Close look shows state GOP was just badly out of touch

Since the election, there has been much soul searching concerning the state of the Republican Party. What is astounding is most of what is being discussed should have been obvious to all prior to the votes being tallied.

And while this post-election introspection has spurred a widespread analysis of the Grand Old Party as being the party of only the grand and the old, we can look to the state of Florida for some valuable lessons.

As a Republican elected official for the past 16 years, I foundmyself increasingly disagreeing with the direction of the party. Had I changed orwas the party moving more to the right? Was the party losing touch with women, the middle class and Hispanics?

Let’s look at some of the policy decisions made by a Republicandominated Florida Legislature and a Republican governor over the past few years.

While criticizing government spending, the Legislature found hundreds of millions of dollars to shower on businesses to relocate or expand operations in Florida.

At the same time, the Legislature, with the governor’s approval, cutK-12 education funding by over a billion dollars in 2011and partially restored it in 2012. They also tag teamed to cut higher education funding of our11 state universities by $300 million but thought it the right time to create a 12th university.

Very profitable friends of party leaders made outwell in our tough budget years with corporate subsidies and sweetheart deals— including $1.2 billion for CSX Corp. and hundreds of millions forU.S. Sugar Corp.

While the Legislature declaredwar on thewelfare state and those collecting unemployment, its actions also targeted our public employees. During the 2010, 2011and 2012 sessions, billswere introduced to privatize prisons, potentially putting thousands of corrections officers out ofwork with no proof of any cost savings; to drastically change healthcare and pension benefits for existing state employees; to tie teacher pay to student performance with no regard to the makeup of the classroom and with no funding source to offer merit pay.

Having angered many in the middle class the Legislature turned its attention to our judiciary. First upwas a proposal to add three justices to the Florida Supreme Court, then to split the court into fiveperson criminal and civil divisions. The rationalewas caseload. After itwas noted the highest court did not have a caseload issue but that lower courts needed funding to address their heavy caseload, legislative talking points quickly shifted to address an activist court thatwas ruling against the Legislature and the governor.

A coalition of Republicans and Democrats killed that proposal in the Senate but allowed a constitutional amendment to appear on the ballot that gave greater power over the courts to the Legislature. That amendmentwas soundly defeated, along with the Republican Party’s attempt to prevent three Supreme Court justices from being retained.

The Legislature loaded the ballot with11 constitutional amendments, hoping to bring out the party faithful with hot-button issues. All but three of the amendments failed. The plan may have backfired with voters motivated to defeat the social agenda items.

Perhaps the most damaging legislative movewas the blatant effort to drastically alter our voting process by limiting early voting and voter registration and by changing our presidential primary election date. Many questioned the motivation of this stealth move. Yet leadership claimed itwas necessary to combat nonexistent voter fraud.

Record numbers of new voterswere registered after the courts tossed out that portion of the law; new voters showed up in long lines to defy efforts to limit their voices and Florida, once again, was the last state to declare a winner in the presidential race.

If there is a silver lining for Republicans, it’s that party leadership is forced to confront what should have been selfevident— that our tentwas getting very small andwewere drastically out of touch with constituentswewere elected to represent. A course correctionwas badly needed.

Dockery