Word: floridae
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While his Republican Party has been flailing and losing and dwindling to its base, Florida Governor Charlie Crist has remained extremely popular by governing from the middle. He has stocked his administration with Democrats, appointed a fairly liberal African-American Democrat to the state supreme court, expanded voting rights for felons, crusaded against global warming and enthusiastically supported President Obama's stimulus package. Crist's crossover appeal - along with his powerhouse skills as a fundraiser and campaigner - has made him a heavy favorite to join the Senate in 2010. To some observers, his success in the largest swing state could...
Still, many indicators suggest Crist might help himself and his party by taking what prominent Florida political analyst Susan MacManus calls "the more forward-looking route for Republicans." Martinez, who also served briefly as chairman of the Republican National Committee, insists he's quitting the Senate to spend more time with his family. But the Senate's first Cuban-American member is also leaving under a cloud of frustration with his party's vitriol against immigration reform and the Sotomayor appointment. In 2008 the GOP's anti-immigration stance helped drop John McCain's share of the Latino vote...
...women voters in 2008, a 5-point increase over John Kerry's tally in 2004. And while about half of female Floridians voted for Bush in 2004, 52% went for Obama last year. As a result, says MacManus, a political-science professor at the University of South Florida in Tampa, "Crist could end up making a bold appointment when you consider how helpful a little diversity would be to the Republican image at this point...
...bold choice being floated is state representative Jennifer Carroll of Jacksonville, a Trinidad-born, African-American Republican who has been the state house's majority whip and deputy majority leader. A rising star in the Florida GOP, Carroll, 49, served 20 years in the U.S. Navy and retired as a lieutenant commander. Another is GOP state representative Anitere Flores of Miami. Flores, the current deputy majority leader, is only 32, and she's the legislature's only Hispanic female - which itself is a comment on both the Democratic and the Republican parties in Florida. Flores, who has also been mentioned...
...being elected in 2006 eclipses that of his more conservative predecessor, Jeb Bush, has already raised almost $4.5 million for his Senate run, compared with the less than $500,000 raised by Rubio. Crist won the 2006 primary in a landslide as a moderate - not all that difficult, given Florida's reputation as one of the nation's most politically centrist states - and his endorsement of John McCain helped that moderate Republican win Florida's presidential primary last year...