Tag Archives: Florida

The Miami Herald reports: In Miami Beach, getting pulled over by city police didn’t just mean a ticket for some drivers. Officers also handed them an invitation to check out a website selling Trump 2024 merchandise. A city police flier in circulation until last week explaining how to resolve minor traffic tickets online dropped a crucial hyphen for a Miami-Dade …

Orlando’s ABC News affiliate reports: An intoxicated passenger who was barred from boarding an airplane at Orlando International Airport rode away from the gate on a motorized suitcase as a police officer on a bicycle followed behind her, court records and newly released video shows. “We’re going to have a bike pursuing a suitcase in a minute,” an Orlando police …

Florida Politics reports: A bill enabling businesses to sue governments and halt enforcement of local ordinances is heading to its final committee after again advancing on a party-line vote Wednesday. The measure (HB 403) would freeze any ordinance for 90 days if a filed lawsuit claims its rules are “arbitrary or unreasonable.” The bill would also require governments to draw …

Florida Politics reports: Republican Sen. Marco Rubio holds a 7-point lead over Rep. Val Demings, the presumed Democratic frontrunner hoping to take him on in the November General Election. That’s according to a new Mason-Dixon Florida poll. Rubio holds a 49% to 42% advantage over Demings among registered voters in the new survey.  The findings don’t offer entirely good news …

The Washington Post reports: A real estate broker was leaving the parking lot of a Mexican restaurant in Fort Myers, Fla., when a sheriff’s deputy pulled him over for an alleged traffic violation. The Dec. 16 stop escalated when Deputy Niko Irizarry, with the Lee County Sheriff’s Office, said he suspected there were illegal substances in the car. With the …

Florida Politics reports: Gov. Ron DeSantis would likely win re-election with a majority of the vote, according to the latest poll of the 2022 gubernatorial race. Polling has consistently shown DeSantis leading each of the three Democratic candidates seeking to unseat the Republican incumbent in November. On Tuesday, data released from Mason-Dixon reaffirmed DeSantis’ lead, showing him winning 51% or …

The Associated Press reports: A judge in Florida has dismissed a defamation and conspiracy lawsuit former neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman had filed against the parents of Trayvon Martin, the teen he fatally shot almost a decade ago in a case that drew international attention about race and gun violence. Judge John Cooper in Tallahassee dismissed all counts against all …

Florida Politics reports: An increasing number of Republican lawmakers have publicly turned on Rep. Anthony Sabatini as he skips Session to campaign out-of-state. The Howey-in-the-Hills Republican, who is filed for Congress in Florida’s 7th Congressional District, has missed a significant portion of the Legislative Session. And he’s the only member of the part-time Legislature to miss so much of the …

The Associated Press reports: The Florida Supreme Court told Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis on Thursday it will not answer his question on whether a Black congressman’s district is unconstitutional. DeSantis has interjected himself into the once-a-decade process of drawing new congressional maps, something highly unusual for a governor to do. The House and Senate have considered maps that largely left …

CNN reports: President Joe Biden on Tuesday took the rare step of weighing in on a controversial Florida bill that would ban certain discussions about sexual orientation and gender identity in the classroom, telling LGBTQ kids that he has their back. The message from the White House on Tuesday condemning Republicans for advancing the bill was a rare step as …

The Associated Press reports: Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo on Tuesday declined to disclose whether he has received a coronavirus vaccine during a contentious confirmation hearing where Democrats pressed the state’s top doctor to promote the shots. Ladapo, appointed in September by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, has attracted national scrutiny over his close alignment with the Governor in opposing …

Miami’s ABC News affiliate reports: Miami-Dade Elections Department 2021-22 records show more than 5,000 registered Democrats switched their party affiliation to Republican. The increase comes just as more victims of third-party registrations are coming forward to report that their voter registration was altered without their permission. All of the victims were older than 65 years old, live in Miami-Dade County, …

CNN reports: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis appeared Monday to voice support for a controversial state bill that would ban certain discussions about sexual orientation and gender identity in the classroom. DeSantis, a Republican, said it was “entirely inappropriate” for teachers and school administrators to have conversations with students about their gender identity, saying that, in some schools, children are told …

The Tampa Bay Times reports: A Pinellas County judge has dismissed a lawsuit centered on a 2020 presidential election wager, ruling that the bet was illegal in Georgia, where the plaintiff resided, as well as void under Florida law. The saga started in November 2020, when St. Petersburg resident Sean Hynes and an acquaintance, Jeffrey Costa of Atlanta, agreed to …

Florida Politics reports: A bill that would place a constitutional amendment on the ballot expanding Florida’s recall law to include county officers in all Florida counties, passed the House Public Integrity and Elections Committee with only two dissenting votes. Under Florida law, “county officers” include each county’s Clerk of Courts, Property Appraiser, Sheriff, Supervisor of Elections, and Tax Collector. If …

Florida Politics reports: On Sunday’s Fox and Friends, Florida’s Attorney General stood with supporters of the Canadian anti-vax “Freedom Convoy” against the GoFundMe service, suggesting that what the fundraising platform contemplated this weekend could have been illegal. Ashley Moody told a Fox News audience that she and Gov. Ron DeSantis will not tolerate threats, such as that made by GoFundMe, …

The Associated Press reports: Three people have been arrested days after a Jewish passerby was attacked by a group of self-proclaimed neo-Nazis who yelled antisemitic slogans outside a central Florida shopping plaza over the weekend, authorities said Friday. Group leader Burt Colucci, 45, and Joshua Terrell, 46, are each charged with battery with a hate crime enhancement, while Jason Brown, …

The Miami Herald reports: Four young men [photo above] did not act in self-defense when they beat up two gay men during a South Beach gay-pride celebration, a Miami judge ruled on Friday. Circuit Judge Ariana Fajardo Orshan declined to dismiss the battery charges against Juan Carlos Lopez and three others who’d been charged in the high-profile attack in April …

MSNBC reports: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ handpicked state surgeon general, Dr. Joseph Ladapo, is currently doing the job, but he still needs to be formally confirmed by the Republican-led state Senate. To that end, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement did a routine background investigation. It apparently didn’t go especially well. The Tallahassee Democrat newspaper reports that Ladapo’s former supervisor …

The Orlando Sentinel reports: Videos of Apopka police officers pulling a Black man from his car before hitting and stunning him in his driveway in November 2019 resurfaced on social media this week, soon after the man filed a lawsuit against the city. The officer who used a Taser on the man and wrote his arrest report, Nathaniel Tuck, resigned …