Winners & Losers
This week’s biggest Winners & Losers
Who’s up and who’s down in the Sunshine State?
What a week of ups and downs for Florida Man-in-Chief Donald J. Trump. Here’s one win: Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, said the ex-president’s two-year stay in the penalty box is over. We kinda doubt he’ll return. “Such a thing should never again happen to a sitting President … !” he said. And here’s a loss: He had a selfie taken with former reputed Philly mob boss Joey Merlino at the Trump International Golf Club West Palm Beach earlier this month. It’s not clear whether he knew who Merlino was. But hey, win for Skinny Joey!
Corey DeAngelis -
As HB 1, a bill that would give Florida near-universal school vouchers, makes its way through committee, we’re hearing the doctrine of the national “school choice” proponents more often. When House Speaker Paul Renner and others use phrases like “education dollars belong to the student and not a system,” they echo the words of school choice evangelists such as DeAngelis. DeAngelis, a senior fellow for the American Federation for Children, has tweeted phrases like “fund students, not systems” in his push toward universal school choice in several states.
Jeremy Matlow -
This pizza maker and progressive Tallahassee City Council member dodged a bullet by dropping out of contention for perhaps the worst job in Florida politics. He announced he is dropping out of the race for Florida Democratic Party chair two weeks after entering the fray. Now, former State Sen. Annette Taddeo, Broward Democratic Party Chair Rick Hoye and political consultant Alex Berrios are left to fight over a position that's main task would be righting the ship of a party that just suffered its worst defeat statewide in 20 years. Matlow can now continue his focus on his current elected office instead of entering a job with a, historically, short shelf life.
Greg Steube -
Phew! The Congressman from Sarasota is on the mend after a frightening fall of 20 feet while cutting a tree at his home last week. Steube tweeted Monday that he suffered a fractured pelvis, a punctured lung and several torn ligaments in his neck, but was resting at home, on his couch with his dogs at his side. Steube received a bit of good news while recovering, as U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy informed him that he’d be serving on the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government.
Vickie Cartwright -
The will they, won’t they saga of whether Broward’s Superintendent will lose her job is finally over, with the (now democratically elected) school board handing her her walking papers. The media circus around this situation likely wasn’t good for her finding her next employer, as well as for the school district itself in moving on from several controversies. Anyway, the second largest school district has decided to look for new leadership (and it didn’t need a DeSantis-appointed majority to make that decision).
Joseph Hackett & David Moerschel -
How useful are militiamen if they are locked behind bars? These two Floridians are about to find out. Both members of the Oath Keepers, they were found guilty of seditious conspiracy in the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol attack. While they haven’t been sentenced yet, their crime carries a maximum of 20 years in federal prison. They cosplayed as patriots trying to “stop the steal,” but a jury of their peers found them to be traitors.
Eric Silagy -
Did he leave on his own or was it time to go? No one is likely to say officially what led Silagy to step down from his post as FPL’s CEO, but he and the company had been heavily scrutinized and linked to allegations of campaign finance irregularities, along with media manipulation and surveillance of at least one critical reporter.
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