SARASOTA, Fla. (SNN TV) – By 1994, Democrats kept control of the Florida House, but Republicans won control of the Florida Senate. That wouldn’t be all Republicans would win that decade, and the scope of the governor’s power in Florida would begin to change significantly. In Part 5 of “Red, Purple, & Blue: A Sea Change in Florida Politics,” we look at the Jeb Bush years and the beginning of dramatic changes in Florida’s highest office.
DEMOCRATIC CONTROL SLIPS SOME MORE
After winning reelection in 1994, Democratic Governor Lawton Chiles had to work with a split legislature. And by 1997, the legislature was fully Republican, so one of the few big accomplishments he could muster with that opposition was using the Medicaid Liability Law to win a $13 billion lawsuit against tobacco companies.
It wasn’t just the legislature that was Republican; more and more Republicans were getting into offices across Florida under Florida’s then-Republican chariman Tom Slade.
“The plan was set in 1994,” said former Republican strategist Rick Wilson. “And he was the guy that set out to run Republicans candidates not all on the top, but for mosquito control district, for soil and water conservation board, for county commission, for school board, for city council. He built a farm team.”
And the 1990s, despite Democrat Bill Clinton as president, was a time Republican successes.
“Nationally, coming off of Clinton presidency, Republicans were winning races on the state level,” said Dr. Michael Binder, a professor and Director of the Public Opinion Research Laboratory at the University of North Florida.
Meanwhile, Jeb Bush, who lost the 1994 governor’s race, worked to smooth over his image by courting environmentalists. He also launched the Foundation for Florida’s Future as a think tank for conservative ideas and to shape conservative policies in state of Florida.
Bush would run for governor again in 1998 against Lawton Chiles’ former lieutenant governor, Buddy McKay. McKay may have worked side by side with Chiles, but he did not connect with voters as Chiles did. Jeb Bush won easily by 11 points and carried all but six counties, including carrying his home county of Miami-Dade. He was the first of more than 25 consecutive years of Republicans being elected Florida governor.
“I was in college [at that time], so I have never voted for a Democratic governor,” said Nikki Fried, chair of the Florida Democratic Party.
But Bush wasn’t simply the first Republican governor in a string of them.
“He was the impetus and the backbone to get things moving forward for Republican Party,” said Jack Brill, chair of the Sarasota County Republican Party.
Bush helped expand Republican majorities in both legislative chambers when he arrived — 25 out of 40 seats in the senate, and 73 out of 120 in the house.
BUSH’S CHARTER SCHOOL PLAN
“When Jeb came in, people didn’t see a seismic shift. He was in a time when things were pretty moderate in the state and governed like that in some respects,” Fried said. “But he did things that didn’t put Democrats on guard, because it was just little things here and there to move the needle. Obviously, some of the more important things was the seismic shift of how we deal with our higher ed system.”
Education was one of Governor Jeb Bush’s biggest priorities. His “A+ Plan for Education” was the state’s first voucher program. When he came into office, student performance in Florida declined in the previous decade.
Bush sold a voucher plan to Floridians in 1999 as healthy competition and a way for poor and working class parents to take children out of bad schools. Public school students who failed two out of four years would receive a voucher.
“From Yellow Dog Democrats to Red State Republicans” says Florida GOP chief Tom Slade and his successor insisted on party discipline. Bush, remember, headed a state political party that had been out of power for so long. Slade didn’t want new legislators to jeopardize Bush’s leadership. Democrats, meanwhile, were facing similar problems to when then-Governor Graham left the governor’s mansion.
Democrats, meanwhile, were facing a similar problem to when then-Governor Bob Graham left the governor’s mansion.
“Democrats were playing the same game that we were playing when in control and not recognizing we can be as aggressive,” said Fried. “Republicans had a 10 to 20 year plan in strategy, and the Democrats were so used to winning our state at a consistent basis and thought that Jeb was an outlier.”
Florida had voted Republican in the presidential elections from 1980 to 1992. Democrat Bill Clinton did win Florida in 1996. But Jeb Bush’s brother, George W. Bush’s win in Florida was arguably more significant. The year 2000 was the first time Florida voted for a Republican president, Republican governor, a Republican congressional majority, Republican cabinet, and significant majorities in both houses of the state legislature.
“And unfortunately, the Democratic Party back in the latter part of the 90s and the early part of the 2000s didn’t do anything to shift,” Fried said.
Democrats Bob Graham and Bill Nelson were U.S. Senators in Congress, but on state matters, Democrats now had little voice.
“Bush’s win and then subsequent redistrictings after that really changed the makeup of the legislature,” Binder said. “In some ways, even though we were a purple state for a couple decades, Tallahassee became as red as my shirt due to how some of those districts were drawn.“
LEGISLATURE CEDES POWER TO THE GOVERNOR
Between that and Jeb Bush’s easy reelection win in 2002, people saw more power being handed to the governor’s office.
“Once you’re in a state that’s comfortably one party,” explained Binder, “suddenly your ability and preferences for giving power to a governor – where you’re confident in your power going forward – changes. That then enables the governors to do a lot. And Bush started this, right? Bush centralized some authority in the governor’s mansion, more so than had been in the past, particularly in education and what was done there.”
Bush appointed Secretaries of Education, members of the state Board of Education, and had firm control of educational reform. Florida voters approved an amendment in 2002 to consolidate the Cabinet, so Bush got to appoint the Secretary of State and Education Commissioner.
HURRICANE JEB
Governor Bush was also associated with hurricanes. In 2004, he was front and center dealing with preparation and cleanup for Frances, Jeanne, Ivan, and the infamous Category 4 Hurricane Charley.
“[He provided] phenomenal support for the citizens that were in need,” Brill said.
With Hurricane Charley devastating Charlotte County, Jeb Bush would flip the coin that year in the Port Charlotte versus Charlotte High School football game, wearing a shirt that read, “Divided by a river, United by a storm.”
And being an election year, his brother, then-President George W. Bush, was front and center as well as he ran for reelection. He would win Florida that year by five points, which was a big margin for Florida standards. His Democratic opponent, Senator John Kerry, did manage to win Orange County, home of Orlando. 2000 and 2004 were the first two times a Democratic presidential candidate won Orange County since FDR in 1944.
In 2005, Jeb Bush was front and center in the preparation to and response after Hurricane Wilma. Before making landfall in Florida, it was the most intense hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic basin, with max winds at 185 mph. It made landfall as a Category 3 hurricane by Cape Romano and swept through South Florida.
Bush got high marks and was riding high. The question now was, who would take over his position after the 2006 election?
His successor elected in 2006 was popular with Republicans, at least at first. But that changed dramatically by the end of his successor’s first term.
In Part 6 of “Red, Purple, & Blue: A Sea Change in Florida Politics,” we dive into the Charlie Crist years, how the power of the Florida’s governor’s office changed, and the hug heard around the world.
Be sure to catch “Red, Purple, & Blue: A Sea Change in Florida Politics” every Sunday at 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. on SNN. You can watch all episodes on our website by hovering over “news” on the top of the page and clicking on “Politics.”