LOTS OF POSTS IGNORED BY BLOGGER.....
OR REMOVED ON THEIR WHIM!
ALL POSTS ARE AVAILABLE ON
MIDDLEBORO REVIEW AND SO ON
BLOGGER DOESN'T LIKE TRUTH OR FACTS!
BLOGGER DOESN'T LIKE FUND RAISERS AND DELETES
POSTS THAT INCLUDE FUNDRAISING THAT 'VIOLATES THEIR
UNDEFINED COMMUNITY STANDARDS SO ALL 'FUND RAISING'
IS DELETED - CONTRIBUTE AS YOU ARE INCLINED TO SUPPORT
IMPORTANT ISSUES! THESE ARE NOT SOLICITATIONS
Thank you so much for being a paid subscriber to The Downballot. Without your support, we simply would not be able to keep publishing. We could not be more grateful. I must also note that we still have yet to achieve long-term financial sustainability, as we remain below our break-even point. For that reason, we continue to ask that free subscribers upgrade to paid subscriptions at the top of every post—in the same space you’re reading this. So if you’re seeing messages like that, you shouldn’t be. It probably means you’re subscribed to The Downballot with two different email addresses—one that has a paid subscription and one with a free subscription. If you’d like help in resolving this and removing the account with a free subscription, just reply to this email and I’d be happy to assist. All replies go directly to my inbox. Thank you again, David Morning Digest: Democrats make late investment in race for Florida attorney generalRon DeSantis’ hand-picked incumbent remains embroiled in the "Hope Florida" scandal
Leading OffFL-AG, FL-Sen, FL-GovThe Democratic Attorneys General Association is sending $5 million to former state Sen. Jose Javier Rodriguez’s campaign to unseat Republican James Uthmeier as attorney general of Florida, a former swing state where Democrats are eager to prove they can win again. DAGA, which tells Politico this money is “just the start” of its involvement, is jumping in at a time when polls show conflicting signals about Rodriguez and the rest of the Democratic ticket. Uthmeier enjoys a wide 50-40 advantage in a Targoz Market Research poll released Friday by the James Madison Institute, a conservative Florida-based think tank. That poll also finds the two most prominent members of the GOP ticket, Sen. Ashley Moody and gubernatorial nominee Byron Donalds, with identical 52-42 advantages in their respective contests. (See our Poll Pile section below for other results from this survey.) But Rodriguez and his fellow Democrats got some considerably more encouraging numbers the previous day when St. Pete Polls, working on behalf of the news site Florida Politics, gave Uthmeier just a 45-43 edge. That survey similarly showed Moody ahead just 47-45 in her race against Democrat Angie Nixon and found Donalds deadlocked at 45 apiece against Democrat David Jolly in the race to succeed termed-out Gov. Ron DeSantis. The Sunshine State’s sharp lurch to the right over the last decade, as well as strong fundraising on the GOP side, has left Democrats in a difficult position, though DAGA’s contribution will help Rodriguez make up what had been a huge financial gulf. Campaign finance reports filed Oct. 2 showed Uthmeier with about $10 million on hand, compared to $1 million for Rodriguez. Democrats are also hoping a scandal involving a charity called Hope Florida will have voters looking for new leadership—a scandal that could be especially troublesome for Uthmeier. “$10 million from a Medicaid settlement was taken from sick kids and ended up in a political committee controlled by James Uthmeier,” Rodriguez tweeted Friday. “As Florida Attorney General, I will protect and recover health care dollars and hold those responsible accountable.” Uthmeier was serving as DeSantis’ chief of staff in September of 2024 when the governor’s administration reached a settlement with a Medicaid contractor called Centene Corp. for overbilling the state. Those terms involved Centene sending $10 million to Hope Florida, a foundation run by first lady Casey DeSantis whose stated goal is to steer people away from receiving government aid and instead urge them to seek help from religious organizations. That money, however, was quickly transferred from Hope Florida through other organizations to reach political committees chaired by Uthmeier. Those committees in turn spent those funds on a successful effort to defeat a ballot measure to legalize recreational marijuana two years ago. None of this was publicly known when, in January of last year, Ron DeSantis tapped Moody, then Florida’s attorney general, to replace Marco Rubio in the Senate after he was chosen to be Donald Trump’s secretary of state. That same day, DeSantis selected Uthmeier, a longtime ally who had managed the governor’s disastrous White House bid, to succeed Moody. Republican lawmakers, though, began publicly raising questions about Hope Florida in April of 2025, and the scandal and subsequent investigation overshadowed Casey DeSantis’ potential campaign for governor. Casey DeSantis ultimately stayed out of the race, but Hope Florida didn’t seem to be a problem for Uthmeier. The attorney general dismissed the matter earlier this year as a “big nothingburger,” and he seemed to be proven right when he secured the GOP nomination without opposition. But the story returned to the headlines in August when CBS Miami published a grand jury report that determined the DeSantis administration had “misappropriated” public funds as “part of a sophisticated scheme to fund political activities.” The report concluded that there was “insufficient evidence to charge anyone criminally,” but it was critical of both Uthmeier and Moody. It cited testimony alleging that Uthmeier had “involvement in directing the money after it went to Hope Florida” and said Moody had “authorized” her top aide to sign the original Medicaid settlement. The grand jury also found that, after Moody’s subordinate raised concerns, the settlement was redrafted so the state’s health agency would direct the money instead of the attorney general’s office. That report was back in the news again Wednesday, but for a very different reason. A state appeals court ordered the report expunged, ruling that the grand jury had exceeded its authority. Judge Lance Neff, whom the governor appointed earlier this year, wrote, “A grand jury may investigate and report, but it may not declare conduct unlawful and then decline to charge it, and it may not condemn people by name without indicting them.” At a press conference the next day, DeSantis declared that Neff’s ruling “fully debunks this idea of any type of misappropriation,” adding, “I think you need to hold the people accountable who disclose this because I think it’s been very, very serious and it was political.” Uthmeier, who was also present, said that law enforcement was looking at whether laws had been broken concerning the investigation. One prominent Republican, though, isn’t ready to shift away from the allegations concerning Hope Florida. “Here’s what I care about: This was $10 million that was supposed to go for poor kids,” Sen. Rick Scott, who preceded DeSantis as governor, told the Tampa Bay Times. “Are the people who spent the money going to give the money back? And then, if somebody did anything wrong, are they going to be held accountable?” Rodriguez, who has called for “an Attorney General who fights corruption, not one surrounded by it,” was himself the victim of a different political scandal six years ago. Following his upset win in a 2012 state House race in the Miami area and his election to the state Senate four years later, Rodriguez became one of the more prominent Democrats in the state’s large Cuban American community, which has long favored Republicans. However, in 2020, he lost reelection to Republican Ileana Garcia by just 34 votes, while an unknown independent named Alex Rodriguez secured more than 6,300 votes and seemingly cost the incumbent another term. And the fact that a second candidate with the same surname as the incumbent earned a spot on the ballot was no accident. State prosecutors later charged Frank Artiles, a former Republican state senator, with offering Alex Rodriguez $50,000 to run as a “ghost candidate.” Artiles was convicted in 2024 and sentenced to two months in prison. Recently released documents indicate that the utility giant Florida Power & Light sought to recruit fake candidates to undermine Democrats it opposed, including Rodriguez. The company has not been charged with wrongdoing in this or any other race, but Rodriguez told the Tampa Bay Times, “The fact that they’ve faced no accountability because they own the political process is not a very compelling argument.” Rodriguez went on to serve in the Department of Labor during the Biden administration and is now campaigning to become the first Florida Democrat elected attorney general in the 21st century. Conservative Democrats secured the post in the 1870s during the final years of Reconstruction, and they’d hold it for well over a century. That grip finally loosened in 2002, when Charlie Crist, still a Republican at this early point in his long and ongoing career, won the 2002 contest to succeed Democrat Bob Butterworth, and he used that post as a springboard to win the governorship in 2006. The GOP continued to hold the attorney general’s office well after Crist left the party in 2010, with Moody securing her second term in a 61-39 landslide in 2022. Rodriguez, though, says the longtime status quo is failing Floridians. “My father left Communist Cuba,” he said in an ad last month. “We know what it looks like when the powerful prey on their own people.” 3Q Fundraising
SenateKS-SenThe Senate Majority PAC is jumping into the suddenly competitive Senate race in Kansas for the first time, making a $5 million investment on behalf of Democrat Adam Hamilton, the New York Times reported on Friday. SMP’s move comes just days after its Republican counterpart, the Senate Leadership Fund, reportedly began spending at least $10 million to rescue Sen. Roger Marshall. The Democratic PAC’s new ad slams Marshall for “vot[ing] to keep the Epstein files sealed, ignoring pleas from victims” while “saying releasing the information was ‘not of much interest to me.’” Marshall made those remarks to reporters last year. GovernorsOR-GovThe Republican Governors Association has contributed $1 million to Christine Drazan, its first donation in her rematch against Democratic Gov. Tina Kotek in Oregon. The incumbent, though, retains a sizable financial edge going into the final three weeks of the campaign. Oregon Public Broadcasting reports that Kotek reported $4.5 million in her campaign account as of Thursday, while Drazan had $1.9 million. Limited polling, including a recent survey from Kotek’s own campaign, previews another close race between the two rivals four years after their 2022 bout, which Kotek won 47-44. On Thursday, Kotek’s team released a poll from GBAO placing her ahead by a small 46-42 spread, with Brett Smith of the left-leaning Pacific Green Party taking 6%. HouseNY-04The Congressional Leadership Fund has booked $1.3 million to target Democratic Rep. Laura Gillen, Newsday reports, as the GOP tries to take back a Long Island constituency that seemed to be falling off the map. Gillen faces Republican Jeanine Driscoll, who serves as receiver of taxes for the Town of Hempstead, in New York’s 4th District, a Long Island constituency Kamala Harris narrowly carried 50-49. Driscoll, however, only entered the race in April after former Rep. Anthony D’Esposito, who beat Gillen in 2022 but lost a rematch two years later, finally decided not to run for a third time. D’Esposito’s long and confusing deliberation process left Driscoll with little over half a year to organize a campaign in what was already shaping up to be a tough environment for her party, and well-funded groups on both sides treated it as an afterthought. The FEC tracked only $220,000 in spending from Republican third-party groups as of Friday, with $160,000 from Democrats aimed at helping Gillen. National Republicans, though, have taken an interest in Nassau County, whose county executive, Bruce Blakeman, is the GOP nominee for governor. Next door in the 3rd District, Republican groups have spent millions to unseat Rep. Tom Suozzi, though Democrats, confident of Suozzi’s standing, continue to direct their resources elsewhere. Poll PileAll polls must comply with The Downballot’s requirements.
Thank you so much for being a paid subscriber to The Downballot! If you’d like to further support our work, you can donate on our ActBlue page. |
