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

- Next on WEDU, the January 6th committee hearings get underway.

Florida has the highest number of January 6th, defendants in the country.

The governor vetoes more than $3 billion from the state budget.

After the recent rash of mass shootings, Florida Democrats want a special session, while the governor wants Floridians to be able to carry a weapon without a permit.

And shake ups in the race for governor and Congress, all that, and more right now on Florida This Week.

(upbeat orchestra music begins) (upbeat orchestra music continues) - Welcome back.

Joining us now in the panel, Maya Brown, is a political consultant and a Democrat, Sharon Calvert writes the blog "Eye on Tampa Bay" and is a Republican.

Mac Stipanovich is an attorney and not currently affiliated with a political party.

And Zac Anderson is the political editor for the Sarasota Harold Tribune.

Great to see all of you.

So, on Thursday, in their first public hearing, members of the house panel investigating the January 6th insurrection at the US Capitol said the attack was an attempted coup, planned in advance.

And the direct result, the former president Donald Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

In never before seen video of extremist groups leading the deadly siege and testimony from Trump's inner circle, the January 6th committee contended that Trump's repeated lies about election fraud and his public effort to stop Joe Biden's victory led to the attack and imperiled American democracy.

Committee Vice Chair Liz Cheney, outlined the evidence that will be presented over the next several weeks.

- On the morning of January 6th, President Donald Trump's intention was to remain president of the United States, despite the lawful outcome of the 2020 election, and in violation of his constitutional obligation to relinquish power.

- [Rob] The opening testimony on Thursday showed how even those close to the president did not believe his claims of a stolen election.

- I had three discussions with the president that I can recall.

One was on November 23rd, one was on December 1st, and one was on December 14th, and I've been through sort of the give and take of those discussions.

And in that context, I made it clear I did not agree with the idea of saying the election was stolen and putting out this stuff, which I told the president was (beep).

- Other videos showed leaders of the extremist Oath Keepers and Proud Boys preparing to storm the Capitol to militantly back up Trump.

To date more than 800 people have been arrested nationwide, charged for their alleged role in the January 6th riot.

Florida tops the list of most erected with, arrested rather, with 87 people charged with criminal acts so far.

And Mac, let me start with you.

What does this say?

What are the, the first day of hearings and testimony?

What does that say about the state of American democracy?

- Well, I thought the, of course I'm old enough to watch the Watergate hearings.

I thought the hearing last night was very compelling, very dramatic.

And of course, I thought it was very persuasive.

I don't know how much difference the hearings will make when it's all said and done.

Because those who need to watch, won't be watching because they don't want to hear it.

They don't want to believe it.

They prefer their current opinions rather than to see any evidence.

- Sharon, what did you think of the hearings?

The Thursday hearings?

- Well, I think there is a problem, whether people are actually paying attention to this committee, and you know, I kind of like think that the headline from the New York Times kind of let the cat out of the bag, by saying that it was giving Democrats a chance to recast the midterm message, which basically admits that, you know, this is politically motivated.

So, you know, the one thing that the committee has to have is credibility.

So we shall see, but I don't think that anyone really learned anything new last night.

We'll see going forward.

But again, the biggest, the biggest point will be, are people paying attention when they're dealing with gas prices, skyrocketing inflation, baby formula shortages, immigration border crisis.

I mean, every day they're hit with everything impacting their life that day, and whether they wanna stay and watch this is, is going to be interesting to find out.

- And Sharon, let me just ask you a follow up.

I mean, what Cheney said at the start was that Trump directed a coup against the US government.

- Well, she got, she truncated his actually comment.

So I don't know, why did she do that?

- All right, Maya.

- She spoke what she spoke.

- What do you think of the first day of hearings?

- Well, Rob, one thanks for having me, and two, I actually didn't watch the entire thing.

One, I think it was difficult for me to watch, seeing as though, one having lived through all of the protests that happened kind of in response to Black Lives Matter and seeing a very different response to what's happened on January 6th in the insurrection.

I do hope that this hearing kind of, as Mac said, brings to light more information and provides context about folks who really tried to overthrow our democracy, because, you know, folks were saying that there was an election that was stolen.

And so yes, credibility is gonna be important.

But again, I think the footage speaks for itself, but this is not an attempt at, you know, making sure that Democrats maintain electoral victories in the midterm, this is making sure that our democracy, what our founders founded this country on is stable and that we aren't, you know, making sure that our partisan beliefs are gonna up heed them.

- And Maya, I was looking at the numbers, The Associated Press said that 10,000 people were arrested during the course of the Black Lives Matter protest a couple of years ago.

800 people were arrested at this incident in the Capitol.

You said it was difficult for you to watch.

How do you think it would've turned out had it been a different group of people?

Maybe Black Lives Matter protesters attacking the Capitol.

- I mean, I think you said it in the answers on who, the numbers of folks who got arrested, right?

Like in Florida, we had a knee-jerk reaction to the Black Lives Matter protest, of folks of all walks of life condemning the fact that unarmed black folks were being murdered at the hands of law enforcement, right?

And that knee-jerk reaction was HB One.

And so why don't we have this type of legislative effort from the states, from folks in Congress, to condemn what happened, again, with this arbitrary belief that the election was stolen when Vice President Pence confirmed that the election was done and it was accurate.

And so I definitely think that this outlines the differences of, of race in this country for sure.

- Zac, one of the most interesting parts of the hearing, I think was the revelation.

And there were some revelations that there was the secret meeting at the White House.

And, one of the people at that secret meeting at the White House a few weeks before January 6th, lives in Sarasota.

- Yeah.

Mike, Mike Flyn who, you know, was the president's first national security director as Sarasota county resident.

He was among a number of Floridians who were highlighted in this first January 6th committee hearing.

It was really interesting to see, you know, the, the committee hearing really focused to a large extent on some of the extremist groups that were involved in January 6th, like the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers and Florida just has a ton of these individuals who were arrested for their involvement in January 6th, roughly a little bit more than a third of all the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers who were arrested for January 6th, live in Florida, including the former leader of Florida, Enrique Tario, who was really featured prominently in last nights committee hearing.

He, you know, met with the, one of the, the really fascinating revelations was that he met with the Oath Keepers leader, Stewart Rhodes, in a parking garage on the night before January 6th.

So it looks like they're really trying to tie these extremist groups to some pre-planning to this event.

And it'll be fascinating to see if they tie people in Trump's orbit to these groups.

But a lot of the people from these extremist groups were from Florida.

- Zac, I gotta ask you about Sarasota, because Mike Flynn lives there, and also a lot of people that are leaders in the movement to deny the results of the 2020 elections live in Sarasota.

Why have so many of those folks congregated in your community?

- It's, it's really a good question.

I don't know that there's a simple answer.

You know, Mike Flynn moved down because his brothers lived in the area.

So he was sort of drawn by family connections.

But I do think this is an area that sort of exemplifies the changing face of the GOP.

This used to be an area that was known for having more moderate Republicans, Republicans who were maybe fiscally conservative, but maybe not so conservative on social issues.

And, and you've really seen the, the type of Republican in this area change.

You know, now we have Greg Steube as a Congressman for this area who is very, very conservative, very MAGA and pro-Trump.

Joe Gruters, who's the chair of the local GOP was one of the first big Trump endorsers in Florida and was the co-chair of his campaign.

So I think you've seen the, this area really come to exemplify how the Republican party has changed.

And, and you're seeing a lot of these new, very MAGA Republicans, prominent ones move here.

- Well, we'll see if the Democrats and the other members of the committee can prove what they claimed on Thursday night in the follow up hearings.

Well, last week, the governor vetoed a record $3.1 billion from the state budget that goes into effect on July 1st.

- [Narrator] Among the items cut, 2 million meant to help low income women access long acting birth control, such as IUDs and Depo-Provera shots.

83 new positions that agriculture director, Nikki Fried had requested for her agency to handle concealed weapons permits, 35 million for new spring training facility for the Tampa Bay Rays in Pasco County, the baseball team has tweeted messages against gun violence and donated money to a gun control group.

The governor said the veto was not about the Rays position on guns.

He said he doesn't support taxpayer dollars going to professional sports stadiums.

75 million for a new ocean science center for the University of South Florida's St. Petersburg campus, 20 million to begin building a new H Lee Moffitt Cancer Center.

350 million for Lake Okeechobee aquaphor storage wells.

And $3 million to save 14 acres of undeveloped forest on West Klosterman Road in Northern Pinellas County.

Some of the projects vetoed by the governor were favored by house speaker, Chris Sprowls, and Senate President Wilton Simpson, who are both leaving office.

- Zac, let me go back to you on this one.

It is interesting that the house speaker and the senate president wanted a lot of these projects and the governor kind of poked them in the eye and said, no, including Senator Simpson saying that he wants more money for birth control for women.

- Yeah.

I think one of the most interesting things about the governor's vetoes was really just like the signing ceremony, where he had these legislative leaders there with him when he signed the budget and announced these vetoes, and he was just massacring some of their projects and they were standing right next to him, smiling.

It was a real power move by the governor.

It shows how much, you know, clout he has within the Republican party in Florida, that the people would just stand there and smile and nod as, as he, you know, cut just large, large projects, big priorities of theirs from the budget.

It was kind of a flex on his part.

- And Sharon, do you think that this proves though that the governor is, a good steward of the public money?

- Well, first of all, I wanna add that he also signed $1.2 billion in tax relief for all Floridians.

So, that was the largest tax relief, as well as, you know, the largest veto.

But I also believe that he, and I believe he may have stated this, that he is looking down the road and he's very concerned about a recession.

So, you know, down the road, hopefully the economy will come back, it'll roar.

Some of this stuff may come back, who knows.

So a couple things, one, the recession that may occur.

And two he's also looking for the agencies who provide money, that are funded, that certain things need to be funded by those agencies who actually do it.

So instead of coming out of an appropriation bill.

So I think in that regards, you know, he's doing the right thing to make sure that Florida is prepared for some economic uncertainty.

And again, we hope that good times come along and, you know, I'm sure that we'll see some of those appropriations again.

And he also shows that he will stand up to leadership.

- Okay, well, after the recent mass shootings in Uvalde, Texas and Buffalo, New York, Democrats here in Florida are calling for a special session of the legislature to address gun violence.

- [Narrator] Democratic lawmakers say they want to try to pass universal background checks, bans on large capacity magazines, and an expansion of Florida's red flag law.

But there's no chance Democrats will get the special session.

They don't have enough votes in Tallahassee to call one, and the governor is opposed.

Ron DeSantis says Democrats efforts to reform gun laws here would quote, "kneecap the rights of law abiding citizens", and that Democrats were going after second amendment rights.

The governor wants to expand the visible presence of guns in the state.

In May, he vowed that before he leaves office, he wants a state law that would allow residents to carry concealed guns without needing permits and predicted that the Florida legislature will get it done.

- And Sharon, let me start with you on this one.

It looks like the governor wants to bring up constitutional carry at the next session of the legislature at the beginning of next year.

And, I'm wondering, what do you think the definition of constitutional carry is?

Because everybody's got a different definition.

Does it mean that people will now be able to go without permits and carry guns around the state into a McDonald's, for instance?

- Well, each state, there's 25 states, which is 50% of the states, have constitutional carry laws, which is also known as permitless laws, which means you don't have to get a permit to own a gun.

And that's for, you know, many of those states also have, it's for concealed weapon.

So open carry is different.

Open carry 31 states have, though you may still need a permit to open carry.

And some states are permitless and open carry, and Vermont has never had any permit at all in the history of the state.

So yes, they are different.

And the bill that actually was, I guess, filed last year and failed was a constitutional carry, which is a permitless carry to be able to own a gun without a permit.

- Maya, what do you think of that?

What do you think about permitless carry?

- Listen, I think folks across the nation, and particularly in Florida, are generally opposed to permitless carry, right?

How do we make sure that, especially when we're talking about in context of our children, we can't say we are pro-life, particularly Republicans say that they're pro-life and are totally okay with magazine capacity of guns and automatic, semiautomatic weapons being on our streets that are actually causing mass shootings at our schools, and not being able and not wanting to have political courage to do anything about it.

So I think that we can't kind of go into this, making this a partisan issue.

We have to make sure that folks on our streets are safe.

And, it's been a call by Democrats to have a special session on this and the governor and Republican leadership in both chambers won't act on it because it is, you know, it's gonna rile up their base.

But it's not, again, Democrats don't wanna take away folks guns.

We wanna make sure that it is handled in a way that folks can have their concealed weapons and do so in a, in a situation that folks can remain safe in our communities.

- Mac, the governor is vowing to do this before he leaves office.

He wants to have constitutional carry or permitless carry in Florida.

- I think there's some substance here.

And then I think there's some election year gamesmanship.

He talks about constitutional carry and, you know, while Sharon's right about many of her statistics and some of her definitions, DeSantis hasn't said, so what he gets to have happen here is, is that everybody gets to hear what they want to hear.

Maya gets to hear, oh, it'll be the current concealed carry laws.

You can't take a gun into school.

You can't take it into a courtroom.

You can't take it into a bar.

You just don't have to get a permit before you carry your concealed weapon.

But you know, the Proud Boys and all of those folks who are, we were talking about earlier, who were so prevalent in Florida, they hear open carry, and DeSantis hasn't said, and he probably won't say before election day, cause everybody gets to vote what they, for what they think he means.

And we'll have to wait until next year and see what he means.

But I don't think it'll be open carry.

- Sharon, let me ask you this, does the availability of more guns, does it decrease our safety?

- You, well, the fastest growing demographic of new gun owners is black women.

And that began during 2020, during the summer of the riots.

So, statistically it's interesting because many of the states who have the strictest gun laws are, are seeing just skyrocketing crime rates.

- Hmm.

And Maya, what would you say back?

Or Mac, do you want to answer that first?

- Well, the states with the strictest gun laws, California, you know, city of Chicago, none of that works if two blocks away, you know, they're selling guns off the back of pickup trucks.

All of the guns in Chicago come from Indiana.

And so if you're gonna have an effective gun control laws in America, it's like whether it's universal background check or whatever, it's gonna have to be nationwide.

You can't, you can't have people manufacturing Ar-15's in Georgia and ship them in semis, and then say that Florida's gun laws don't work.

- Maya, what about...Sharon.

- Don't forget.

- Go ahead.

Share.

- Don't forget.

What then Senator Biden said there in 1985 that, you know, more gun, more gun laws, the, the criminals don't care whether there's gun laws.

- Okay.

Maya I'm gonna let you wrap it up.

Maya, what would you say?

- Listen, I think it is a huge induction to say that we now have rising crime because more black women have guns.

And, certainly have concern and would like to learn more about where that statistic comes from, particularly as it relates as a reaction to kind of the Black Lives Matter protests and what we're calling riots.

I think it, I would push back and, and ask Sharon to provide receipts on if black women are going through the concealed carry and permit process.

And what does that mean to be able to be armed, particularly me, when I know that Proud Boys are all across the state of Florida, right?

How do I make sure that I'm protecting myself too?

- All right.

Well, to be continued.

Well, one of the Democrats running for governors dropped out of the race.

- [Narrator] State Senator Annette Taddeo announced this week that she's leaving the democratic primary for Florida governor to run for a US House seat in South Florida.

That's Florida's 27th congressional district, which includes all are part of Miami, Miami Beach, Coral Gables, and Kendall and Miami-Dade County.

That seat is currently held by a Republican, and two Republicans have dropped out of the race for the new 15th congressional district, which includes Northeast Hillsborough, Southeast Pasco and parts of Lakeland.

Former Congressman Dennis Ross announced he is withdrawing from the crowded Republican primary.

Also, retired green beret and military contractor, Jerry Torres will shift from that race to a Tampa race.

The Lakeland Republican now plans to challenge Congresswoman Kathy Castor, a Tampa Democrat, who is seeking her ninth term in Congress.

- Maya, let me ask you about this.

If Annette Taddeo drops out of the governor's race as she has, does that help Nikki fried, or does that help Charlie Crist?

Or how would you rate that?

- Well, Rob, I think that what's been interesting about this primary is that Governor Crist has continued to lead the polls.

And I don't know if identity politics really kind of makes a difference anymore in some of these races.

You know, it's really a matter of who is going to have the most effective message to make the most effective appeal to the voters.

Right?

Sharon mentioned this earlier, folks are concerned about gas prices and inflation, the rising cost of property insurance and housing.

And it's making sure, I think it's gonna, you know, see if the governor or Commissioner Fried has a plan to actually address this, and who actually has the best plan to take on Ron DeSantis and win.

- All right, well, before we go, what other news story should we be paying attention to?

And Maya, let's go back to you.

The other big story of the week.

What else is happening out there that we should be paying attention to?

- Listen, there's qualifying is happening next week.

And so with redistricting, it's gonna be interesting to see where folks wind up running and where they're gonna appear on the ballot.

So next week, Friday, we'll see, who's gonna qualify to be on the ballot.

- Especially with the newly drawn districts.

All right, Mac, your other big story?

- Well, this is probably not very profound, but I think last night's committee hearing was just a teaser.

You know, we've talked about, well, we didn't learn all that much new.

I think we're gonna learn some new things before this is over.

- You think the Democrats will, and the, the Republicans on the committee will be able to prove what they claim they were about to prove?

- Well, you know, whether they can prove it or not is, is kind of a subjective thing.

But I think that they will bring forth, forth some facts unknown to us now, that will be very surprising, and to anybody who has an open mind, very persuasive.

- All right, Sharon, your other big story.

- Well, now that the $18 billion transit tax is on the November ballot, I expect the county to approve $700,000 of tax dollars to go towards hiring an engineering firm, HNTB, who is also bringing their PR marketing, political consulting and strategic messaging partners to launch a campaign, to tell voters they need to vote for the tax.

And this is actually worse than the 2016 Parsons Brinkerhoff debacle, because this time the tax is on the ballot.

So they're really walking on some thin ice to skirt our election laws, and it's quite egregious.

- And, and this is happening in Hillsborough County and, and Sharon, they still haven't figured out what to do with the money they've already collected.

- Absolutely.

And I think people will remember that in November, because I doubt that it's gonna be resolved by then.

- All right, Zac, your other big story.

- My story is the governor's press secretary, Christina Pushaw, registering as a foreign agent.

The Department of Justice contacted Pushaw about registering as a foreign agent because she worked in Georgia, not the state of Georgia, but the former Soviet state of Georgia, which is now an independent nation.

Pushaw worked there between 2018 and 2020.

And she's been very, you know, open about this.

It's not something she's hiding at all.

You know, she's talked about it extensively on Twitter, it's on her resume, but apparently she should have registered as a foreign agent because of that work, and she didn't until recently when she was contacted by the Department of Justice.

She listed that she made $25,000 during her time working in Georgia.

You know, again, it's not something that she's hiding, but notable, she's a pretty high profile figure at this point.

- All right.

Well, Zac Anderson, thanks a lot.

And Mac Stipanovich, Maya Brown and Sharon Calvert, thank you so much for joining us this week.

- Thanks.

- For having me.

- Thanks for watching, it's pledge week here at WEDU and your support helps this program as well as the PBS NewsHour.

You can pledge at wedu.org or call the number on your screen.

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

(upbeat orchestra music begins) (upbeat orchestra music continues) - [Narrator] Florida This Week is a production of WEDU who is solely responsible for its content.