Peter Schorsch
Today, Jeb Bush returns to Tallahassee like Julius Caesar after the Gallic Wars, bestriding the narrow city like a colossus.
In addition to an afternoon “summit” on education, Bush will attend three fundraisers for his Right to Rise political committees, including a dinner at lobbyist Chris Dudley‘s residence, where donors are expected to contribute $100,000.
The most high profile of the fundraising events is a $1,000-per-plate luncheon at the Hotel Duval Horizon Ballroom (disclosure: I donated to this event, but am not attending). On the host committee for the event is a veritable who’s who of Florida’s political elite, from Slater Bayliss to House Majority Leader Dana Young.
When the invite for the event went public there was one name that, to me, really stuck out: Sen. Jack Latvala.
Sure, sure, Latvala is a powerful Republican state senator, so what’s so interesting about him being on the host committee of an event for Bush’s PAC?
Well, let’s just say that Bush and Latvala didn’t always get along.
“Sixteen years ago, when Jeb Bush came to town as our new Republican governor, I was the Florida Senate Majority Leader,” Latvala wrote today on Facebook. “We bumped heads a few times through the years and had different opinions on a few issues …”
That’s putting it mildly.
Before Jack Latvala was the lovable grizzly bear that now stalks the Florida Senate, he was Jack Freakin’ Latvala, perhaps the most, um, aggressive political operator in Florida. He’d dump $10,000 into turning on the printers at his mail shop just to deliver a message to an opponent who had crossed him. He was, in 1998, the first man who actually intimidated me (I was 22 and had screwed up a mailer he wanted done, if I recall correctly, for the FMA.). Latvala’s index finger, which he did not hesitate to brandish, should have been registered as a concealed weapon.
Of course, this is not the Senator Latvala now in Tallahassee. He’s the old bull who cautions the young bulls not to run down the hill to court one cow, but to walk down the hill and court them all.
Still, it was interesting to watch Bush and Latvala butt heads, mostly because Latvala was even then a voice of moderation in a Legislature full of Republican revolutionaries. Latvala’s work during that period on conservation and the environment is a legacy he can still be very proud of today.
Speaking of today, Latvala says he is all in for Jeb Bush, calling him “a leader! That is what we so badly need today in Washington, D.C.”
Latvala says he is “making the largest personal political contribution I have ever made to help him get his race for president under way.”
Sixteen years ago, you would never have predicted that. But considering Latvala’s courageous work on the tuition bill for undocumented immigrants and his long history of being a true conservative, it certainly makes sense.
