent Democrat told me that the churches and community groups are with Davis. Evidence of that can be seen in the number of small-dollar donations she’s gotten. However, it’s interesting that Davis keeps ducking forum appearances with Fullwood. That likely won’t make a difference in the end.
The winner of this primary is going to end up facing the winner of the GOP primary, Pastor Mark Griffin. The local GOP establishment will fall in behind Griffin; Sheriff Mike Williams was the first of many. Councilman Sam Newby manages Griffin’s campaign, and if there ever were an opportunity for the GOP to take this largely black, largely Democratic seat, this year would be it.
HOUSE DISTRICT 14
NW Jax HD14 is likely going to betakenby former Jacksonville City Councilwoman Kimberly “the Demonbuster” Daniels.
Daniels, a preacher in the Benny Hinn mold, described herself to me as like a “Timex … she takes a licking and keeps on ticking.”
Indeed, the scandals come and go, and she’s still here. A messy divorce from a pastor who trusted her to handle their communal finances until the day Kim kicked him to the curb and off the board of their shared church, which meant he no longer had rights to the communal property. Issues with campaign finance, issues with one of her sons, who got swept up in an apparently groundless police raid.
She’s still here, and she says she’s up in the polls.
Her main opponent — Leslie Jean-Bart — had an interesting weekend this month, in which her canvassers went to Sherwood Forest, a neighborhood which Daniels sees as her territory, and got shook by Daniels and her team to the point where they spent the rest of that Saturday attempting to file a police report on the confrontation, which was rooted, in part, in a discussion of which campaign was really endorsed by Corrine Brown.
Daniels didn’t get much legislation through when she was on council, and it will be interesting to see how she navigates the conservative legislature. Chances are good that on social issues, such as the Competitive Workforce Act and gun rights, she will be to the right of many Republicans. For journalists, however, she will offer an interesting four years. For all of her well-documented issues, she has charisma and presence, and always brings a great quote.
HOUSE DISTRICT 16
In HD16, former school board member Jason Fischer takes on political lifer Dick Kravitz.
Kravitz is in his 70s, and has been in politics since Fischer was learning to read.
The rap on Fischer is that he’s a charter-school guy. There are also those who don’t like his personality. He rubbed education activists like blogger Chris Guerrieri wrong; he also irked some people on the right. And incumbent Charles McBurney opted to endorse against him, which Kravitz is messaging hard.
Kravitz, meanwhile, has been reliable in his political gigs. He’s an old-school guy and a good person to have a beer with. Both guys have raised more than $100K and have the money they need to message. Ultimately, it’s going to be a matter of voter preference. But Kravitz, hands down, is the better debater and better retail politician, and Fischer may be in trouble in the Southside district.
There are two more races and a Duval County referendum worthy of note.
The GOP primary race for 4th judicial circuit public defender involves embattled incumbent Matt Shirk taking on Charles Cofer, a former Duval County judge.
Cofer is winning the money race and he’s got the endorsement from the police union. His path to victory appears to be almost certain.
Shirk, meanwhile, has an uphill battle, and the only open question at this point seems to be which local TV station will hire him for a legal analyst position after he hands Cofer the keys to the office — taxpayer-funded shower included.
STATE ATTORNEY
In the race for state attorney, Angela Corey is fighting for her political life against Melissa Nelson.
Corey may have Lenny Curry’s endorsement, along with every other incumbent’s. But Nelson has the Curry political machine behind her: specifically, the attack ad experts at Data Targeting, who dig through public records like no other operatives locally.
They hit Corey with shots through June and July, leaving Corey up to 27 points behind in one public poll, though even the biggest mark for Nelson doesn’t think that spread will hold.
Corey has the backing of the police union, of course. But the biggest helping hand she’s got is that of Wes White.
The third candidate in the race has transferred his reflexive critiques of Corey to an attack on Nelson … as if his operative theory is to make sure Nelson can’t win, and four more years of Corey is acceptable to him if Nelson loses.
White has utilized an eclectic group of operatives: activist nurse Denise Hunt, a cop fired for beating up an inmate, and anti-gay mouthpiece Raymond Johnson.
What would four more years of Angela Corey look like? Effectively, the same as the previous eight. Probably time for two or three more cases that go national. Who will be our next George Zimmerman? Our next Cristian Fernandez? Our next Marissa Alexander?
If she’s re-elected, we’ll find out.
PENSION TAX REFERENDUM
The final race covered in this preview: the pension tax referendum, aka County Referendum No. 1.
At issue: extending the half-cent sales tax for Better Jacksonville Plan projects past its mandated 2030 sunset date, and using the income that will come in to pay off the now $2.8 billion unfunded actuarial liability on public pensions.
Critics comprise a disorganized group including Riverside lawyer John Winkler and the Concerned Taxpayers of Duval County, and two guys who backed Alvin Brown’s re-election — former City Council presidents Bill Bishop and Stephen Joost. They say that the deal passes the buck to children and those yet to be born.
As if that’s something new to this plan.
The Curry Administration has gotten something of a bunker mentality down the stretch, not commenting on questions for a five-part The Florida Times-Union series on the pension tax, though the mayor has answered questions about the tax and his appearance at Trump’s rally earlier this month in press gaggles.
Curry’s political guys feel good about their polling. They’ve raised a couple million dollars to message it. Every civic group and union group has bowed down and kissed the ring (though the union guys expect to roll Curry in collective bargaining to renegotiate terms). You’d think that would be enough.
That question and many others will be answered on Tuesday, Aug. 30.
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