A.G. Gancarski
The two leading candidates in the GOP race in Congressional District 4, Hans Tanzler and John Rutherford, both donated money to Charlie Crist when Crist was a Republican.
At the time, that wasn’t a political liability. Years later, however, donations to Crist have become more controversial, and Republicans of a certain age are compelled to answer for them.
FloridaPolitics.com already reported Tanzler’s donations to Crist, the last one in 2009, during Crist’s unsuccessful campaign for the Senate.
Tanzler, appointed to the St. Johns River Water Management Board by Crist in 2008, managed to monetize that position in the years since, with six-figure salaries as general counsel and then director of the board.
However, it turns out Tanzler is not the only candidate in the CD 4 race to donate to Crist; John Rutherford donated $500 to him in 2001.
On behalf of the Tanzler campaign, Brett Doster had this to say:
“It is odd that Rutherford would attack Hans for past donations on Charlie Crist. Rutherford was a past donor to Crist. Almost every major donor in Jacksonville was a contributor to Crist back when Crist purported to be a conservative Republican. Rutherford also endorsed Crist when he was running for governor in 2006,” Doster notes.
“We are not surprised by this misinformation and personal attack launched directly by the Rutherford campaign. John refused to sign Tanzler’s clean campaign pledge, and now we know why,” Doster adds.
Unsurprisingly, Rutherford spokesman Tim Baker has a different take.
“Hans Tanzler violated his own clean campaign pledge by lying about the conservative record of John Rutherford. As the Tanzler campaign rightly points out, Hans was a longtime donor to Charlie Crist, including supporting him against Marco Rubio, and parlayed his donations into a board appointment and a secret $165,000 contract for himself. John Rutherford and Hans Tanzler both donated to Charlie Crist 15 years ago before anyone knew he was a liberal, but Hans Tanzler continued to support him once we all knew the truth because it clearly benefited himself,” Baker asserts.
A Rutherford television ad, now airing in the Jacksonville market, makes many of the points Baker articulates.
Whatever the “clean campaign pledge” may have meant, it has been eclipsed by the reality of a sharp-elbowed race between two well-funded candidates with strong consultants.
This week saw numerous skirmishes between the messaging arms of the Rutherford and Tanzler operations.
Tanzler took issue with Rutherford’s opposition to the death penalty, calling it an “indication of weakness” that made Tanzler doubt that the lifelong police officer and three-term sheriff could be “trusted to protect America.”
At a Thursday night forum, Rutherford and Tanzler sparred over that claim, and two other candidates, Bill McClure and Lake Ray, jumped into the fray.
Rutherford had to defend his death penalty opposition, and counter the recurrent charge from opponents that his sheriff’s office budget increased every year, which Rutherford has contended was a function of ever-increasing pension costs.
As the CD 4 race enters the home stretch, expect Rutherford, Tanzler, and the rest of the field to continue to throw strikes at each other.
The stakes are high: the Republican nomination for a safe seat typically retained by occupants for as long as they want to be there.
