florida

Markos Moulitsas leaks (on Twitter) the results of the latest Daily Kos/Research 2000 poll, which has Marco Rubio surging against Gov. Charlie Crist (R-Fla.) in the 2010 GOP Senate primary. The trendlines:
Charlie Crist – 47 percent (-10)
Marco Rubio – 37 percent (+26)
Likely Democratic candidate Rep. Kendrick Meek (D-Fla.), according to Kos, is a non-factor in [...]

Blogger Jordan Carmon catches Marco Rubio’s upstart Senate campaign putting together an ad against Gov. Charlie Crist (R-Fla.) — his opponent in the 2010 GOP primary — that looks and sounds exactly like a hard-hitting ad then-presidential candidate Barack Obama ran against Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) in 2008.
After the jump, check out the ads.

Lisa De Pasquale, director of the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, shares the news on Twitter. It’s another confirmation of Rubio’s prominence as the next, post-Doug Hoffman, conservative cause celebre.

This is starting to look like a trend — Florida Republican activists are demanding a “special emergency closed meeting” with state party chairman Jim Greer. Their stated reasoning is nebulous, but a quick scan of the names reveals some supporters of Marco Rubio, the dark horse candidate running against Greer’s preferred 2010 Senate candidate, Gov. [...]

There may be no better example of how the Senate’s holds and filibusters work now than this one — Sen. George LeMieux (R-Fla.), who holds his job because his political ally Gov. Charlie Crist (R-Fla.) appointed him in September, has placed a hold on the Obama administration’s nominee for ambassador to Brazil. Tom Shannon’s nomination [...]

The new Quinnipiac Poll suggests that conservative U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio is making gains in Florida. The new results among GOP primary voters, with trend lines:
Gov. Charlie Crist (R-Fla.) – 50 (-5)
Marco Rubio – 35 (+9)

Marc Caputo reports on the rumors of a Chamber of Commerce-sponsored poll in Florida that shows Gov. Charlie Crist (R-Fla.) slipping below the 50 percent line in his primary with former state Speaker of the House Marco Rubio. The rumored poll numbers, which differ by only “one or two points” among Caputo’s sources: Crist 44, [...]

This Sun-Sentinel video of Florida Republicans at a firing range pretty much speaks for itself. But did Robert Lowry, the Republican challenging Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.), really need to have the letters “DWS” next to the silhouetted head of his target?
h/t: The Hill.

Immigration advocates are wondering what the newly chosen Florida senator-to-be, George LeMieux (R), is going to mean for their campaign for immigration reform — as well as how the pick could influence how the growing number of Latino voters view the Republican Party.
Harsh questioning by Republicans of then-Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, confirmed earlier this [...]

Short answer: Hard to say.
Long answer: Retiring Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) has been a moderate voice on environmental policy — he voted for cloture on the Lieberman-Warner cap-and-trade bill last year — and his departure could deprive Democrats of one of their few potential Republican allies on this issue. Odds are that the environmentally friendly [...]