Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings signed an updated agreement with U.S. Immigration and Enforcement (ICE) on Friday, although he later said he did so under “protest and extreme duress.”

It came days after Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier threatened the mayor and all six county commissioners that their failure to do so would result in their removal from office by Gov. Ron DeSantis.

“Yes, we signed the damn thing because we really had to. We were put in a tough spot,” Demings said during a late afternoon press conference in Orlando. “I can’t let our entire board of county commissioners and myself be removed from office.”

Demings signed an addendum to modify the 287(g) Warrant Service Officer (WSO) Memorandum of Agreement that will allow county jail officials to transport immigration detainees to ICE facilities — although he said he still needs to assess the readiness of his corrections department staff to do so while keeping everyone safe at the county jail. He said that there are 212 vacancies within the Orange County corrections department right now, a vacancy rate of 24%.

Speaking in Orlando earlier on Friday, Gov. Ron DeSantis said that local governments could apply for grants from the state to reimburse their costs for detaining and transporting detainees. “I think the detention transport, that’s something that would be appropriate to do, and we approved the guidelines for the grants to go out,” he said.

In his letter posted on X earlier this week (which Demings said his office had just received on Friday), Uthmeier wrote that “prohibiting your corrections officers from transporting arrested aliens to ICE-approved detention facilities squarely prevents your corrections officers from cooperating with ICE and participating in federal immigration operations.”

Failure to back down, he added, would result in removal from office by DeSantis.

Demings, the former chief of police for Orlando who has led Orange County since 2018, said earlier this week that he was not going to allow Uthmeier to “bully” him or other Orange County leaders. But he said on Friday that with the possibility that not signing the addendum would allow DeSantis to “insert his minions,” he really had no choice in the matter.

“I thought it was urgent that we had to take action now to preclude the possibility that the elected body here in Orange County could be removed from office,” he said. “I hope you understand that. That was a calculated risk that we had, obviously. People that had no elected responsibility to our county would be inserted or put in place. That would be catastrophic to the continuity of government here in Orange County. That is something that I certainly did not want to happen.”

Uthmeier and DeSantis have previously asserted that other local governments in Florida that do not fully cooperate with ICE would be defined as employing “sanctuary” policies, which are prohibited in Florida.

In doing so, they ensured that local governments in Fort Myers and Key West ultimately did sign 287(g) agreements with ICE, though in fact cities are not legally required to sign such agreements under Florida law — even if counties are.

Demings said he didn’t understand why state officials had to be so confrontational when it came to enforcing immigration policy in Florida.

“We’re not enemies,” he said. “Local governments are subdivisions of the state. Our state officials in government should act like it. They should remember that we are part of the state of Florida. The state of Florida works best when we work in collaboration, across political lines. The comments I’m making today have nothing to do with partisan politics. It has everything to do with public safety in our community.”

The Orange County Commission must still approve the addendum. Members are scheduled to meet next Tuesday.

South Florida Republican U.S. Rep. Maria Salazar introduced a bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform package on Tuesday that would provide legal status for certain undocumented immigrants.

The announcement comes as the Trump administration leans further into its mass deportation efforts, with hundreds and sometimes thousands of undocumented migrants being detained on a daily basis.

“The Dignity Act of 2025,” co-sponsored with Texas Democrat Veronica Escobar — is a revised version of a bill that Salazar first introduced in 2023. It also would provide protections for Dreamers but would not allow for any federal benefits for migrants or a pathway to citizenship.

The measure would create a “Dignity Program” allowing undocumented immigrants who have been in the U.S. since 2021 to apply to live in the country for up to seven years with work authorization. They would have to pay $7,000 in restitution, stay in legal compliance, and check in with the Department of Homeland Security regularly. It would be renewable if individuals remain in good standing.

The measure would also create a $70 billion “American Workforce” fund that would be used for apprenticeships, retraining, and education for citizens, with one American worker trained for every “Dignity” participant. It would be funded through annual restitution fees of $1,000 and a 1% payroll levy on Dignity Program participants.

It would include border security provisions, with barriers, drones, and radar used to stop the flow of migrants. It would require nationwide E-Verify for all employers to check on the legal status of their employees. It also calls for DNA testing to verify family relationships at the border.

And it would reform the asylum system. with most asylum cases to be decided within 60 days. It would include optional regional processing centers in Latin America. It also calls for penalties for fraudulent claims, with expedited removal for repeat violators.

The introduction of the measure comes as the number of migrants caught crossing the U.S.-Mexican border illegally has been setting record monthly lows this summer. The Department of Homeland Security reported earlier this month that the number of encounters and apprehensions on the southern border was the lowest in history.

‘A commonsense solution’

“For 40 years, every president and Congress has looked the other way while millions have lived here illegally, many working in key industries that keep our economy running,” Salazar says in a written statement.

“It’s the Achilles’ heel no one wants to fix. The Dignity Act offers a commonsense solution: certain undocumented immigrants can earn legal status — not citizenship — by working, paying taxes, and contributing to our country. No handouts. No shortcuts. Just accountability and a path to stability for our economy and our future.”

“The vast majority of immigrants are hard-working, law-abiding residents; and, despite how maligned they have been by the administration, most Americans recognize that it is in our country’s best interest to find a solution,” Escobar added.

“We can enact legislation that incorporates both humanity and security, and the Dignity Act of 2025 offers a bipartisan, balanced approach that restores dignity to people who have tried to navigate a broken system for far too long.”

The bill’s attempt to merge border security with a path to remaining in the U.S. bears some resemblance to the immigration reform bill co-sponsored in the U.S. Senate by Florida’s Marco Rubio in 2013. While approved in the Senate that year, it died in the House.

A ‘duty to due process’

A former television news anchor, Salazar has served in Congress representing Florida’s 27th Congressional District since defeating Democrat Donna Shalala in 2020 and has been re-elected twice since then.

Last month, she said she was “heartbroken” about the uncertainty she said was “gripping” her South Florida district because of deportation actions by the Trump administration.

“Arrests in immigration courts, including people with I-220A and pending asylum cases, the termination of the CHNV (Cuban, Haitian, Nicaraguan, and Venezuelan) program, which has left thousands exposed to deportation, and other similar measures, all jeopardize our duty to due process that every democracy must guarantee,” Salazar said in a statement.

An additional 20 members of the House from both sides of the aisle are listed as co-sponsors of the bill, including South Florida GOP U.S. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart.

Gov. Ron DeSantis suspended Osceola County Sheriff Marcos Lopez from office on Thursday shortly after he was arrested on felony charges of racketeering and conspiracy to commit racketeering.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier’s Office of Statewide Prosecution charged Lopez and four other individuals in a “massive Central Florida gambling operation,” according to a press release issued by the attorney general’s office.

“Initially engaging the operation for campaign contributions and personal payments, Sheriff Lopez played a multifaceted role in expanding and protecting this illegal enterprise, using his office to shield the enterprise from law enforcement,” the release said.

DeSantis has appointed Christopher Blackmon to take over the Osceola County Sheriff’s Department. Blackmon has been serving as the Central Region Chief for the Florida Highway Patrol since November 2023, and before that served as a troop commander and major in the FHP. Between 2007-2016, he worked as a resident security agent for Major League Baseball, according to his LinkedIn account.

Lopez began serving in the Osceola County Sheriff’s Department in 2003 while he was still serving in the U.S. Navy Reserve. He rose up the ranks before ultimately being elected sheriff in 2020, becoming the first Hispanic in Osceola County to do so. A Democrat, he was re-elected last fall.

There had been scandals under Lopez’s tenure, including a 2022 sheriff deputies’ killing of a man who drove a car carrying two passengers accused of shoplifting $46 in pizza and Pokemon cards. A grand jury report later said the killing could have been avoided if not for their faulty judgement and their department’s “poorly crafted policies on the use of appropriate force in response to minor crimes,” the Orlando Sentinel reported.

Lopez also ended up agreeing to pay a $250 fine last December in a plea deal with then-State Attorney Andrew Bain for inadvertently posting a photo on social media of a crime victim who was a minor. That led Bain to add Lopez’s name to his office’s Brady Identification System, which lists the names of law enforcement officers who have a history of misconduct.

The AG’s press release says a multi-agency investigation led by Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and joined by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement began looking into Lopez and his associates in 2023. The investigation ultimately uncovered “a criminal organization operating an illegal gambling enterprise throughout Central Florida, particularly in Lake and Osceola Counties.”

Lopez and his associates ran a lottery, slot machines, and a “gambling house out of a business known as Fusion Social Club,” according to the charging document filed in Florida’s Fifth Judicial Circuit. The alleged criminal operation generated $21.6 million in profits, according to the AG’s office.

According to an official with the Lake County Jail, Lopez is being held without bond pending a June 30 arraignment.

Following the exploratory phase of his campaign this spring, David Jolly says he’s ready to go and has officially entered the Democratic primary for governor of Florida. He acknowledges the challenges about running in an electoral landscape that hasn’t elected any Democrat to a statewide office since 2018, but says the environment is ripe for that to change in 2026.

“We will be in every community, building trust and building relationships and building a coalition that will ultimately and successfully win an election where a Democrat hasn’t won in 30 years and where the voter registration rolls are against us,” he said in a phone interview with the Phoenix on Wednesday.

“In Florida we are in the midst of a generational affordability crisis,” he added. “Everybody feels it. I mean this has been affirmed everywhere I’ve gone, every group I’ve sat with. The affordability crisis is number one on the minds of every Floridian. Wherever you live, whatever your socioeconomic status – whatever your party registration – the affordability crisis is number one. I would make the case that Republicans in Tallahassee have contributed to it, and will continue it. They won’t do anything about it, and we will. I will.”

The 52-year-old Pinellas County resident is the first major Democratic candidate to enter the race for governor in a seat that will be vacated next year by a term-limited Ron DeSantis. It’s been quite the evolution for man who previously described himself as a “George H.W. Bush Republican” for much of his adult life before leaving the GOP in 2018 to become a political independent, and then only officially joining the Democratic Party six weeks ago.

Florida hasn’t had a Democrat occupying the governor’s mansion in Tallahassee since Buddy MacKay finished out Lawton Chiles’ second term in office in January of 1999. Since then there has been eight years of Jeb Bush, four years with (then Republican) Charlie Crist, eight years with Rick Scott, and so far nearly six-and-a-half years of the DeSantis revolution.

Jolly’s previous elected experience in office is limited – he defeated Democrat Alex Sink in a special congressional election in early 2014 following the death of venerable Republican lawmaker C.W. Bill Young. After coasting to re-election that fall, Florida’s 13th Congressional District was redrawn and became friendlier for a Democratic pick-up, which is what happened when Crist defeated him in the fall of 2016.

Jolly was an early member of the GOP “Never Trumper” caucus, and his critiques of Donald Trump in his first term in the White House catapulted him into a political analysis spot for MSNBC (his contact has been paused since he began exploring a gubernatorial run, an MSNBC source told the Phoenix in April).

The independent spirit

Jolly officially left the GOP in 2018 and became a political independent, where he actively worked on efforts to provide an alternative to the two-party political system. First with the Serve America Movement (SAM) in 2021 where he served as the executive chairman, and then later with Andrew Yang and Christine Todd Whitman with the Forward Party in 2022.

It was during his period with SAM that he actively discussed the possibility four years ago as running as a political independent candidate for governor in Florida for 2022, but ultimately decided not to.

Currently the Republican front-runner for the GOP nomination for governor next year is U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds. But there’s also likely to be at least one independent candidate in the race with state Sen. Jason Pizzo saying he’s likely to join the campaign for governor this fall.

“We won’t know who qualifies for the governor’s race until next June, and that’s very important,” Jolly says. “Because our job between now and next June is to build a campaign that appeals to independents. As you know I helped mobilize the independent space for six years, and I would beg the parties that we are available to you. Speak to us, reach us, don’t ignore us. Don’t slap us down. And so Jason Pizzo’s right that the independent voter has been ignored by the major parties for too long. The answer to that is not to argue with Jason, it’s to build the Democratic Party that reaches out to independents. And if I do that, then we’ll build a coalition that Jason Pizzo or John Morgan can look at and say,’Wow. I like what I see over there.’”

The Trump Factor

Jolly’s opposition to Trump has been a central part of his brand over the years, but he tells the Phoenix that the 2026 election is about the people of Florida, not the current president of the United States.

“I believe the president has taken us in the wrong direction, just as I believe Gov. DeSantis has, but this race is not about Donald Trump,” he says. “Not for one moment is this race about Donald Trump. This race is about the affordability crisis in the state of Florida. Republicans will try to make this race about Donald Trump. They will try to make it about division, not unity. My job every day on behalf of this coalition, is to keep us focused on the affordability crisis. Investing in public schools. Providing for safe communities. Restoring dignity to people across the state of Florida. This is an open seat governorship race. I stand by my view of the president, but this race is not about the president.”

While the Florida Legislature is currently working overtime to get a budget passed, GOP lawmakers and Gov. DeSantis have talked about delivering property tax relief to Florida homeowners, most likely via a constitutional amendment that the voters would have to approve in the fall of next year. Jolly says his biggest concern about the discussion in Tallahassee on the issue so far is that the GOP has “no plan for where the revenue comes from to provide for safe communities and good schools, and they just want to chase the property tax cuts.”

He says the state needs to look at a “broad based property tax reform package” that maintains the Save Our Homes amendment that limits annual property tax increases to 3% while also providing “dramatic relief” for first-time home buyers.

University of North Florida political science professor Michael Binder says that the obvious parallel in assessing Jolly’s candidacy is with Crist, who left the Republican Party to become an independent during his last year as governor in 2010, ultimately losing a Senate bid to Marco Rubio. He officially became a Democrat in 2012 and lost two bids for governor: In 2014 by one point to Rick Scott, and in 2022 to DeSantis by 19 points (in between he served in what had been Jolly’s congressional seat for six years).

“Charlie Crist was unable to connect with base Democrats and get them to the polls,” Binder says of the 2022 contest. “If Jolly can do that, and that’s going to be a challenge being a former Republican, then maybe you might have a race that was closer. You might get a race that’s in the single digits. But if this is a similar circumstance where Democrats are not motivated, if Jolly cannot connect with the base of the Democratic Party, then there’s absolutely no chance.”

Binder adds that Pizzo’s likely entry as an independent means that both he and Jolly would be taking up what he calls a “moderate, non-MAGA type with maybe some Republican leanings” that are occupying the same ideological lane.

So far, the Florida GOP doesn’t seem too concerned.

“David Jolly has lost before, and he will lose again,” said Republican Party of Florida Chairman Evan Power in a statement issued earlier this week. “Floridians won’t trust a slick opportunist who simply can’t be trusted. Jolly has no platform, no base, and no chance in Florida.”

Jolly says while Trump’s actions in the White House will dominate the news headlines over the next year and-a-half, his campaign will be about making Florida better for everyone.

“It’s about responsibly delivering government and providing for safe communities and good schools and a property insurance and property tax construct that actually works … If that’s what we’re talking about for the next 16 months? Then we become a coalition for change and Republicans are offering more of the same, and we win the race.”

The National Rifle Association (NRA) on Friday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear its challenge to Florida’s ban on firearm purchases by adults under 21. It’s the latest move by the gun-rights group in its four-year-battle to override the 2018 Florida law that bans 18-to-20-year-olds from purchasing long guns.

The full U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit denied the legal challenge by the NRA in March, two years after a three-judge panel similarly ruled against the organization. The Florida Legislature passed and then-Gov. Rick Scott signed the law shortly after the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland that killed 17 people.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier said after that ruling that his office would not defend the law if in fact the NRA filed an appeal with the high court.

“Notwithstanding CA11’s opinion today, I believe restricting the right of law-abiding adults to purchase firearms is unconstitutional,” Uthmeier said on X on March 14, adding that the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals recently reached the same conclusion. “Men and women old enough to fight and die for our country should be able to purchase firearms to defend themselves and their families.”

The NRA’s petition for certiorari calls upon the justices to review the split among federal circuit courts over whether adults under 21 enjoy Second Amendment rights. The Third, Fifth, and Eighth Circuits have ruled that they do, while the Tenth and Eleventh circuits have upheld laws banning firearm purchases by adults under 21.

The Florida House in March passed a bill (HB 759) that would lower the age for individuals in Florida to purchase shotguns and rifles from 21 to 18. It was the third straight year the chamber has done so, but both times the legislation failed to be come law because the proposal never moved in the Florida Senate.

NRA appeals to U.S. Supreme Court on FL ban of purchases of long guns by under-21-year-olds

by Mitch Perry, Florida Phoenix
May 16, 2025

The National Rifle Association (NRA) on Friday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear its challenge to Florida’s ban on firearm purchases by adults under 21. It’s the latest move by the gun-rights group in its four-year battle to override the 2018 Florida law that bans 18-to-20-year-olds from purchasing long guns.

The full U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit denied the legal challenge by the NRA in March, two years after a three-judge panel similarly ruled against the organization. The Florida Legislature passed and then-Gov. Rick Scott signed the law shortly after the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland that killed 17 people.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier said after that ruling that his office would not defend the law if in fact the NRA filed an appeal with the high court.

“Notwithstanding CA11’s opinion today, I believe restricting the right of law-abiding adults to purchase firearms is unconstitutional,” Uthmeier said on X on March 14, adding that the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals recently reached the same conclusion. “Men and women old enough to fight and die for our country should be able to purchase firearms to defend themselves and their families.”

The NRA’s petition for certiorari calls upon the justices to review the split among federal circuit courts over whether adults under 21 enjoy Second Amendment rights. The Third, Fifth, and Eighth Circuits have ruled that they do, while the Tenth and Eleventh circuits have upheld laws banning firearm purchases by adults under 21.

The Florida House in March passed a bill (HB 759) that would lower the age for individuals in Florida to purchase shotguns and rifles from 21 to 18. It was the third straight year the chamber has done so, but both times the legislation failed to be come law because the proposal never moved in the Florida Senate.

Florida Phoenix is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Florida Phoenix maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Michael Moline for questions: info@floridaphoenix.com.

First Lady Casey DeSantis on Wednesday denounced the criticism about her Hope Florida charity program in her harshest terms to date, while maintaining that she remains open about a potential run next year to succeed her husband in office.

The DeSantises appeared at a Brandon church in eastern Hillsborough County to host a roundtable discussion about the virtues of Hope Florida, the social services initiative led by the First Lady that aims to help Floridians in need.

The program itself has come under fire following reports last month from the Tampa Bay Times/Miami Herald that the Hope Florida Foundation last year quietly and quickly moved a $10 million “donation” from a settlement with a health care company that the state contracts with to two nonprofit political committees that did not have to list their donors.

Those political committees then sent $8.5 million to Keep Florida Clean, the main group opposing the constitutional amendment that would have legalized recreational cannabis in Florida — an initiative that Gov. DeSantis opposed.

Claiming that Hope Florida represents one of the “only meaningful reforms” to the welfare state since President Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society” programs from the late 1960s, Ms. DeSantis said it was “really disheartening and very sad, but not surprising, to see these slanderous false accusations hurled at Hope Florida in an attempt to undermine all of the meaningful progress that we’ve had on so many families across the state of Florida.”

“We are not going to be dissuaded by the critics who have been captivated by willful ignorance, and we will not allow any politics to drown out the voices of families who have told us over and over for the first time that they feel a sense of hope. Hope Florida is not a program,” she said. “Hope Florida is a movement.”

The governor and his wife have held multiple press events over the past two months defending the program and assailing Florida House Republicans and news reporters who have investigated it as having a political agenda.

The House Committee investigating the allegations ended its work nearly three weeks ago and, unless the federal government intervenes, the controversy may be over for the time being.

But those news reports have done nothing to boost a potential run for governor for Casey DeSantis in 2026. That’s led to questions about how serious she actually is about entering the race. A report published earlier on Wednesday in the Miami Herald speculated that the odds of her pulling the trigger are diminishing by the day.

‘The GOAT’

With Southwest Florida U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds already on the campaign trail and raising considerable money through his main political committee, a Phoenix reporter asked her on Wednesday where she stood on a possible gubernatorial candidacy for 2026?

“I get why this is a big conversation,” she acknowledged. “But I can also say it’s more than a year away from qualifying. I mean, I think we need to be thinking about what people put people in office to do, to try to make sure that they’re delivering on the promises that they told the people that they were going to do when they first got elected.”

She labeled Ron DeSantis “The GOAT” (Greatest of all Time), adding that whomever “he ultimately decides who should be following up after him should be somebody I think was obviously there for the people of the state of Florida.”

That person “should be in the mold of a DeSantis who’s willing to get out there and fight,” Ms. DeSantis said, eliciting a huge response from the approximately 100 people who’d gathered at the ARISE Church.

The First Lady’s comments bolster the notion that the governor is seeking a candidate he can fully back next year to maintain his legacy — someone other than Donalds, who has already been endorsed by President Donald Trump.

Other potential candidates, like former Attorney General Ashley Moody and former Lt. Gov. Jeanette Nuñez, have now moved into other positions and taken themselves out of the running — DeSantis appointed Moody to replace Marco Rubio in the U.S. Senate and Nuñez is interim president at Florida International University, soon perhaps to be president in full.

Fresh reports

The Miami Herald published a story earlier on Wednesday quoting Republican consultants (not all by name) who speculated that the combination of negative publicity around Hope Florida and Donalds’ Trump-backed candidacy was making it less likely that Ms. DeSantis will run to succeed her husband.

But Ron DeSantis blasted the story, asserting that the Herald had been “concocting hoaxes” when it came to reporting about his administration during the Covid crisis, “and so I’m very skeptical of discredited outlets in terms of what they do.”

A recent public opinion survey of Republican voters initially showed Casey DeSantis in a virtual tie with Donalds in the race for the Florida GOP nomination. However, after the voters polled were informed that Trump had endorsed Donalds, he took the lead over Mrs. DeSantis by 19 percentage points.

Although he’s already been endorsed by Donald Trump for governor, Southwest Florida Republican U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds is just now beginning to introduce himself to Floridians who don’t know much more about him other than his ubiquitous appearances on cable news over the past few years.

Speaking on the back of a small flatbed truck outside of Conservative Grounds, the MAGA-flavored coffee shop in Pinellas County on Saturday afternoon, Donalds was intent on responding to a criticism voiced by Ron DeSantis earlier this year that he “hasn’t been part of any of the victories” that Republicans have enjoyed in Florida in recent years.

“A lot’s been made about what I’ve been doing the last couple of years,” Donalds acknowledged about halfway through his 22-minute speech. He said the choice before him a year ago was whether he should stay in Florida and work for GOP candidates or “do I go on the road with Donald Trump and campaign to make sure that we save the United States of America?”

He said that, after conferring with his wife Erika and his team, he went all in for Trump.

“I told the president and I told his campaign, I said, ‘Listen: You can have the entire calendar. Just take it. It’s yours,” he said.

“Because Florida is wonderful. We have leadership that has protected this state. Gov DeSantis is to be commended for that. He’s done a tremendous job. But the fight this last November was not in Florida. The fight was across America. And so it didn’t matter where the liberals were, that’s where I was. If they were in Detroit, I was there. If they were in Philadelphia, I was there.”

Donalds, 46, is a Brooklyn native who moved to Florida to attend Florida State University, where he graduated in 2002 before beginning a career in banking, finance, and insurance, according to the biography listed on his congressional website. He got involved in politics in 2010, the year of the Tea Party, which led to his first run for Congress in 2012 (when he lost in a Republican primary in Congressional District 19 to Trey Radel).

He was elected to the state House representing all of Hendry and a part of Collier County in 2016 and was re-elected in 2018. In 2020, he opted to run for Congress in Florida’s 19th District in Southwest Florida after GOP incumbent Francis Rooney announced he was resigning. He narrowly defeated fellow Republican Dane Eagle in a nine-person GOP primary in 2020, and has been re-elected to that seat twice since.

Few details

In speaking about his plans if elected governor in 2026, Donalds touched on a variety of subjects without delving too deeply.

The property insurance situation? “We’re going to fix it once and for all.”

Transportation? “We’re going to continue the work from Gov. DeSantis. We’re going to expand these roads. We’re going to make it easier for people to move through, not just here in Clearwater, not just here in Pinellas, but all through Florida. We’re going to make it clear for everybody.”

The economy? “We’re going to make sure that our economy is the number one economy in the entire [nation],” he said. “We’re going to have more businesses coming here employing more people.”

Donalds is the only major declared Republican candidate in the race, although how long that remains the case remains to be seen here in the spring of 2025.

First Lady Casey DeSantis has kept the idea alive that she might enter the race. Miami Mayor Francis Suarez says he is still considering getting into the contest. Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson was reportedly considering his own bid, although that was before Trump stepped in and endorsed Donalds (before the congressman himself had officially announced).

Early polls show that the Trump endorsement is a big deal for Donalds.

As Donalds begins his campaign, Florida’s top Republicans are in disarray, with a tentative budget deal between the state House and Senate now off the table, according to state legislative leaders in comments made on Friday.

Donalds assured the audience that “they’re going to figure this out, I promise you that.”

No RINOs

He added that “there will be no RINO (Republicans in Name Only) activity in Tallahasee,” drawing large cheers. “None of that is going to occur.”

He dismissed Democrats, inaccurately claiming that they have now grown so low that they’re behind registered independents in the state.

“We are going to make sure that the Democrats stay exactly as they are in the state of Florida. And that’s not number two, it’s number three,” he said. “Because there are actually more independents than Democrats now.”

As of April 30, the Florida Division of Elections website shows that there are 5.5 million people registered as Republicans and 4.32 million registered Democrats in the state, with 3.58 million registered as No Party Affiliation. Another 425,882 are listed as registered with minor parties.

Donalds was introduced to the crowd by his wife, Erika, a former member of the Collier County School Board who now serves as the chair of the Florida state chapter of the America First Policy Institute. She described the Tea Party movement that they joined.

“We got angry at what we saw the government doing, making decisions that were ruining our economy, bailing out people and companies that didn’t deserve it, while we were working our butts off to pay all of our bills and do things the right way. That’s what got us involved in politics,” she said.

A public opinion survey shows U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds leading Florida First Lady Casey DeSantis, 44%-25, in the race for the Republican nomination for governor in 2026.

That’s from a new poll conducted for the James Madison Institute (JMI) in the middle of May among 516 Republican voters.

That’s after those Republicans were informed that Donalds has already been endorsed by President Donald Trump for the governor’s race. The poll says initial results from GOP voters surveyed before learning of the Trump backing had Ms. DeSantis narrowly leading Donalds by a single point, 29%-28%.

Ms. DeSantis is not a declared candidate yet for governor, but she has not dismissed the possibility of running next year to succeed her husband, Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is term-limited from running again.

She has faced more media attention over the past month than at any other time as First Lady over the past six years. That’s because of reports about potential misappropriation of funds involving Hope Florida and the Hope Florida Foundation, the social welfare charity that she has been associated with.

Gov. DeSantis has accused House Republicans, the “liberal media,” and Democrats of launching “baseless smears against Hope Florida and by extension myself and the First Lady,” he said at a press conference in Kissimmee last month.

Donalds announced his candidacy for governor on Feb. 26, five days after Trump endorsed him. Since his announcement, Donalds has reported raising more than $12 million as of the end of March, with most of that money flowing into his affiliated political committee.

The James Madison Institute commissioned two public polls, one in April and one in early May. The April poll results were taken when South Florida Sen. Jason Pizzo was still in the Democratic Party and a potential nominee for that party’s gubernatorial nomination next year.

The May poll shows former Northwest Florida U.S. Rep. and now cable news pundit Matt Gaetz in third place at 10%; Jeanette Nuñez, the former lieutenant governor and now interim president of Florida International University, in fourth place with 9% support. Miami Mayor Francis Suarez is next with 5%.

Democratic field

As mentioned above, the JMI poll surveyed voters in both April and May. In April, it surveyed 464 Democratic voters, who gave Pizzo 41% support.

In distant second place at that time was Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava with 15%. Former Republican U.S. Rep. turned Democrat David Jolly was next with 7%, followed by former U.S. Rep. Gwen Graham at 5%.

Jacksonville state Rep. Angie Nixon and former South Florida state Sen. Lauren Book were next at 4%. South Florida state Sen. Shevrin Jones was at 2% and House Leader Fentrice Driskell was at 1%.

But with Pizzo’s departure, a follow-up survey in May of 396 Democratic voters showed Mayor Levine Cava now leads the Democrats with 32%. Gwen Graham is next at 13%, followed by Jolly at 10% and former state Sen. Lauren Book at 7%. However, 20% were undecided.

The survey in both months was conducted by Targoz Market Research of 1,200 voters, 43% of whom said they were Republicans, 33% Democrats, and 23% independent voters. It has a +/- margin of error of 2.77%.

For the past month, something of a civil war has raged between Florida Republicans in Tallahassee.

Gov. Ron DeSantis has accused Florida GOP House leadership of being “at war with the voters who provided the supermajority in the first place.”

He’s criticized them for ignoring his request for a property tax cut and not doing enough on condominium legislation.

And he’s accused them of working with the “liberal media” in the now-concluded investigation into Hope Florida, the welfare assistance program led by First Lady Casey DeSantis.

As a show of support, supporters of DeSantis called for a “Rally in Tally” Friday afternoon at the Capitol in support of his “Freedom Agenda.”

There was no such rally, but there was a press conference on the Plaza Level of the Capitol featuring former Panhandle House Republican Dr. Joel Rudman and Tracy Caruso, wife of Palm Beach County GOP Rep. Mike Caruso, along with some DeSantis supporters.

‘There was a mandate when we voted DeSantis in … and there isn’t a person here who ran on the idea of dismantling any of DeSantis’ policies,” said Tracy Caruso, who has already filed to run in the House District 87 seat in 2026 now held by her husband.

“My message to everyone here is please come out and talk to your representatives,” she added. “Tell them that you stand with our great Gov. Ron DeSantis.”

Text messages sent this week to voters from Restore Our Nation (RON) PAC, a DeSantis-affiliated political committee, bore a similar message: “Florida House leaders are working with Democrats to stop our agenda and sabotage Florida’s success. … Call your State Rep … and tell them to stand with the people and me to keep Florida free!”

Text messages like this were sent to Floridians this week from Restore Our Nation (RON) PAC.

Rudman stepped down from his seat representing parts of Okaloosa and Santa Rosa counties late last year to run for the congressional seat vacated by Matt Gaetz, but lost in the GOP primary to former CFO Jimmy Patronis.

He said on Friday that he was “appalled at what was being taught” at a learning session for House members last November.

“We weren’t being taught open carry. We weren’t being taught red flag laws. We weren’t being taught immigration,” he said. “Instead, the topics of discussion that afternoon from the top down were, ‘We are not listening to Ron DeSantis anymore.'”

Rudman has made these charges repeatedly in recent weeks, including during a press conference hosted by DeSantis last week.

“Looking back, once the session started, I had no idea what we were facing even here today,” Rudman said.

“I had no idea that we would see what I would call treachery. Basically, we have the most popular conservative governor in America. Other people in other states stop me and they tell me, ‘I wish I was from Florida. What can we do to get your conservative leadership in Georgia? In South Carolina? In Mississippi? So, to have this open revolt was even more that I couldn’t dare imagine.”

“We cannot have representatives who go against our governor when he’s the one who makes the decision on these things,” added Larry Downs from Pensacola. “I don’t want the fighting amongst our governor and our legislators. I don’t like that. I want them to lead.”

Perez responds

Perez fired back in a statement sent to Fox News on Friday.

“While the Florida House remains the most conservative body in the Legislature — passing a budget billions lower than the Governor’s, approving larger tax cuts than the Governor, and pushing bold conservative policies like repealing gun laws and passing E-Verify — the Governor seems uninterested in a conservative Legislature,” he said.

“He wants a compliant one. After seven years in office, it’s clear he doesn’t want people asking hard questions, especially after neglecting his duties while running for president.”

Rep. Caruso was also slated to speak at the event, but with the House in session, he was unable to attend.

Pizzo says Democratic Party in Florida is ‘dead’ — will become an independent

by Mitch Perry, Florida Phoenix
April 24, 2025

The superminority status of the Florida Democratic Party in the state Legislature just got smaller when Democratic Senate Leader Jason Pizzo stunningly announced that he was leaving the party and would become a political independent.

Democrats already had just 11 members in the 40-member chamber, after Orange County Sen. Geraldine Thompson died just weeks before this year’s legislative session began. They are now down to just 10 members.

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“The Democratic Party in Florida is dead,” he said while speaking on the floor of the Senate following the conclusion of the chamber’s business for the day. “But there are good people that can resuscitate it, but they don’t want it to be me.”

He went on to say that the Democratic Party that his father volunteered for when John F. Kennedy ran for president in 1960 was not the same party today.

“It craves and screams anarchy and then demands amnesty, and that’s not okay,” he said. “I’ve always been criticized by the far left and the far right, but you know what the small businesses and the hard-working families and the teachers and the cops and the firemen want us to do? Be public servants, not politicians.”

A former assistant state’s attorney in Miami-Dade County, Pizzo has had a reputation as a centrist Democrat since his election to the Senate in 2018, and at times has angered the more liberal parts of the party, particularly regarding criminal justice issues.

He’s also one of the wealthiest members of the Legislature, with an estimated worth of $59 million, based on his 2023 financial disclosure forms.

Whether this will affect his putative plan to run for governor is uncertain at this point. He has previously said he was considering the possibility, although he said in January that he would not run as a political independent.

Some of the party’s top leaders reacted with anger to Pizzo’s announcement.

“Jason Pizzo is one of the most ineffective and unpopular Democratic leaders in recent memory, and his resignation is one of the best things to happen to the party in years,” said Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried in a statement.

“His legacy as leader includes continually disparaging the party base, starting fights with other members, and chasing his own personal ambitions at the expense of Democratic values,” Fried continued.

“Jason’s failure to build support within our party for a gubernatorial run has led to this final embarrassing temper tantrum. I’d be lying if I said I’m sad to see him go, but I wish him the best of luck in the political wilderness he’s created for himself. The Florida Democratic Party is more united without him.”

Hillsborough Democrat Fentrice Driskell, the party’s leader in the House, similarly made blistering remarks about her now former Democratic colleague.

“The party needs strong Democrats who are ready to stand up to Trump, not big egos more interested in performative outrage than true leadership. Legislative Democrats will be fine without him,” she said in a statement. “The Democratic Party is not dead, but if it was Jason Pizzo should consider the fact that he has been a party leader and would bear some responsibility.”

Stunned

Pizzo’s Democratic Senate colleagues seemed stunned — and more charitable about Pizzo’s bombshell.

“It’s a surprise to us,” said South Florida Democratic Sen. Shevrin Jones.

“We need to process all this information,” added Palm Beach Sen. Lori Berman. “He is certainly independent and he did what he felt was right for himself, and like Sen. Jones said, I think he’s not going to become a far-right wing Republican by any means, and he will continue to be an effective voice here in the Florida Legislature and hopefully a voice of reason, as he has been.”

Pizzo is the third state Democratic lawmaker to leave the party in the past half-year. In December, Hillsborough County Rep. Susan Valdés switched to the GOP immediately after losing a bid to lead the Hillsborough County Democratic Party. Weeks later, Broward County Democrat Hillary Cassel did the same, saying the party no longer represented her values.

Republican Party of Florida Chair Evan Power responded in a statement that Pizzo could have waited until the end of the legislative session, “but it’s clear he could no longer tolerate the direction of the party.”

Power’s comment does lead into the question of why Pizzo chose Thursday, just eight days before the legislative session is scheduled to end, to make his announcement (although Senate President Ben Albritton announced earlier in the day that the session would go beyond next Friday due to an impasse regarding the state budget).

Earlier in the day, former Florida GOP Congressman David Jolly announced that he was switching from being a non-party-affiliated voter and was now a registered Democrat, fueling speculation that he in fact will run for the party’s nomination for governor in 2026.

Florida Phoenix is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Florida Phoenix maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Michael Moline for questions: info@floridaphoenix.com.

A proposal that would lift the anonymity of people filing complaints against a law enforcement officers advanced in a Florida House committee on Thursday, even though key players in Florida law enforcement are divided about whether the legislation is truly “Backing the Blue.”

The proposal sponsored by Miami-Dade Republican Tom Fabricio (HB 317) would require a person who initially files an anonymous complaint about a law or corrections officer in the state to have to give up his or her anonymity before any interrogation of that officer can commence.

Both the Florida Sheriffs Association and the Florida Police Chiefs Association oppose the bill.

“It will not increase accountability,” said Tampa International Airport Police Department Chief Charlie Vasquez, who is serving as president of the Florida Police Chiefs Association. “It will make it more difficult to hold officers accountable when they have serious misconduct.”

But other parts of the law enforcement community do support the measure, such as the Florida Fraternal Order of Police.

A member of that organization, Miami Police officer Felix Del Rosario, said the proposal is about fairness, integrity, “and the protection of those who dedicate their lives to public service.”

Del Rosario added that, for too long, police officers in Florida have been subjected to “prolonged and ambiguous investigations.”

“This legislation helps address those inequities,” he said, “by ensuring that officers have timely access to their complete investigative file, providing safeguards against unfounded and malicious allegations that can have long lasting affects on an officers’ reputation, career, and upholding the principals of.due process and equal treatment under the law.”

‘I also back the Black’

Orange County Democratic Rep. LaVon Bracy Davis noted how the Legislature last year effectively eliminated civilian review boards designed to oversee certain local law enforcement, which was supported by the sheriffs and police chiefs, so why wouldn’t they support those agencies on this piece of legislation?

“I feel like I’m in an alternate universe right now because I hear from this chamber, from this committee, often times that we need to ‘Back the Blue.’ And the Blue just spoke. What I wrote down from the police chief is that this bill will make it more difficult to hold officers accountable when they participate in misconduct,” she said.

And Bracy Davis, who is Black, said she was speaking as a representative of a minority-majority district with constituents who in some cases “have apprehension when it comes to dealing with police officers.”

“So, not only do I ‘Back the Blue’, but I also back the Black, and I back the Brown.”

Rep. Bruce Antone, who also is Black, said he opposed the bill which, ultimately would repeal anonymity for a complainant once law enforcement begins interrogating the accused officer. Antone listed three separate occasions when he was harassed by law enforcement.

South Florida Democratic Rep. Mike Gottlieb said he disagreed with the notion that if he opposed the bill he somehow was not ‘Backing the Blue.’

“We have many masters, and in a bill like this we have the administration, we have the rank and file, the law enforcement officers who are on the street fighting day and day out to protect the society, and we have the citizens, and each one of us represents approximately 175,000 individuals,” he said. “And to come here and tell us that if we vote no on this product we don’t ‘Back the Blue?’ That’s just not true.”

‘You put your face on it’

But Republicans on the committee said that while the administrators and lobbyists for Florida’s top law enforcement agencies oppose the bill, actual cops on the street support it, and that should be good enough.

“All we’re saying is, if you have a complaint against someone, just like if you’re going to accuse someone in a court of law, put your face on it,” said Hillsborough County GOP Rep. Danny Alvarez, whose job outside of the Legislature is general counsel for the Tampa Police Benevolent Association. “And if you can’t put your face and name on it, then it’s not worthy of going forward and smearing this person for the rest of their career.”

Alvarez added that the bill was “for the cop, not the sergeant, not the captain, and not the chief.”

Last week, when the bill was heard in the House Government Operations Subcommittee, Jennifer “Cookie” Pritt, executive director of Florida Police Chiefs Association, gave highly personal testimony regarding an incident involving a herself and a high-ranking command officer as a real life example of why she opposed the bill. She chose not to comment publicly on the measure on Thursday.

Ultimately, the House Judiciary Committee voted 16-4 to advance the bill, and it now moves to the full House for consideration. But it may not end up becoming law this year, as its Senate companion (SB 516) has yet to be heard in any committee in that chamber.

State lawmakers have placed thousands of appropriations in the respective House and Senate proposed budgets this year in Tallahassee — so how to get some attention for one particular project?

Bring penguins.

That’s what the staff at the Florida Aquarium in Tampa did Wednesday, bringing four penguins to the Capitol for lawmakers, staff, and reporters to get a glimpse of.

It brought attention to the budget appropriation made by Tampa Republican Rep. Karen Gonzalez Pittman in the House and Tampa Bay-area Republican Danny Burgess in the Senate for $1 million for the aquarium’s storm and flood protection project, which is designed to provide total perimeter protection for animal habitats and life-support systems against wind and flood damage.

“Because we are building and investing in this large outdoor habitat, for not only our African penguins but we’ll have California sea lions out there as well, with all the recent impacts from the hurricanes that we had this past fall, we’re really looking forward to being able to have a more resilient outdoor space, so we’re seeking funding for a seawall that will protect us during those times,” said Emily Vazir, development coordinator at the Florida Aquarium.

That project is just part of the $45 million expansion that the aquarium has been working on since 2023 and expects to complete in 2026.

Archibold, or Archi, was on display at Senate Majority Leader Jim Byrd’s office on Wednesday. At 4 years old, Archi is the youngest penguin in the aquarium colony, according to Vazir. There are nine at the facility. Three other penguins accompanied Archi in making the visit to the Capitol.

While a new poll indicates a growing percentage of Republicans aren’t pleased by all of Elon Musk’s moves to take down certain federal agencies through his “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE), Ron DeSantis is not one of them.

The Florida governor said Thursday that he thinks it’s “great” what the tech billionaire has accomplished with his DOGE team since they began looking at reducing government spending over the past three weeks. Despite its name, the operation is not a federal department and runs outside of normal government channels.

Speaking during the opening day Governor’s Day Luncheon at the Florida State Fair in Tampa, DeSantis specifically praised Musk for exposing what he described as spending excesses at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which was established by Democratic President John F. Kennedy in 1961 to coordinate U.S. foreign aid.

“They’ll talk a big game about what they are accomplishing but, really, I mean, it’s almost like a corrupt scheme to political supporters and trying to promote an ideological agenda,” DeSantis said. “They’re doing a good job of exposing really, really deep corruption into how the federal administrative apparatus actually operates.”

Musk’s focus on USAID has exposed some examples of government spending he has characterized as dubious, but its supporters say the agency has also provided financial aid to countries around the world for decades to combat human trafficking and diseases, and has funded equipment, medicine, and staffing in countries battling pandemics and disease outbreaks.

News subscriptions

“They’re even funneling it to favorable media outlets to be able to presumably get good coverage,” DeSantis added, a reference to published reports cited by Trump that the agency had paid more than $8 million to Politico.

But that’s not accurate, according to The Dispatch. They report that only two payments were made by USAID to the publication in the past year, and that was for subscriptions to E&E, an environmental report published by Politico. The report also says that various other government agencies have purchased subscriptions to Politico publications going back to 2016.

DeSantis went on to blast Congress for amassing trillions in debt, adding that it’s been Republicans who have been in control of the House of Representatives longer than Democrats have over the past 15 years. He said that while it “great to be able to see a lot of the corruption be rooted out,” it is ultimately up to lawmakers in D.C. to do a better job of protecting taxpayer dollars and “defunding corrupt agencies in the first place.”

“DOGE is kind of the first real significant intrusion into the bureaucrat’s aura of invincibility that somehow they can’t be touched, and you’re seeing the apple cart be upended, and so that’s a great sign,” he said.

Wary of Musk

Meanwhile, the percentage of Republicans who want Musk to have “a lot” of influence in the Trump administration has fallen to 26%, according to a The Economist/YouGov poll released this week, down from 47% in a poll taken in November.

The survey also shows that 43% of GOP respondents want Musk to have “a little” influence, while 17% want him to have “none at all.”

Overall, only 13% of surveyed Americans want Musk to have “a lot” of influence on the Trump administration, while 25% say want “a little” and 46% want “none at all.”

That’s substantially down from November, when 34% of surveyed Americans wanted Musk to have “a lot” of influence, 22% wanted him to have “a little,” and 30% said, “None at all.”

Gov. Ron DeSantis attempted to salve the intense enmity that has grown in recent weeks between himself and Florida legislative Republicans over the issue of illegal immigration in public remarks he made on Monday morning.

Speaking to reporters from his office in the Capitol after he introduced his proposed 2025-2026 state budget, DeSantis’ tone and style represented a 180-degree shift from his attacks last week after GOP leaders in the Legislature rejected his proposals for immigration reform and came up with their own plan, which most controversially takes the power of immigration enforcement away from his office and gives it to the office of Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson.

“We’ve had great discussions. I think we’re going to land the plane,” DeSantis said in response to a statement on social media by GOP U.S. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna that the two sides were coming together on a compromise.

DeSantis said he wasn’t ready to announce any legislative breakthrough just yet but said, “I’m pretty sure we’re going to get there.” He added that he always thought that would be the case, but acknowledged simply that “some things happen.”

His manner seemed to indicate a ceasefire in the charged rhetoric in the media and online over the past week between the governor and GOP leaders. DeSantis labeled the bill supported by House Speaker Daniel Perez and Senate President Ben Albritton as “weak” and said that it created a “conflict of interest” by investing the powers of state immigration enforcement over to Simpson.

He derided the commissioner for voting at one time as a legislator to give driver’s licenses to the undocumented and provide in-state tuition rates to Florida colleges and universities to Dreamers (as did the majority of Republicans when the bill was voted on in 2014).

Praise for rank and file

DeSantis praised the Republican rank-and-file lawmakers he’d lambasted just days ago, saying that “they’ve passed bold initiatives across a wide variety of subject matters and really helped lead the nation, part of the reason why we’ve gone from a deficit of 300,000 registered Republicans to now close to 1.2 million [lead over Democrats], because people do respond to that leadership.

“And while I’m the best well known of all the folks up here, the reality is that the Legislature has had a huge role to play in that. And it wouldn’t be within their character of their more recent actions to not aggressively address illegal immigration given the historic moment.”

One of DeSantis’ loudest critics in the Legislature — Brevard County Republican state Sen. Randy Fine — attempted to keep the discourse on a higher level when he appeared on conservative talk-show host Dana Loesch’s podcast on Monday.

Loesch has been blasting Republicans like Fine for opposing the governor in this battle, and she sharply questioned him about why they were putting the Florida Commissioner of Agriculture in charge of immigration policy and not DeSantis.

“The governor wanted a bill that gave chief immigration enforcement responsibility to somebody in the deep state, he didn’t want the responsibility himself,” Fine said, using a buzzword for Republicans attempts to demean whoever would be that appointed official in the governor’s administration. “We thought it should be a statewide elected official. We thought it should be someone accountable to the voters, and we thought he had the time and the ability to handle it.”

Loesch directly attacked Simpson, saying, “So you want an egg farmer who has ties to illegal labor and exempted himself from E-Verify. You think that’s better?

“I’m not aware of any accusations that President Simpson has ever used illegal immigrants on his farm, and he’s someone who we all supported. Republicans shouldn’t be taking potshots at each other,” Fine responded.

No time

As a way to show that the bill was relatively popular with most rank-and-file Republican lawmakers (it passed the House on an 82-30 vote and the Senate, 21-16), Fine said that only Democratic lawmakers — who opposed the measure en masse in both legislative chambers — had offered amendments to the proposal.

But after the program aired, Hernando County Republican state Sen. Blaise Ingoglia, who filed several immigration bills supported by DeSantis that never reached the floor last week, posted on X that there was a reason no Republicans offered their own amendments.

“The bill came out of committee at 5:17 pm. Amendment deadline was 6:17pm. We had ONE HOUR to read the final bill, draft amendments, barcode them and then hand deliver them to the secretary office. Impossible task. I know. I tried,” he wrote.

Concluding his remarks on the issue, DeSantis sounded like he wanted to bury the hatchet.

“I think it was an aberration last week,” he said. “I do think we’re going to be united on this issue, and then we can move forward. So, I look forward to working and continuing to have those discussions.