South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Sunday)
A few things to knowabout races for Palm Beach County.
Palm Beach County tends to lean liberal. Voters helped deliver awintoBarackObama in 2008 and 2012. It is so dependently left-leaning that sometimes Republicans don’tevenbotherfieldingacandidateinsome congressional races.
Butwith2020being, well, 2020, willsomethinggiveinthecounty? InFlorida, thecountry’s biggestswingstate?
Alleyes, astheyusuallyareeveryfouryears, willbeonFloridathisNovemberasthemasses watch to see if Florida will be repeat of the famous, contested 2000 election that ultimatelywent in favorofGeorgeW. Bush.
WhenObamawonFloridaby less than3% of the vote in 2008, itwas a the first time the state had supported the top person on the Democratic ticket since 1996. But much has changedsincethenationelecteditsfirstBlack president.
The backlash and bitter divisiveness is the likes ofwhat many say they have never seen before: Enter DonaldTrump, currentlyPalm Beach’smostnewsworthy resident.
It’sgottentothepointwhereUtah’sRepublicanSen. MittRomneyonTuesdaybrokehis silence and castigatedTrump, and to a lesser
extenttheDemocraticparty and the media, saying the world iswatching and very concerned.
“I’m troubled by our politics as it has moved from spirited debate to a vile vituperative hate-filled morass that is unbecoming of any nation,” Romney said in a post thatwentviralonTwitter.
Though Trump lost the 21stCongressionalDistrict— where hisMar-a-Lago club is — by 21 points toHillary Clinton, he did manage to pull off a Florida win and snag its coveted 29 electoral votes in 2016.
Will Trump’s decision last year to call South Florid home allow him to pull off what he was unable to do before at thepolls?
WillTrump’smomentum be enough for the Republican down-ballot races? Or will Palm Beach County’s most notable resident energizehisdetractorstoflockto the pollsandvotehimout?
The Trump Effect could goeitherway.
TheTrumpeffect
Laura Loomer, the hard right-leaning, 27-year-old, political neophyte who has been banned from most socialmediaaccountsaswell as ride-sharing and reportedly even some food- delivery apps because of her no-holds-barred, inflammatory statements about Muslims is going up against a South Florida political maveninNovember.
Loomer bested five other Republican candidates during the primary for the
21st Congressional District race, winning 43% of the Republican votes.
A conspiracy theorist, Loomerwas congratulated after her win by the head of the Republic National Committee and Trump, who had this to say: “Great going Laura. You have a greatchanceagainstaPelosi puppet.”
That so-called puppet is none other than incumbentU.S. Rep. Lois Frankel. Frankel has been in theU.S. House of Representatives
since2013, servedintheFloridaHouseofRepresentatives for 14 years, and served two terms as the mayor ofWest PalmBeach.
After Loomer’s win, a former Trump campaign adviser reportedly said the race between Loomer and Frankel will be the mostwatched congressional race in the country.
Frankel bested her next
bestopponentbysome27%.
BecauseFrankelearned86% oftheDemocraticvoteinthe primary, strategists don’t seemthatworried.
OmariHardy
While Loomer may have been the darling for a chunk ofSouthFloridaRepublicans inAugust, LakeWorthBeach commissionerOmariHardy, a progressive, soundly defeated the Democratic incumbent for the party’s win for the State House District88seat inAugust.
Thoughthe former occupant of the Florida House seat had his well- documented faults, those not paying attention to news accounts would have been hard-pressed not to follow social media, which overnight turned Hardy into cause celebre.
During aMarch commission meeting in LakeWorth Beach, Hardy called out the mayor and city manager becausethecity-ownedutility departmenthadcut electricwaterandsewerservices toresidentslateonpayments as the pandemic and lockdownhadjust set in.
Hardy rose fromthis seat and loudly pronounced the citywas abananarepublic.
“We cut off people utilitieslastweekandthenmade them pay what could have been their last check to us to turnontheirlightsonduring aglobalhealthpandemic,” he roared.
A recording of themeetingwent viral with some 6.4 million viewers. AndHardy
isnowapproaching200,000 followersonTwitter.
Hardy, who faces Republican DanielleMadsen and non-party-affiliate Rubin Anderson, supports legalizing recreation marijuana, wants all police officerswearing body-worn cameras, and called the state’s response to COVID
19 disastrous.
COVID-19
To help readers make informed decisions, the South Florida Sun Sentinel sentsurveystoallcandidates for races in Palm Beach and Broward counties for its voter guide.
Candidates were asked to list their top three prioritiesifelectedtotheirdesired office. And with very few exceptions the candidates for the Palm Beach County Board of County Commissioner and state and U.S. seats listed COVID-19 as theirNo. 1 answer.
“Re s o l v i n g the pandemic,” answered Saulis Banionis, a medical doctor hoping to snag the western Palm Beach County State House District 81. “I am a doctor, not a politician but I am a medial expert and have worked to improve healthcare in Florida by working as a medical expert for the Medicaid Board. I am the only candidate that can provide a level of expertise with the current crisis and that canhave animmediate impact on our community and bring that experience to the Florida Legislature. We needandexpert to solve problems, not politicians.”
Speaking of experts and politicians, a Palm Beach County position that is typical thought of as ceremonial was anything but that forPalmBeach County MayorDaveKerner.
Kerner, who is running to retain his District 3 seat of the Palm Beach County Board of County Commissioners, came across as an expert and experienced mayor right out of the gate when the pandemic took hold inPalmBeach County.
In the questionaire, Kerner said he’d continue focusing on combating the virus and all its aspects — health, education, financial andhomelessness.
“I am proud of our county’s response to COVID-19, but I am even more proud of how our residents and collectively participated in our assault on the virus,” Kerner wrote on the questionnaire.
Even Sheriff Ric Bradshawwho is anticipated to handilywinafifthterm, gave COVID-19 top billing in his listofpriorities.
Bradshaw has worked hard to make sure those impacted by COVID-19 are taken care of, and that’s not just first responders. He’s expanded the Sheriff’s Senior Program to assist the county’s elderly who are unable to get out of their homesand go to the grocery stores or to the pharmacies. He’s also delivered food to front-line workers and helped to provide essential needs to residentswhohave lost their jobs.
The economy
Millions of Floridians knowabout job loss.
The impact of the pandemic was so crushing that when 6million Floridians filed for unemployment benefits this spring, the system couldn’t handle influx and crashed, leaving people without any safety net forweeksonend.
A broken system tops the list of priorities for Tina Polsky, a mediator, who is hopingafterNovembertobe going toTallahassee as state senatorrepresenting southern Palm Beach County’s
29th District. She is finishing her first term as a FloridaHouse representative.
“We have a broken system thatwasdesigned to fail and it needs to be overhauled,” Polsky said in her South Florida Sun Sentinel VoterGuide questionnaire.
Poslky said the state needs to increase the maxi
mum$275 inweekly benefits, a sum she calls paltry, aswell as lengthen the time that someone may receive unemployment benefits.
Also hoping to be able to increase the amount of money in one’s pocket is James “Jim” Pruden, an attorney hoping to head to Washington as a U.S. congressman.
Pruden said he’d like to give Floridians a larger paycheck without what he calls wasteful government involvement. For workers who make less than $100,
000a year, Prudensupports eliminating income tax on overtimewages.
Such would be a “direct benefit on their paychecks without the need forwasteful government spending,” Pruden said in his survey.
But first, Pruden will have to beat a South Florida and Palm Beach favorite, Democrat and six-time incumbentTedDeutch.
Eileen Kelley can be reached at 772-925-9193 or ekelley@sunsentinel. com. Follow on Twitter@ reporterkell.