Florida Republicans are redefining the word “dirty” in the phrase “dirty politics.” Their latest trick is intended to keep Democrats away from the polls — voluntarily.
Mailers were sent to Democrats calling out candidates, like state Sen. Audrey Gibson, for not being progressive enough — especially for working or compromising with Republicans — and the pieces appear to come from fellow Democrats.
“Progressives” is run by a group of Republican operatives who are using mailers designed to look like they are from a Democratic-leaning group to attack Democrats across the state…
Guess who wins if Democrats stay home?The group is chaired by Alachua County Republican Party Chairman Stafford Jones, who runs several other fund-raising groups that pay for political advertisements. It shares an address with the law firm of Richard Coates, general counsel for the Republican Party of Florida…
The mailers hit Gibson for working for a member of Congress who was convicted of taking bribes, for running for California’s state assembly in the 1990s and for voting for a redistricting map opposed by many Democrats and later found unconstitutional by the Florida Supreme Court.
“Audrey Gibson voted with Republicans to protect herself and hurt progressives,” one of the mailers reads.
In some cases, the group has had to stretch awfully far to find anything to fake criticize in the candidates’ records.
It blasted state Sen. Maria Sachs of Delray Beach for giving contributions to George W. Bush, state Rep. Darren Soto of Orlando for supporting a 2008 bill that would allow employees to keep guns in their cars at work, state Rep. Dwight Bullard of Miami for filing financial disclosure forms late, and Frank Bruno for voting to raise Volusia County’s gas tax more than two decades ago.
While most of the targeted candidates are running in competitive races, Gibson is not.
Gibson’s opponent, Cherron “C.C.” Newby, had her filing fee paid for by the state GOP on the last day of candidate qualifying. She has raised no money, and has no visible campaign presence.
So if Gibson is highly unlikely to lose, what explains the bizarre mailers? Two things.
First, the vindictiveness of the Republican Party of Florida (RPOF) is the stuff of legend — and fact. The criminal trial of Jim Greer, its former party chair, for living large on party funds threatens to embarrass and expose Republicans at the highest levels (paging Sen. Marco Rubio) but was recently postponed until…Nov. 12.
The reason for the postponement from its scheduled July 30 start date was NOT to keep revelations out of the news until the week after the general election, but was instead to allow more time for various documents to be reviewed. Since Greer was arrested on June 2, 2010, you can understand that two full years wasn’t long enough for all that reading to take place. Or so Republicans claim.
Even with the postponement, enough back-stabbing and rats deserting sinking ships have come out in the past two years to promise retribution and vengeance of Old Testament proportions once the trial begins.
So if Republicans are vindictive, what, you might ask, are they getting back at Florida Democrats for?
Incoming Florida Senate Minority Pres. Chris Smith, recruited Democrats to run this cycle against Republicans who would otherwise have no opposition. That move forced the candidates to keep for their own races mountains of cash they were accumulating for use in other races.
The rule is, if a candidate has no competition for a seat by the qualifying deadline, he or she can turn over the money they’ve raised to the state party to help candidates with competitors. This year, that would have meant an extra $2 million for the Republican Party of Florida (RPOF) to spend as it sees fit to trample Democrats across the state.
Republicans were enraged by Smith’s move, and vowed revenge. And here we are.
But there’s a second reason for the mailers, and it’s in many ways worse than simple childish spitefulness.
Tearing down Democrats from a supposedly Democratic perspective is intended to discourages voters and lead them to the, “What’s the point of voting, they’re all liars and bad guys” mindset. And guess who wins if Democrats stay home?
Indeed, discouraging turnout among likely Democratic voters is the number one Republican strategy in Florida. Since the U.S. Department of Justice seems intent on protecting voting rights, the RPOF and the national GOP will have to keep coming up with alternate means to depress the opposition — even literally.
