Janelle Irwin Taylor
Rep. Fentrice Driskell, the House Democratic Leader for the past two terms, is running for Senate District 16.
Driskell, who faces term limits, will seek the seat currently held by Sen. Darryl Rouson, who himself is leaving office due to term limits.
“At a time when Democrats are down in numbers, we need strong voices and we need individuals who are really going to roll up their sleeves and get to work,” Driskell said. She added that she believes she is the right person for the job, and that she hopes voters will trust her to continue the work she began in the House, this time in the Legislature’s upper chamber.
Currently, Driskell will face one of her own colleagues in the Democratic Primary for the race: Rep. Michele Rayner. Unlike Driskell, Rayner is not facing term limits.
A Republican has also filed in the race, in perennial candidate Amaro Lionheart, though he is unlikely to gain traction in the heavily Democratic district spanning parts of Hillsborough and Pinellas counties. A full 47% of the district’s voters are registered as Democrats, compared to just 23% as Republicans.
Driskell enters the race with some high-profile backing, including from former Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn and former Senate Democratic Leader Arthenia Joyner, who held the seat before Rouson and is considered an icon in Tampa Bay politics, especially among Democrats.
“I’ve known Fentrice for nearly a decade. She has the experience, vision, and work ethic necessary to be an outstanding state Senator,” Joyner said. “She has consistently fought for our communities, and I know she will continue that fight as the next Senator for District 16. She has my complete and total support.”
Added Buckhorn: “Fentrice Driskell is a proven leader who consistently delivers for her constituents. Her dedication to improving the lives of Floridians is unwavering, and I am proud to endorse her for state Senate.”
Driskell is the first Black woman to lead the Florida House Democrats, and was the first person in more than 30 years to be elected to the position twice.
Driskell will be a formidable candidate in the race. She’s Harvard-educated, with a law degree from Georgetown, and is telegenic with a strong platform as a party leader.
And her campaign is centered on priorities that matter most to constituents in the district: pocketbook issues.
“This is a district I know very well and have partnered with Sen. Rouson on. There are some pockets (of the district) that have great wealth, and there are some pockets that face challenges economically,” Driskell said.
She pointed to economic statistics showing nearly 20% of district residents living below the poverty line, with that number skyrocketing to 26% among children under 18. The median household income in the district is less than $61,000, about 80% of the Florida median income and about three-quarters of the national median income. The share of residents in the district with college degrees is also slightly less (32% compared to 33%) than the state’s, and about 3 percentage points less than the nation’s share.
“They need a champion who is going to stand up for affordability and investing in the workforce, and who will fight for our kids,” Driskell said.
Instead, Driskell lamented, the most recent Legislative Session was marked not by addressing affordability issues, such as in housing and insurance, but by what she described as Republican infighting, a reference to prolonged budget negotiations that saw the House and Senate deadlocked for weeks over how to reduce government spending and cut taxes.
“We need to center the story back on the American worker, our families, our seniors,” Driskell said, noting that any legislative action needs to focus on those who need help the most, not just the wealthiest among us.
“When we take care of them, that means we can have households that can thrive, and fewer people who fall through the safety net,” Driskell said, adding that “we can accomplish so much if we just focus on tax fairness.”
Driskell acknowledges that any Democrat will have a difficult time ushering priorities through the Legislature, which is currently under supermajority control by the GOP. But she said to remember the tradition of Senators in SD 16 who have come before — Joyner and Rouson — who “have been able to maintain fidelity to Democratic principles, but have also been able to work across the aisle to get things done.”
On affordable housing, Driskell emphasized the need to tap into resources already in place.
“There are so many wonderful partners on the ground who focus on housing affordability and who focus on smart development,” she said.
Groups such as the Pinellas Urban League and the University Area Community Development Corporation in Hillsborough County area are already working diligently to address the housing affordability crisis plaguing not just SD 16, but areas throughout the state and nation.
Housing affordability is also being degraded by the state’s high cost of property insurance — rates that can also impact renters through price pass downs.
Republican leaders have claimed rates are going down — and that they will continue to do so — and Driskell said she’s been told the same. But when speaking at a legal forum recently, Driskell said she posed the question to attendees.
“Two people raised their hands out of a group of about 60,” she said. “The state hasn’t done enough.”
And it’s not because Democrats haven’t tried, Driskell said.
She said as a Senator, she would continue advocating for transparency and accountability, pointing to reports of insurance companies shifting profits to subsidiaries, leading them to “cry that they’re broke.”
That’s in reference to a study earlier this year, first reported by the Tampa Bay Times and Miami Herald, showing that between 2017 and 2019 some insurance companies that claimed to be losing money had parent companies or affiliates that were making billions. What’s more, the study found that insurance executives distributed $680 million to shareholders, removing so much money from the companies collectively that they were violating state regulations, according to study findings.
Beyond holding insurance companies accountable, Driskell also said the state could invest more money into the My Safe Florida Home program, which helps Florida homeowners fund home-hardening projects making their homes more resilient as storms more frequently threaten, and hit, with ever-increasing intensity.
And Driskell has another plan to make her district — and everywhere else in the state — more resilient: better exercising the Legislature’s veto override authority. Democrats are in no position to rally their own for veto overrides, which require a supermajority, but the issue of resiliency has sometimes found bipartisan support, and offers a rare opportunity for both sides of the aisle to come together to ensure progress.
She pointed to Gov. Ron DeSantis’ vetoes in 2024, which included a number of resiliency projects in the Tampa Bay region.
“Some of those projects could have helped our friends and neighbors,” Driskell said. “If it’s going to be a priority, it’s got to be a priority. We can’t just give lip service.”
Driskell has already proven her ability to lead in the House, despite obvious challenges associated with being in the political minority.
She was a top advocate for a series of legislative actions taken in recent years to identify, study and preserve abandoned African American cemeteries, several of which have been found in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties.
Driskell has also been a champion for criminal justice reform, including efforts to reduce the number of minors charged as adults. Driskell cosponsored HB 6051 in 2019 along with Republican Rep. Tyler Sirois to end “direct file,” which is the automatic transfer of certain juvenile suspects into the adult criminal justice system. While that bill didn’t pass, Driskell and other sponsors successfully advocated to have the direct file provision included in another bill (HB 7125) that did.
More recently, Driskell cosponsored HB 59, a measure to end Florida’s “Clean Hands” rule, which makes it difficult for certain people wrongly convicted and incarcerated for crimes to seek compensation. The Senate version of the bill (SB 130) cleared the Legislature this year, and became law on June 30.
Other legislative efforts throughout her tenure have included promoting accountability and transparency for law enforcement, through a 2021 bill preventing excessive force by police officers, and establishing the first Sickle Cell Research Centers of Excellence in the country, through HB 7085 last year.
“I’m honored to have been recruited by folks on the ground and by constituents who have appreciated the work that I have done,” Driskell said. “I would appreciate the opportunity to continue that work in the Senate.”
