Florida Politics - Campaigns & Elections. Lobbying & Government.

Phil AmmannFebruary 24, 2018

As House Speaker Richard Corcoran’s priority education bill is pushed through the Senate committee process, some watching this week were perplexed by the vote of one sometimes perplexing Republican lawmaker. Sen. Tom Lee, who has helped carry Corcoran’s policy in a sometimes-hostile Senate, voted with Democrats to gut language from the omnibus bill that would […]

Guest AuthorFebruary 23, 2018

The most important and unregrettable time of my life was the 12 years I spent in the Army. I became a bomb technician because I wanted to save lives. I nearly gave my own life for that — I lost both my legs and a finger when a roadside bomb detonated beneath me — and […]

Mitch PerryFebruary 23, 2018

The Florida Education Association hasn’t often championed Gov. Rick Scott‘s education proposals, but it is applauding his $500 million plan to address school safety that he announced Friday in Tallahassee. The suite of proposals most notably does not include arming schoolteachers, an idea that President Donald Trump and other Florida Republican lawmakers have proposed in […]

Scott PowersFebruary 23, 2018

While saying he was impressed by the passion and delivery of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School students who came to Tallahassee to ask for gun legislation, Republican state Rep. Mike La Rosa on Friday denounced the procedural vote taken in front of them as “a political stunt” and the bill itself “a gun grab” attempt. […]

Washington PostFebruary 23, 2018

The governor is planning to roll out his legislative proposal Friday that, according to a spokesman, will be “aimed at keeping Florida schools safe and keeping firearms out of the hands of mentally ill people.” With Florida now at the epicenter of a fast-changing national gun debate, the state’s Republican governor is so far refusing […]

Ana CeballosFebruary 22, 2018

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement requested $1 million in emergency funding from the U.S. Justice Department this week to reimburse law enforcement agencies that responded to the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School mass shooting. Local agencies are facing “significant costs” after responding to the shooting that left 18 people dead, including 15 students. The […]

Joe HendersonFebruary 22, 2018

Screen-Shot-2018-02-21-at-12.58.37-PM.png

Something seems different about the gun debate this time, and Tallahassee lawmakers ignore it at their peril. The young people who marched on the state capitol and demanded to be heard on the issue of gun control are extraordinary by any measure, but it’s more than that. They are the faces of change. They are […]

Scott PowersFebruary 22, 2018

If the crowd at Wednesday night’s gun discussion at the BB&T Center in Sunrise was indicative of more than just a normally Democratic community now suffering from one of the most horrific school massacres in history, then Republicans such as U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio and staunch 2nd Amendment advocates can find little place there. In […]

Danny McAuliffeFebruary 21, 2018

newsEngin.21263137_021518-scott-parkland.jpg

Facing the state’s head honcho, kids from Marjory Stoneman Douglas shared their policy suggestions in the wake of the massacre at their school, and Gov. Rick Scott seemed to have listened, according to one student. “It went better than I expected it was going to go,” Sofie Whitney, an 18-year-old senior at Stoneman Douglas, told […]

Jim RosicaFebruary 21, 2018

House Speaker Richard Corcoran told a group of Marjory Stoneman Douglas students Wednesday “how guns are treated is absolutely on the table” for bills that are in the works. Corcoran, a Land O’ Lakes Republican, and other House members met with dozens of teens who attend the Broward County high school in a midday meeting […]

Tag: Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School

Takeaways from Tallahassee — A puzzling vote

Brian Mast: I appreciate assault weapons. And I support a ban

Florida’s largest teacher union backs Rick Scott school safety plan

Mike La Rosa calls gun bill vote ‘political stunt,’ and bill a ‘gun grab’

Rick Scott stays in sync with the NRA as he faces a reckoning on guns

FDLE asks for $1 million in federal funding to assist Parkland law enforcement

Joe Henderson: Could this be the time gun debate sparks action?

CNN Parkland town hall crowd expresses powerful gun-control message

Rick Scott, Parkland students talk policy behind closed doors

Richard Corcoran to teens: Gun legislation ‘on the table’