Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Gillum, DeSantis clash over probe, race
Governor hopefuls meet in final debate
Andrew Gillum used the final governor’s debate Wednesday night as his shot to fight back against revelations that he accepted a ticket to the musical “Hamilton” from an undercover FBI agent.
Gillum, 39, Democratic mayor of Tallahassee, admitted he should have asked more questions about who paid for the ticket, but he said it’s a distraction from the real issues that affect Floridians.
“In the state of Florida, we’ve got 99 issues, and ‘Hamilton’ ain’t one of them,” he said.
Ron DeSantis, 40, accused Gillum of abusing his position as
mayor to get free perks, repeating his line of attack that Gillum is a corrupt politician leading a crime-ridden city.
That was just the start of a back-and-forth brawl between DeSantis and Gillum in a debate at Broward College in Davie filled with negative attacks.
Text messages released this week showed that undercover FBI agents provided tickets to the hit musical “Hamilton” to Gillum, his brother and Tallahassee lobbyist Adam Corey during a trip they took in August 2016 to New York City.
Gillum fired back saying everything he has done as mayor was above board. He said DeSantis should release records detailing $145,000 in taxpayerfunded travel he took as congressman, including trips to New York to appear on Fox News to increase his profile before declaring his candidacy.
DeSantis said that isn’t the same. He called on Gillum to waive confidentiality and allow the Florida Commission on Ethics to release all documents related to its probe into Gillum’s travels.
“I received my money legally and through my congressional office. … Andrew got travel money from the federal government because it was from an undercover FBI agent who is investigating him for corruption,” DeSantis said.
Gillum — who would become Florida’s first black governor — lashed into DeSantis for attending conferences that featured farright speakers. The day after securing the nomination, DeSantis said Floridians shouldn’t “monkey this up” by electing Gillum, a comment deemed racist by Democrats.
“I'm not calling Mr. DeSantis a racist. I'm simply saying the racists consider him a racist,” Gillum said.
DeSantis objected to that characterization. He said he served next to people of every race and creed when he was in the military.
“How the hell am I supposed to know every single statement somebody makes? … I am not going to bow down to the altar of political correctness,” DeSantis said. “I am not going to let the media smear me.”
He attacked Gillum for supporting the Dream Defenders, a group aligned with the Black Lives Matter movement. Gillum said he signed the group’s pledge that supported ending private prisons.
The exchange mirrored the intensity of the first debate three days ago that was nationally televised on CNN.
DeSantis and Gillum clashed on immigration, taxes, guns, health care and the economy. Each secured the nomination by being an unapologetic champion of his party’s causes.
The debate came on a day that saw bombs show up at the homes and offices of prominent Democrats, including former President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. One was received at the Sunrise office of U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Weston. Wasserman Schultz attended the debate.
Gillum said “we really have seen the collapsing of our political discourse,” adding “we’ve seen neo Nazis empowered” by President Donald Trump.
He said DeSantis “has run this race very, very close to the Trump handbook, where we call each other names, where we run false advertisements.”
DeSantis said he has ex Tallahassee perienced the turn for the worse, saying he was at the Republican Congressional baseball practice in 2017 where Rep. Steve Scalise was shot.
On the issues, Gillum touted his plan to raise the corporate tax rate from 5.5 percent to 7.75 percent, which would generate about $1 billion to raise starting teacher pay to $50,000 a year. DeSantis said raising taxes would kill jobs, while Gillum said it would affect only a few of the wealthiest corporations.
On guns, Gillum said he’d ban assault weapons and take on the National Rifle Association. DeSantis said he’d hold local leaders accountable and beef up school security to prevent shootings.
DeSantis said Gillum's soft stance on immigration would lead to child molesters who are in the country illegally being released back into society instead of deported. Gillum dismissed that claim as another false attack from his opponent.
Questions about Gillum’s travel and an ongoing FBI investigation into possible Tallahassee government corruption are expected to dog his campaign as Election Day nears. No one has been charged by the FBI, but Gillum’s travels are the subject of a state ethics probe.
Gillum, who has served as mayor since 2014, said he received the ticket from his brother, and he assumed his brother had obtained the ticket by swapping it for a Jay-Z concert ticket he had. In a text message, though, before the outing, Corey wrote that a developer later learned to be an undercover FBI agent was supplying the tickets.
With 13 days until Election Day, Vice President Mike Pence is scheduled to stump for DeSantis on Thursday in Jacksonville. Trump will follow with a rally in the Fort Myers area on Oct. 31. Gillum will be campaigning Thursday at three South Florida college campuses — Florida Atlantic University, Florida International University and Florida Memorial University.
More than 1.4 million have already voted. Early voting in South Florida will run through Nov. 4. Election Day is Nov. 6.
The debate was hosted by the Florida Press Association and Leadership Florida and was broadcast on local stations statewide.