Florida Politics - Campaigns & Elections. Lobbying & Government.

Joe HendersonNovember 11, 2016

Mike Fasano, the Pasco County Tax Collector and former state legislator, lives near incoming Florida House Speaker Richard Corcoran. They are friends and they speak frequently with each other. Sometimes they agree on policies, sometimes they don’t. But they are in total accord about the dramatic changes regarding lobbyists and other measures Corcoran has planned […]

Mitch PerryNovember 10, 2016

In presidential election years, Florida Democrats perennially have high hopes to increase their meager numbers in the Legislature by winning crucial swing district races. They lost several of them on Tuesday, including most surprisingly in House District 36, where 21-year-old University of Central Florida student Amber Mariano knocked off Democratic incumbent Amanda Murphy in a stunning upset by 732 votes, or […]

Peter SchorschOctober 25, 2016

An Orlando-based nonprofit says the state’s Department of Corrections is wrongly trying to discredit a POLITICO Florida report showing that it “misled” the public about shutting down community based re-entry centers. Bridges of America, one of several outside organizations helping ex-cons and others, also said DOC “continues to fail to address that they don’t have the […]

Tom JacksonSeptember 13, 2016

Whatever else we might be tempted to say in the aftermath of last month’s recent primary election, for those who live and/or work in Pasco County, this, above all, is beyond dispute: Pasco is Mike Fasano’s county. Everyone else is just visiting. Who but Fasano, the nudging, empathetic, perpetually beatifying champion of the “little guy […]

Tom JacksonAugust 22, 2016

Ordinarily, the only thing less interesting than electing a county’s property appraiser is electing its clerk of court. At least people have a pretty good idea of what a property appraiser does. But when a long-time appraiser creates an open seat by announcing his retirement, and does so in a year in which Donald Trump declares all […]

Peter SchorschAugust 1, 2016

Mike Fasano took to social media last week to “shame” GOP political consulting firm Data Targeting for having the audacity to request public personnel records. In doing so, the Pasco County Tax Collector — recognized with the Friend of the First Amendment award only last year — disappointed a number of people, including several of his friends. But in the […]

Peter SchorschJuly 28, 2016

What a difference four years can make. Especially in the world of politics. Elected officials change their positions. Sometimes it can happen when new facts emerge, or because of a desire to follow the will of the people who elected them to serve. And then there are the other scenarios. Take my friend Pasco County […]

Peter SchorschJuly 20, 2016

While Florida’s delegates to the Republican National Convention noshed on a Tuesday morning breakfast fit for a Hubert Mizell column — chicken & waffles, honestly cheesy grits, and cinnamon sticky buns — Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam extolled on the virtues of living under GOP rule in the Sunshine State. “The economy was in the tank, and we had more […]

Keith MorelliJune 29, 2016

The collecting began last year, and the contributions flowed into Tampa Bay incumbent constitutional officers focused winning this fall’s elections and keeping their jobs for four more years. By last week, when qualifying ended, nearly a dozen had raked in close to $900,000, ready to wage war with challengers to their positions as sheriffs, tax […]

Joe HendersonMay 31, 2016

Recent headlines heralded the fact that Citizens Insurance, the state-run company for those who can’t get coverage anywhere else, has a lot of cash. With the official opening of hurricane season at hand, company officials say Citizens has enough money in reserve to pay claims if even a catastrophic Category 5 storm hits a major […]

Tag: Mike Fasano
Image via AP.

Joe Henderson: New House rules put lobbyists in their place and increase transparency

Donald Trump ‘tsunami’ in Pasco led to stunning result in Florida’s House District 36 race

Non-profits rebut Corrections’ accusations on re-entry programs

Tom Jackson: In Pasco, all roads lead to Mike Fasano

In Pasco, big fireworks over low-profile job

First Amendment Foundation calls Mike Fasano’s conditions on public record access ‘highly inappropriate,’ illegal

Mike Fasano, it’s none of your business who requests public records

Richard Corcoran for Governor in 2018?

Unopposed local constitutional officers to return nearly $900,000 in contributions

As hurricane season begins, asking tough questions of Citizens Insurance