- [Narrator] This is a production of WEDU PBS, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Sarasota.

- [Rob] Coming up next, the house releases its' proposed maps, redrawing congressional districts and Democrats are not happy.

The Governor's proposing a pay increase for first responders.

There's an effort to make Florida's school board races partisan and Tallahassee begins another move toward preempting the power of city councils and county commissions.

All coming up right now on Florida This Week.

(upbeat music) - Welcome back, this week our panelists are: Travis Horn, is the President and CEO of Bullhorn Communications and a Republican, Janell Irwin Taylor is the Senior Editor at Floridapolitics.com.

Victor DiMaio is the President and CEO of DiMaio Associates and a Democrat.

And Rick Wilson is an author, commentator, political consultant and editor at large of "The Daily Beast" and the co-founder of the Lincoln project and thank you all for joining us.

Rick, let's start with you.

You want Donald Trump to run for President again in 2024, that's drawn some controversy from critics on the left who say you're underestimating Trump's strength.

You've said that you want Trump to clear the field of Republican rivals and you go on to say that we believe if we narrow the field and it's only Trump in 2024.

It's an easy choice for Americans to say no.

Are you underestimating Trump's appeal to voters?

- Well, first off, what that quote has been taken out, was a string of additional statements on it in a long Twitter thread.

It's not that I want Trump to run in 2024, It's that I have a clear-eyed view of the fact that he owns the republican party from top to bottom.

There is no other person in that primary field who will take that seat if Donald Trump is still alive, not in prison and ambulatory in any way whatsoever.

He is going to be the nominee.

So I am preparing for that.

Now, I do think that Donald Trump who can play a useful role in winnowing out a bunch of these people who are the wannabes, who follow on Trump with all the nationalism, the statism, the authoritarianism, and the dangers of this country, that this sort of new national conservatism poses.

And I think that Donald Trump in particular, will always turn on the people that supported him and that are imitating him, Rhonda Santos is a good example, Josh Hawley, Tom Cotton, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, all of them want to be president.

All of them will be devoured by this man.

Not one of them will survive a primary against him.

So it's not that I want him to run, I want Donald Trump to disappear.

I want Donald Trump to rot in a prison cell for the rest of his life, but he's not going to, unless there are some externalities that we can't predict.

So my statement was about the reality and getting ready for the reality of that.

In the meantime, do you wanna leverage Donald Trump's mania?

Do you wanna leverage his venom against any rival?

Do you wanna leverage that to break this hyper nationalist, hyper populist movement that we think is behind things like the January 6th attacks and is behind things like this rising tolerance inside of the maga world for political violence?

Yes, you wanna leverage that, you wanna push back against that, you wanna discredit those people in the future.

Look, I'm not a republican anymore, but I'm still a conservative, I'm a central right guy.

I believe that he poses an enormous threat to our democracy.

I also believe that we as a country, understand Donald Trump now a lot better.

There may be 70 million Americans that voted for him, but there were 83 million that didn't, there may be a lot of people who underestimated them in 2015 and 16.

I was not one of them.

If he runs again, it's gonna be tough.

It's gonna be a hard race, but I want the maximum amount of chaos on the republican side of the equation, if he runs again and when he runs again.

- Alright, Travis, as the republican on the set.

Do you think that it would cause chaos within the republican party if Trump ran again or do you think that people would fall in line behind the former president?

- As he said it's probably an expectation that Trump would run.

I just don't get if Rick and all these Lincoln project guys are so conservative.

Why are you hoping for this discord?

Why are you hoping for this meltdown?

I don't know, I'm glad to hear that he's... - [Rick] Because Donald Trump doesn't represent conservatives.

- I'm glad to hear that you're registered a Democrat now, cause I was gonna offer to send you... - No, I'm not, I'm an independent - A voter registration card because we don't need Republicans like that.

- I'm a registered independent.

- I'm not called the personality guy.

I don't agree with Trump on all of his stances.

And I certainly don't agree with the way he delivers his message all the time.

As someone who works in politics, works in public relations, I think obviously he had some deficits there and that's why we lost the middle and lost the election.

Thankfully Biden's running this economy in the ditch, so we probably will get it back and we'll get back the house as well.

- Rick, let's (indistinct) for the last word on this one.

- First off, I'm a registered independent at this time.

I am not a Democrat, okay?

Second off, I don't think that Donald Trump's version of nationalism and populism represents any conservative value at all.

They talk about using the power of the state to punish their business, so people who oppose them financially.

They talk about using executive power in a way that is broader than anybody in history.

And most importantly, Donald Trump's outright contempt for the constitutional process of our elections, has been a thing that you cannot interpret as a conservative value or principle.

- Donald Trump made you famous, You should send him a Christmas card.

- Alright, so... - You know what?

I didn't care about being famous at all.

I didn't give a damn about being famous, I was a perfectly happy guy well before Trump.

- Let's move on, the Florida house released its proposed congressional maps this week, and they appear to give republicans more of an advantage than the senate proposed maps released earlier this month.

- [Rob] Florida democrats are complaining that congressional maps proposed this week by the state house select committee on redistricting favor the Republican Party, which also controls the state legislature.

The house maps would give Republicans either a 17 or 18 seat majority of Florida's 28 congressional seats.

Two Tampa Bay area congressional seats, now held by democrats, Charlie Crist and Kathy Castor, would see major changes under the house maps, making those districts less safe for Democrats.

- The process of redrawing the new political maps, is far from over.

They need to go through the committee process and the house and senate must come to an agreement on the new lines.

So Janell, I think it's fair to say that one of the house maps is bad for the Crist seat and the Castor seat or one of them is pretty much the same.

How do you think this is gonna shake out?

- Well, like you said, it's entirely too early to tell.

Both of the maps actually, both of the house drafted maps, received an F from the Princeton Gerrymandering project for their partisanship.

They received mediocre grades in terms of geography.

So there is certainly a lot for democrats to be concerned about.

The impacts on congressional district 13 are actually a little bit less than what some people had expected if we're looking at that here locally, but it's not just the congressional districts that we're looking at.

This is a process that happens every 10 years.

So how this shakes out, is going to affect Democrats for the next 10 years.

And they have been in the minority for a very long time and they will stay that way if they experience any level of additional Gerrymandering through this process.

If you look up in Tallahassee with the districts up there, it looks very clear like there is an effort to draw Alison Tams out of the legislature and create a red district up there where currently her district is not.

So there are certainly depending on where you look within the state, there are a lot of examples of some of this, what some would describe as Gerrymandering, but as the house has pointed out, these maps were drawn to highlight what happens when you follow one priority versus another priority.

So you have one map that seems very aggressive and another one that's less so, and their take is that these are not final drafts, that these are meant to spark a conversation and get people thinking about how they should create the districts and make sure that they're adhering to the fair districts amendment from 2010 while also accommodating their own goals.

- So Victor, what power though do Democrats have because the democrats don't control the legislature, whatever the legislature comes up with, it's gonna lean Republican.

- The democrats have very little power in this, I mean, this was a project that the Democratic Party, excuse me, the Republican Party started a couple of decades ago.

They concentrated on the fact that a little less control the legislatures, because if we can get, if we can control the legislatures, you get the majority legislatures, we can control redistricting and we can consolidate our power and keep it for generations.

And they were very successful at doing this.

And far as it probably a primary example of fact that even though the parties have now pretty close in registration 50, 50 with the democrats edge losing a little bit, they control over 60 to 70% of the legislative power in Tallahassee and it's all because of redistricting.

It's not just in Tallahassee, it's the senate seats, it's a congressional seats, it's a county commission seats, all the way down to city council seats, but the Republicans were smart, they did it, they effected that change.

And this is the result, and I don't see the Democrats.

The only recourse at the time, even with the amendment process that asked for fair districts, was having a couple of maybe swing people on the supreme court in Florida.

But the supreme court of Florida now is a solid seven member conservative group and even in Washington DC, if you appeal it to Washington, you're gonna to have a majority conservative court.

And they've been less and less more reluctant to weigh into these redistricting issues.

So it's gonna be extremely difficult for the democrats to come back and effect any kind of change on these districts, I hate to say.

- Alright, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis says, he will propose pay increases and bonuses for first responders, when he unveils his budget proposal in the coming week.

- [Rob] DeSantis says he will propose a 25% pay raise for current law enforcement officers, and will raise the minimum salary for entry-level officers by 20%.

On top of that, DeSantis wants another $1,000 bonus, this coming year for law enforcement firefighters and emergency medical technicians, on top of the bonus they received during the last years' budget.

The governor's proposal came the same week it was revealed that when DeSantis pulled law enforcement officers off duty in Florida this summer and assigned them to patrol the Texas border with Mexico, it costs the state taxpayers at least $1.5 million and that number is likely to climb.

- And this week, the governor said he wants to spend more than a $100 million to boost funding for the Florida National Guard.

Most of that money will be used to expand the Florida National Guards existing readiness center in Miramar.

And build three new Florida National Guard armories, across the state.

Some of the money would be used to build what he calls a Florida state guard, a civilian militia force under control of the governor that could respond to state emergencies.

So Travis, is it time for law enforcement officers to have a pay increase.

(Travis laughs) - It's it's probably past time.

I was joking with Vic in the green room, I wouldn't do it, I just wouldn't do the job even with the raise.

Every time I interact with a law enforcement officer, I acknowledged that they have a really tough job and I think I'd probably rather be a middle school teacher than I would enter law enforcement as a career right now, it's just a really tough gig for them and certainly, I mean, a 25% raise for folks who haven't had raises in years, I think is fitting.

Again, I wouldn't do it for that.

And so I think these proposals are fair.

I like what they're doing for first responders firefighters.

I like the attorney general's move to lower good quality law enforcement officials who are tired of maybe the political climate and some of those blue states up north, lower them down here to the sunshine state.

I think that's a good thing and a good program.

We've even got folks moving companies in the private sector, reaching out to to those people to help, even sweeten the pot to get them to move down here with these incentives.

So it's a long overdue.

And as I mentioned as well, we've lost more law enforcement officials this year than any other year on record nationwide.

So that's truly astounding statistic.

- Rick, I want to ask you, the governor seems to be concentrating on law enforcement, on first responders and this new idea of creating a state national guard or a state guard.

And the Democrats have said that, well, this could turn into a secret police or of a vigilante militia.

What's your take on what the governor is trying to do here by upping the amount of money for these areas?

- Well look, in terms of compensating, first responders, firefighters, police, EMT, et cetera, I think that your point was correct.

There has been a degree of lag in pay and benefits for those folks, just as there's been an enormous lag of paying benefits for all state employees and all county employees over the years in Florida.

We have under-invested in a lot of those people, including teachers.

So I don't really have any real agita about that.

I think the state guard story is a little silly.

I don't think Ron DeSantis, he's not going to build the out of them, but this is also something that, part of this is trolling more than governing.

I mean, we have a lot of things in this state that are off the rails and a lot of things in this state that need attention.

And creating a state guard with a morphous powers, right now, it seems to be more trolling than anything.

We'll see how the proposal flushes out as we go forward.

- And Janell in an election year in 2022, when crime is supposed to be one of the big issues that Republicans are gonna run on, their anti-crime fight, what do you think this does for them in 2022?

- That's a great question because I think if you look at this from a political strategy prospective, what the governor's doing, whether you love him or hate him, is actually quite brilliant because when you're talking about the pay raises for the actual law enforcement officers themselves, there are very few people who would argue that is not something that should be happening.

We are losing law enforcement officers particularly in corrections and the Florida highway patrol because they are underpaid.

They are moving and flocking to other higher paid agencies into other states.

So he is accomplishing two things.

He's talking about a winning scenario that a lot of people can get behind, but at the same time, he's also catering to his base by saying, "Hey, we're not going to cow to this defund the police movement, we're going to support our law enforcement."

And he takes it one step further by saying, we're going to incentivize people who are in states, blue states as the way that he pitches it, to have them come here because we support our law enforcement.

So strategically, it's a very smart talking point.

- Let's move on, an effort to turn Florida school board races in a partisan contest, moved ahead in the Florida senate this week.

- [Rob] Sarasota Republican Senator Joe Gruters, is the sponsor of the bill which cleared the senate ethics and elections committee on a party line vote.

Gruters made the argument that elections would be more transparent by having candidates parties appear on the ballot.

Before it could become law, the question would appear on the November ballot next year and need the support of more than 60% of voters to change the constitution.

That's because school boards became non-partisan through a constitutional amendment that was passed by voters back in 1998.

- So Victor, Florida voters just decided in 1998 to make school board races nonpartisan.

Do you think they're want to turn it around this year?

Is it a good idea to turn that around and make them partisan races?

- You're right, this just passed recently as a constitutional amendment.

People are pretty much in favor of that idea.

It's a very altruistic idea.

Unfortunately, between Donald Trump and DeSantis, altruism is going down the toilet.

It's about as dumbest ideas as I think it's the split season between the Rays playing half their games in Canada.

So I don't like the idea.

Most people know nowadays who the Democrat and Republican is running on the school board.

The parties have gotten very much involved in even local school board races, there's been national stories about how the parties are targeting school board races, from the QAnon supporters, for school board races and Republican Party targeting school board races.

So, I think school board races are gonna be targeted either way, regardless of whether this happens or not.

But I don't know, at this point in time, I don't know if it got on the ballot, would it pass?

I personally don't have a feeling one way or the other.

We'd have to wait and see whether there's any interest in this at all.

- Okay, and Travis, do you think that the grassroots Republican Party wants to start to turn races like the school board and some of your other... Well, of course, cause I think it's still disingenuous for us to kind of suggest that hey, we already know who's the Democrat and who's the Republican, but let's just not have the label and let's say that we're being objective.

I think it's silly, I get the whole, like you can get anything, you can get pigs on the state constitution.

You can get all kinds of silly things on the state constitution.

I mean, let's just take the gloves off, I agree with Senator Gruters, let's be partisan, state your case.

- But, you could put lipstick on a pig and it's still a pig.

So it doesn't necessarily change at all.

- What Vic's point thought though that the QAnon and some of the other grassroots organizations are getting more involved in local elections and they want this, they want this kind of change.

- Black Lives Matter, all these other part of the far left organizations are doing the same thing.

So, six one half dozen on the other.

- I still think it's been out there for, it was done for a reason initially, but we have such a hyper-partisan environment right now, nationally and locally.

I just don't know, I mean, I really have, I still think it's a dumb idea personally.

- Rick this is really where the battleground is going on.

The culture wars are played out at places like school districts across the country, right?

- Right.

- And basically everything is culture war now in our politics.

Exactly.

- It's become this starkly divided tribalistic approach to everything.

And you will end up getting people on the Republican side who will have to be running for a school board who have to say, "Yes, I believe the big lie that Trump's election was stolen."

- [Rob] Right.

- And you have Democrats on the school boards who are gonna have to say, "I agree with all these AOC policies."

And it will depart further and further from what it's supposed to be, which is to focus on the education of children.

Look, I for one, wouldn't run for school board for a billion dollars because the army of Karens that comes in and screams at them, at every one of these meetings now, those people aren't even Republicans.

They are some like weapons grade crazy, coming out of the woodwork to these school board meetings because they believe in all this crazy conspiracy stuff.

And it's regrettable but inevitable that even down to the things that aren't supposed to be particularly partisan drivers, have become partisanized, if that's a word.

- Okay.

- And, can I just really quick add to that?

I think that there might be an appetite for this among the average voter, because things have become so partisan.

And I think what Senator Joe Gruters is doing here, might be something that's palatable to a lot of people across party lines if that was the reason that he was doing it, but I think you look no further than Virginia, where education was the crux of the gubernatorial race there and they all have their eye hyper-focused on these school board races because that is going to translate into talking points that they can use and races further up on that ballot.

(indistinct chatter) - Anyone trying to hang crazy on just for Republicans who show up at school board meetings, is going down the wrong path.

Either that you haven't been to a school board meeting lately (laughs).

- School board members that I know had to have 24 hour security when during a mass meeting.

And if you want to see crazy, go to Texas where even judges run under a label, so it's really crazy in Texas.

- They sick of the FBI on them.

- Lets go to our last topic, also in Tallahassee this week, a set of committee approved a measure that could lead to cities and counties facing lawsuits because of decisions that result in reduced revenue or profits for businesses.

- [Rob] The bill is sponsored by St. Augustine Republican Travis Hudson, who said his proposal is a more efficient form of preemption.

That's when the state legislature bars cities, and county governments from passing laws it does not like.

Republicans have complained about local laws that they say go too far, such as key west ban on giant cruise ships because they heavily pollute the water, or Miami Beach closing bars at an earlier time because of noise and crime or counties regulating nitrogen runoff from farms.

- And the new law would apply to such local ordinances and allow businesses to sue local governments if they suffered a loss in profits of at least 15%, because of the local ordinance.

Opponents say the law would have a chilling effect on county commissions and city councils while taking away their ability to fix local problems.

Rick, let's start with you.

This preemption idea has been going on in Tallahassee for a long time, where Republicans in control of the legislature have said no to many local ordinances.

This would be the mother of all preemption laws.

- I have to say, I think the fact that this becomes a cause of action for businesses to sue county governments over their constitutionally designated regulatory functions, I think it presents a whole bundle of legal and I'm just a simple country campaign consultant.

I'm not an attorney, but I think it presents a whole bundle of legal and constitutional challenges that nobody's really taken a hard look at yet.

And also, when I was a young man in the before times at Republican Party, believed and was told that local government is the best government, we should push everything down to the local level and regulate things that way rather than having it come from Tallahassee or Washington.

But what do I know?

- Travis, what about this law proposal?

Should businesses be able to sue if a city or county passes a law that hurts the business profit?

- Well, certainly I'm not opposed to them having recourse in the courts, but this statewide preemption, I'm not sure.

I think it's going to be sorted out in committee, as we've talked about it.

It's gonna get a lot of attention and a lot of lobbying.

And I think hopefully at the end of the day, the legislative process, our process will work itself out and we'll figure it out.

I actually agree with Rick, a government that governs least governs best and at the lowest level locally, is typically where we we've found that in the past.

And that's still a tenant by and large the Republican Party.

- And Victor, the Florida league of cities has come out pretty strongly against this, they've been already lobbying against it in Tallahassee.

- Yeah, I saw the committee meeting this week and it was ugly.

I mean, the cities, the counties are going crazy because can you imagine every disagreement that you have with the city council or the county commission, you can immediately run to court and sue because you disagree with them.

And then you may have a loss.

I mean, as someone does a little bit of lobbying at a local level with the county commission and city council, this would be a total nightmare if this were to pass and become law.

But I agree with 1000% really with Rick Rosen and with Travis, I just don't see how this works out.

It's going to be a mess.

- Janell, in an election year, which 2022 is, is the legislature likely to do something really, I don't want to use the word drastic, but major along the lines of this?

- I've learned to never say never with the Florida legislature, just when you think that something couldn't possibly happen for whatever reason, it does.

And I will say that because it's an election year, it might be something that in a non election year, might not really have any theme, but because this is going to be a hyper partisan election, this might be something that people are catering to their base with.

The idea that local governments tend to be, especially in urban cities, tend to be more liberal, more progressive than in Tallahassee.

So we've seen this trend increase more and more of attacks on home rule, where you have a conservative Tallahassee infiltrating itself into liberal cities.

And this might be something that some of the lawmakers, particularly in the lower chamber, might see as a way to drum up some support among their base.

- Okay, we're going to see really soon when the legislature starts next month.

We'll Travis, Janell, Victor and Rick, thank you for a great program.

And thank you for joining us.

You can send your comments to FTW@wedu.org, Florida This Week is now available as a podcast.

You can find it on our website or wherever you download your podcasts.

And from all of us here at WEDU, have a great weekend.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] Florida this week is a production of WEDU, who is solely responsible for its content.

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