Politics: Quinnipiac Polls Show Leads for Rick Scott and Jeff Greene in Their Primaries, a Close Race for Governor, and Gov. Charlie Crist Leading the U.S. Senate Race
Surveys released by the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute on July 29 and 30, 2010 indicate that two self-financed candidates, Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott and Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Jeff Greene, hold solid leads in their respective primary races.
Mr. Scott’s opponent in the August 24 Republican primary for governor is Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum. Mr. Greene is running against U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek (D-17th Congressional District) in the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate.
The surveys also showed that Gov. Crist, running for the U.S. Senate as a no-party-affiliation candidate, holds a lead over the Republican candidate, former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio (R-Miami) and either Democrat in the November 2010 general election contest. In the general election for governor, state Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink, the Democratic candidate, is in a virtual tie with either Mr. Scott or Attorney General McCollum.
Among Republican primary voters, Mr. Scott led Attorney General McCollum by 43 percent to 32 percent, with two percent preferring some other candidate and 23 percent undecided. These results were substantially the same as the results of a June 10 Quinnipiac poll.
In the Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate, Mr. Greene led Rep. Meek by 33 percent to 23 percent, with four percent supporting former Miami Mayor Maurice Ferre, one percent supporting some other candidate, three percent saying they would not vote, and 38 percent undecided. These results represent a dramatic shift from the June 10 Quinnipiac poll, which showed Rep. Meek leading Mr. Greene by 29 percent to 27 percent.
In a three-way race for the U.S. Senate between Gov. Crist, Mr. Rubio, and Rep. Meek, Gov. Crist leads with 39 percent, followed by Mr. Rubio with 33 percent, Rep. Meek with 13 percent, and 14 percent undecided. The results are similar when Mr. Greene is the Democratic nominee. In a matchup that includes Mr. Greene, Gov. Crist leads with 37 percent, followed by Mr. Rubio with 32 percent, Mr. Greene with 17 percent, and 12 percent undecided. The July 2010 Senate poll results were generally consistent with the results of a June 9 Quinnipiac poll, except for some weakening on the part of Rep. Meek.
The contest for governor also is a three-candidate race, in which Bud Chiles, son of the late Gov. Lawton Chiles, is running as a no-party-affiliation candidate. In a matchup between Attorney General McCollum, CFO Sink, and Mr. Chiles, Mr. McCollum has the support of 27 percent of respondents, Ms. Sink has the support of 26 percent, Mr. Chiles has 14 percent, six percent either support someone else or would not vote, and 27 percent are undecided.
With Mr. Scott as the Republican gubernatorial candidate, the race is still within the margin of error. Mr. Scott leads with 29 percent, followed by CFO Sink with 27 percent, Mr. Chiles with 14 percent, five percent who would vote for someone else or not vote at all, and 26 percent undecided.
Both of these matchups show some slippage for both Republican gubernatorial candidates since the June 9 poll, in which Mr. McCollum had a 33 percent to 25 percent lead over Ms. Sink and Mr. Scott had a 35 percent to 26 percent lead over CFO Sink.
The Quinnipiac surveys were conducted from July 22 through July 27. The general election part of the survey included 969 registered voters and had a margin of error of 3.2 percentage points. The Republican primary survey included 760 likely Republican primary voters, with a margin of error of 3.6 percentage points. The Democratic primary survey included 782 likely Democratic primary voters, with a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points.
Campaign Finance: Eleventh Circuit Sides With Rick Scott, Reversing District Court Refusal to Enjoin Florida’s “Millionaire’s Amendment”
On July 30, 2010, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit overturned a district court denial of gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott’s petition to enjoin a portion of the Florida campaign finance law. The so-called Millionaire’s Amendment attempts to cap a gubernatorial candidate’s spending at $24.9 million by providing a dollar-for-dollar payment to a candidate’s opponents matching all of the candidate’s spending in excess of the cap.
The Eleventh Circuit found that Mr. Scott was “exceedingly likely to prevail on the merits of his claim that the excess spending subsidy violates the First Amendment,” relying in large part on a 2008 U.S. Supreme Court decision that invalidated a comparable provision of the federal Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (McCain-Feingold), Davis v. Federal Election Commission, 554 U.S. ___, 128 S.Ct. 2759 (2008). The court also found that the other tests for an injunction were met, in that the injury to Mr. Scott is irreparable and the grant of a preliminary injunction would not be adverse to the public interest.
Florida Constitution: Circuit Judge Removes Health Care Amendment 9 From General Election Ballot
Three weeks after removing a constitutional amendment proposed by the Legislature on redistricting from the November 2010 ballot, Leon County Circuit Judge James O. Shelfer removed another legislatively proposed amendment from the ballot. On July 29, Judge Shelfer removed Amendment 9 from the ballot, declaring that its ballot description was “manifestly misleading.”
Amendment 9, which is entitled the “Health Care Freedom” amendment, was intended to counter federal health care legislation by providing that Floridians could not be compelled to participate in particular health care systems. The issue involved language in the ballot statement to the effect that the amendment would “ensure access to health care services without waiting lists, protect the doctor-patient relationship, guard against mandates that don’t work, prohibit laws or rules from compelling any person, employer, or health care provider to participate in any health care system …”
Opponents of the amendment argued that at least the first three of these statements (“ensure access,” “protect the doctor-patient relationship,” “guard against mandates that don’t work”) were electioneering statements rather than objective descriptions of the amendment. Judge Shelfer agreed, stating that “the three phrases that the plaintiff has pointed out are manifestly misleading.”
Rep. Scott Plakon (R-Longwood), the prime sponsor of the amendment, criticized the decision, saying, “It’s another example of how far the opponents of health care freedom will go. Now they’re using the activist judges to fight their case.”
Of the nine amendments originally on the general election ballot, three have now been removed: Amendment 3, relating to non-homestead property tax assessments, Amendment 7, relating to redistricting, and Amendment 9, relating to health care. Challenges also are pending with respect to three other proposed amendments: Amendments 5 and 6, relating to redistricting, and Amendment 8, relating to public school class sizes.
Economy: Foreclosure Activity Is Decreasing, But Florida Accounts for Nine of the Nation’s Top 20 Metro Areas for Foreclosures
According to information released on July 29, 2010 by mortgage market analyst RealtyTrac, the number of properties in foreclosure in Florida has declined, but Florida remains one of the nation’s foreclosure hot spots. Nine Florida metropolitan areas were among RealtyTrac’s top 20 metro areas for foreclosure activity in the first six months of 2010.
In Florida’s most severely affected area, Cape Coral-Ft. Myers, 18,179 properties, or 4.98 percent of all housing units, were the subject of foreclosure activity from January through June 2010. This level of activity represented a 30-percent decline from the first half of 2009 and a 21.7 percent decline from the second half of 2009, but was still high enough to put Cape Coral-Ft. Myers in second place in the national rankings. Only Las Vegas, Nevada, had a higher percentage of foreclosure activity, with foreclosures affecting 6.6 percent of all housing units in the first half of 2010.
Other Florida metro areas in the top 20 were Orlando-Kissimmee, Miami-Ft. Lauderdale-Pompano Beach, Naples-Marco Island, Deltona-Daytona-Ormond Beach, Port St. Lucie, Lakeland, Palm Bay-Melbourne-Titusville, and Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater. With one exception, all of these areas saw reductions in foreclosure activity as compared with either half of 2009. The foreclosure rate in the Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater metro area rose by 5.6 percent as compared with the second half of 2009, with a total of 35,835 properties, or 2.71 percent of all housing units, affected by foreclosure activity in the first half of 2010.
Public Policy News Alert is part of our ongoing commitment to providing up-to-the-minute information about pressing concerns or industry issues affecting our clients and our colleagues. If you have any questions about this alert or would like to discuss these topics further, please contact your Foley attorney or any of the following individuals:
G. Donovan Brown
Tallahassee, Florida
850.513.3362
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Marnie George
Tallahassee, Florida
850.513.3398
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Michael P. Harrell
Tallahassee, Florida
850.513.3373
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Robert H. Hosay
Tallahassee, Florida
850.513.3382
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Jonathan P. Kilman
Orlando, Florida
407.244.3256
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Thomas J. Maida
Tallahassee, Florida
850.513.3377
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Leonard E. Schulte
Tallahassee, Florida
850.513.3380
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Marnie George of The George Group assists Foley on a variety of government and public policy matters as a consultant.