Democracy dies in darkness but liberty lives in light
Author: The Paradise Progressive
David Silverberg is a veteran journalist who spent over 30 years in Washington, DC covering a variety of topics, including Congress and politics. He moved to Southwest Florida in 2013 and lives in Naples.
Freedom of speech in Florida, with respect and appreciation to Norman Rockwell. (Illustration: AI for Silverberg4Florida/ChatGPT)
April 13, 2026 by David Silverberg, candidate for Florida Senate, District 28
Most people don’t know this but until now America had a secret superpower.
That superpower was the relationship of its federal, state and local governments.
They were like the three legs of a stool, each one contributing to the strength of the whole. Each one could provide support for the others and fill in if gaps appeared.
This was especially true when it came to disasters and nowhere more so than in Florida.
If a local government couldn’t cope with a disaster—like a hurricane—then the state government could step in. If the state government needed assistance, it could count on the federal government. Each form of government, by being autonomous and making its own decisions, by functioning in a democratic fashion according to law, and by cooperating together, created a remarkably strong whole that served the needs of all the people, especially in emergencies or under duress.
Until now.
Unfortunately, the stool has been broken. At the federal level Donald Trump bullies and threatens all other governments in his quest for complete domination and dictatorial power.
In Florida a governor seeking to rule in the Trump mold, an ambitious, ideologically-driven attorney general, a rapacious chief financial officer and an extremist legislature are waging war on “home rule,” the ability of town, city and county governments to make their own decisions.
Overruling home rule is usually called “preemption,” in the sense that state government preempts local government powers and takes decisionmaking out of their hands.
I call it “Big Tallahassee”—and it’s been going on far too long.
If elected state Senator from the 28th District, the area including Collier and Hendry counties and the Lee County area east of Route 75, I intend to do everything I can to protect, strengthen and respect local governments, not just in my district, but in all of Florida.
We just had an example of Big Tallahassee bullying right here in the 28th District; the state took away the City of Naples’ power over the airport within its city limits. The city will no longer name the commissioners on the airport’s board. Instead, they’ll be elected by the surrounding county.
This was proposed in House Bill 4005 by Florida House Rep. Adam Botana (R-80-Estero), whose district doesn’t include the City of Naples. He had no relationship to the airport. He just decided to strip the Naples city council of its authority and the rest of the Republican legislature and the governor went along with it. Naples’ desires were simply ignored and overridden.
(Botana is being challenged this year by Meg Titcomb, whose website, VoteMegTitcomb.com, will soon be operational.)
Other examples of Big Tallahassee overreach are passage and enactment of bills preempting local governments from planning land use changes after disasters (Senate Bill (SB) 180, 2025), stopping local governments from trying to reduce harmful environmental emissions (Committee Substitute (CS) /House Bill (HB) 1217, 2026), prohibiting local governments from using non-gasoline power tools (SB 290, 2026), or from seeking diversity in hiring decisions (CS/CS/SB 1134, 2026).
Big Tallahassee even stopped local governments from mandating heat breaks for workers (CS/CS/HB 433, 2024)—and that’s really saying something in Florida’s sunbaked fields. I swear, Big Tallahassee would have denied water to Jesus on the way to Calvary.
I’m not the only one saying this. On Sunday, April 12, in the Naples Daily News, in an op-ed titled “Naples is losing its constitutional right to local control,” authors Gregory Fowler and Stacy Vermylen pointed out that, “Taken together, these actions point to a clear shift. Home rule is no longer functioning as a broad constitutional right. It is becoming a shrinking space in which cities can act only where the state ban has not yet intervened.”
Even legislation with relatively benign intent, like the Live Local Act, which was introduced and shepherded to passage by Sen. Kathleen Passidomo in 2023, has preemptive provisions—prompting the Sarasota County Commission to challenge it in court.
So far, these preemptions have had three overall purposes. The first is to end home rule and strip local governments of the power to make land use decisions, like determining their own zoning and preserving the natural environment.
The reason for this is simple and obvious: developers, their legislative puppets (and in many cases legislators who are also land speculators, realtors and developers themselves) don’t want any interference as they pursue profits by paving over Florida. They truly don’t care what we local residents want, think or need.
A second purpose is to prevent any effort to prepare for the effects of climate change. Big Tallahassee, following Donald Trump’s dictates, denies that climate change exists. But it’s not enough that they themselves deny it, they want to force everyone else to deny it and ignore it—and this particularly means crippling local governments that are more alert, aware and awake to the dangers climate change presents.
Nowhere is this truer than in Collier County, part of the 28th Senate District I’m running to represent. With its over 20 miles of shoreline along the Gulf of Mexico, Collier County’s beaches are ailing and eroding, after being battered by repeated hurricanes, sea level rise and salt water intrusion.
But if Collier County ever tried to change its zoning or planning in order to cope with this, it would be stopped by Big Tallahassee.
The third reason for preemption is to aid Donald Trump’s efforts to turn back the clock to fossil fuel use and stop any kind of renewable energy. Trump is insisting on fossil fuels, fossil wars, fossil pollution and fossil costs—no doubt to pour fossil cash into his own pockets.
Big Tallahassee is completely on board with this. What else are we to make of a law that prohibits local governments from requiring use of electric leaf blowers or any other non-gasoline landscaping equipment to tend its lawns? Big Tallahassee is seeking a new Florida fossil age and it’s trying to send all of us the way of the dinosaurs.
It’s time we were no longer led by dinosaurs with fossilized thinking.
If elected to the Florida Senate I intend to do everything I can to preserve, protect and defend the integrity and autonomy of our local governments.
I can’t say I’ll be able to stop all preemption but I can certainly say that I’ll be on the look out for it. I’ll fight it any way and any time that I see it. I want the people of Florida to have a say in how they’re governed; that’s just Democracy 101.
When it comes to the City of Naples, I will certainly explore ways to rescind HB 4005.
The next assault on home rule will come in a special session of the legislature that is likely to be held in the coming weeks. In that session Gov. Ron DeSantis and his cohorts will attempt to end property taxes.
They’re painting this effort as an anti-tax way to improve affordability for Floridians. But that’s because they don’t dare criticize the real reason Floridians are in an affordability crisis—Donald Trump’s wars, tariffs and mismanagement of the economy.
So don’t buy their bull: it’s a trap and a con—and another assault on home rule and Florida’s local governments.
If property taxes are eliminated, local governments will be starved for revenue along with the policemen, firemen and school teachers they employ. Local services—think of your water supplies and sewerage, repairs to roads and bridges, even things like marriage and business licenses—will be crippled. Public schools, already under assault by Big Tallahassee, will be further damaged.
What is more, ending property taxes will only mean that everyday Floridians will ultimately pay more, adding to their affordability woes. The revenue lost by ending property taxes will need to be made up somehow. That will likely be in the form of sales taxes. Those taxes will hit everyday Floridians hard, while billionaires with huge mansions taking up large tracts of property will get off Scott-free and avoid paying their fair share to support the services and facilities that make their lavish lifestyles possible.
Ending property taxes is a bad idea hatched by Big Tallahassee to crush home rule and local governments. Floridians should fight it and I certainly intend to do so.
America’s strength has always been in its local governments where people have the most say. We shouldn’t let Big Tallahassee bully and order our towns around. If elected, I can’t promise a perfect outcome—but I can certainly promise a vigorous effort.
Florida should be run by and for Floridians; not developers, not speculators, not dinosaurs—and certainly not for the convenience and profit of Big Tallahassee.
I hope you agree and you’ll join me in this fight. Please volunteer and donate and in November vote for David Silverberg for state Senate from District 28.
It is a concentration camp because it concentrates detainees and inmates in a single location, whether for processing, deportation, punishment or incarceration. No one can be sure what’s happening there because outside observers cannot get in. American citizens—even as young as 15 years old—have been detained there without due process, a hearing or a chance to establish their innocence.
There have been reports of cruel and unusual conditions and appalling treatment that doesn’t meet basic American standards of justice or incarceration.
As if the injustice, indignity and injury of Alligator Alcatraz were insufficient, the monstrosity in the swamp has already cost the state of Florida over $600 million in taxpayer dollars, which the governor and his accomplices do not know if they can get back from the federal government.
Even if the state gets reimbursed for its past expenses, Alligator Alcatraz is costing Florida a million dollars a day to operate. That’s money coming straight out of our pockets at a time when we’re struggling to put food on the table and gas in the tank.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, the money being spent on Alligator Alcatraz is coming from funds designated for emergency management—responding to and cleaning up disasters like hurricanes. This state money is now extremely important because the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has been gutted for funding and personnel. Donald Trump wants the states to handle emergency response and even wants to do away with FEMA.
Given that, there’s no telling if there will be federal funding help us if the worst happens this hurricane season in Southwest Florida. So every cent needs to be reserved for state emergencies—not thrown away in a swamp.
Nor are the direct costs of this concentration camp the only concern; there are also the ancillary costs of defending it in court from its many legal challenges.
Additionally, there is no telling how much money went to contractors in sweetheart, no-bid deals and grotesque overcharges—like $92 million for porta-potties—and continue to go there.
Alligator Alcatraz was hastily constructed without the consultation or consent of the people of Florida. It is the brainchild of Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, who promoted and took credit for it. It was created without any regard to its impact on the sensitive environment of the Everglades or its effect on the people of the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians whose lands are adjacent to it.
The history of concentration camps is not reassuring: if not closed, Alligator Alcatraz is likely to go from a temporary facility to a permanent installation, and its capacity will likely expand. It will devolve from holding migrants with criminal records, to imprisoning innocent immigrants, to jailing US citizens, then dissidents, then political opponents, then factions in the ruling regime. And its mission will transition from detention to incarceration to death.
A dangerous progression: A patch worn by guards at Alligator Alcatraz bears an ominous similarity to a Nazi SS ‘Totenkopf’ insignia from World War II. (Photo: Miami Herald and historic archives)
What is more, Alligator Alcatraz is the first concentration camp in a string of concentration camps that the Trump administration is building to create an American gulag on the Soviet model. There’s Deportation Depot in north Florida, the Lonestar Lockup in Texas, the Speedway Slammer in Indiana and the Cornhusker Clink in Nebraska. On top of these are warehouses being obtained by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) directorate of the Department of Homeland Security to hold the people it purges in cruel and unusual conditions.
Alligator Alcatraz is not making Americans safer. If it were really just for rounding up criminal aliens then its mission would be fulfilled by now and it would be dismantled.
Instead, Alligator Alcatraz and the gulag system of which it is a part is a clear and present danger to all Americans, regardless of citizenship status. It threatens all Americans all the time and is an attack on our freedom and fundamental rights.
There is the possibility that if Donald Trump tries to overturn the results of the 2026 midterm elections and Americans protest in large numbers, they will be rounded up and held in this American gulag.
If elected, the very first bill I will introduce to the Florida Senate will close Alligator Alcatraz.
Nor do I want Alligator Alcatraz merely closed—I want it scraped from the face of the earth and replaced with a restored Everglades environment.
There is the possibility that Alligator Alcatraz might be closed by court order. This already happened once but it made no difference as the state appealed the ruling. There’s no telling how long the court process is going to take to resolve these issues.
If elected, I’ll not only introduce legislation to close it, I intend to investigate the contracting waste, fraud and abuse that went into its building and operation. I will work to claw back any ill-gotten gains and return them to taxpayers and hold guilty parties to account.
To his great credit, Democratic gubernatorial candidate David Jolly has just committed to closing Alligator Alcatraz if he’s elected governor. I applaud that position and endorse it. If Jolly wins his race and I win mine, I will do all I can in the Florida Senate to assist and support his efforts to close this camp.
As Alligator Alcatraz was the first concentration camp in a would-be Trump gulag, so it should be the first to be removed. Its termination will lift a dangerous threat to every American, whether native-born or immigrant.
Alligator Alcatraz is a moral stain, a financial drain—and it cannot remain.
April 8, 2026 by David Silverberg, candidate for Florida Senate, District 28
Like every Floridian, I’m being squeezed from above and below.
The “above” is the price I’m paying at the grocery checkout and fuel pump because of insane presidential decisions by Donald Trump: a war started without my knowledge or consent; gas prices skyrocketing because of his bad planning and lack of forethought; ridiculous tariffs that are turned on and off like a light switch, prompted by his whims and rages.
It’s not just me saying this. Sean Snaith, the Director of the Institute for Economic Forecasting at the University of Central Florida told an Orange County Commission meeting yesterday, April 7, that the “biggest cloud of uncertainty” facing Florida’s economy is the Iran war. Just as people were recovering from a previous round of inflation, “now here we go again with some costs of living being impacted by the conflict here with Iran.” Snaith said.
“The impact we’ve seen immediately [is] certainly at the gas pumps. We’ve seen it in the price of oil, price of natural gas. We’re starting to see it work its way through the economy, these higher prices,” he said, noting that all forms of transportation have already been hit, with everything from airlines raising their baggage fees to delivery companies adding fuel charges for shipping packages.
Thanks a lot, Donnie!
The “below” is the cost imposed by Gov. Ron DeSantis and an extremist Republican legislature—what I’m going to call “Big Tallahassee” from now on— driving up the prices of everything that we all need to live.
It’s not as though I’m living extravagantly or using hundred-dollar bills to light cigars. I’m trying to be frugal and sensible and keep my expenses within limits. Every other Floridian I know is trying to do the same.
But Big Tallahassee sees the everyday Floridian as its enemy and is doing everything it can to make us all poorer, sicker and sadder. It’s waging war on the state’s economy and every Floridian’s wallet.
Big Tallahassee’s war against all immigrants, whether documented or not, is bleeding Florida of the critical labor it needs for construction, farms and basic services at reasonable costs. That means higher prices in the grocery cart and just about every other business activity.
Big Tallahassee’s refusal to face climate change and help Floridians prepare for the worst that can happen is driving up insurance rates at the very time that we need more helpful insurance we can rely upon.
Big Tallahassee won’t face climate reality so living in Florida becomes riskier and more dangerous every year and insurance companies either leave the state, charge higher premiums or fail to pay out when the worst happens. And in its last session, Big Tallahassee batted away all Democratic proposals to relieve or help homeowners cope with what is increasingly becoming a crushing burden.
Even if new insurers have entered the state, there’s no telling if new mom-and-pop insurance companies will be able to pay out in the event of a disaster—and their newness and small sizes lead them to charge higher premiums, putting another burden on Florida policyholders.
On top of all this, Big Tallahassee’s hatred of foreigners and Donald Trump’s threats, insults and attacks on the rest of the world are driving away the international tourists and seasonal residents who pumped money into Florida’s economy.
So Floridians are being crushed by these two sides of a fiscal vise.
I am determined to do everything I can to end this squeeze if I’m elected to the Florida Senate from District 28.
There was a time when life in Florida was not only affordable, it was inexpensive. It’s what brought retirees and lots of other new arrivals to the state. It made possible a reasonably comfortable lifestyle to those of less than extravagant means. It also created a prosperous middle class and let immigrants start businesses and flourish, lifting everyone.
But now, Trump’s lunacy and Big Tallahassee’s wars on Floridians are creating a Florida that’s divided into billionaires versus everyone else. No doubt in many of those billionaires’ minds, they see a Florida divided into masters and servants, with themselves as the masters.
This is not a good outcome. It’s not an American outcome. It’s not a fair outcome.
If elected to the Florida Senate in District 28 I am determined to do everything I possibly can to make Florida affordable again. That includes close scrutiny of the insurance industry and its rates, premiums and payouts. It means facing the reality of climate change and helping Florida families and businesses build in resilience so that insurance rates can come down. It means ending the war on immigrants and labor, so that it costs less to produce Florida’s food, goods and services.
It also means resisting Donald Trump’s crazy and destructive decisions and tendencies rather than sucking up to his hatred, prejudice and rage. We may not be able to stop the war in Iran from the Florida state capital but where we can we must protect Floridians.
This is what I hope to do if elected. If we all work together, I actually believe we may succeed. I hope you’ll agree and join me by donating, volunteering and in November, voting, for David Silverberg for Florida Senate District 28.
I am running for public office, seeking the Florida Senate seat for District 28, covering Collier, Hendry and Lee counties. This encompasses the towns of Naples, Marco Island, Immokalee, Ave Maria, Gateway, LaBelle, and Clewiston—and the Alligator Alcatraz concentration camp.
You should now consider this a partisan website and blog, committed to advocacy rather than non-partisan coverage and analysis.
This is nothing I ever anticipated doing. Indeed, if I were pursuing a political career, I would have started this effort last year.
But, as the Declaration of Independence put it, “when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them”—the American people— “under absolute Despotism,” it is time to take action, even if that action takes one outside a previous sphere of activity.
Donald Trump and, in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis, have invariably been pursuing the object of reducing the American people and the residents of Florida to a state of absolute despotism.
Our political system still affords us the means of resistance. One of those means is the pursuit of elected public office. For the past eight years in The Paradise Progressive blog I have used logic and language to cover and expose their “abuses and usurpations,” particularly relating to the region of Southwest Florida. The moment has come for me to pursue the power of public office to take that resistance to new levels and battlefronts.
These “abuses and usurpations” are reaching a critical point, indeed one where the very existence of the United States and the future of Americans as a free people is at stake.
Nationally, Donald Trump, reigning as though he were a monarch and ignoring the laws, the Constitution and Bill of Rights, has committed the nation to war without any consultation or consent. Every time Americans have to fill their gas tanks they’re being robbed by a war they had no say in starting. When you watch your wallet drain as your tank fills, that’s Trump at the pump.
He has so mismanaged the economy that everyday Americans are being reduced to poverty despite their most strenuous efforts and hard work.
His actions have robbed Americans of their freedom from fear by sending a masked, murderous, motley mob of mercenaries into towns and cities to terrorize and abuse them.
In Florida, Ron DeSantis, reigning in the style of Donald Trump, has waged war on learning and thought, on science and public health, on public education and teachers at all levels. He and his enablers are waging war on the very water, air and soil that makes life in Florida possible for everyone regardless of their political affiliation, beliefs, or national origins. He has attacked institutions and industries that previously welcomed and depended upon visitors from all over the world and disparaged and insulted innocent people of foreign origin.
In a state that is one of the most environmentally vulnerable in the world, he and his extremist legislature have deliberately and purposefully denied and dismissed the clear and present challenges of climate change, to the detriment and danger of all Floridians.
He and his political followers have also sought to eliminate the autonomy and authority of the state’s local governments, especially when it comes to land use and management, in an effort to override responsible planning and governance.
The ultimate end of these actions will be an oppressed nation and a Florida that is poor, paved and polluted.
For all these reasons and many more, I will try to change the current course of events through the system in place.
That’s why I’m running for state senator in District 28. My campaign website is Silverberg4Florida.com. And yes, I’m taking donations (a link is on the site).
My heartfelt thanks to the people who have already made this possible.
In the days ahead I will be elaborating in this space on my reasons for running, the solutions and actions I intend to pursue, and the end state I hope to achieve for Florida and the nation.
This campaign is a race to restore decency, dignity and democracy to Florida and the life we all lead. It’s a race to conserve our Constitution, our Bill of Rights, our freedom from fear, and our pursuit of happiness. It is a campaign to make Florida affordable again. And it is a campaign to end Alligator Alcatraz.
The path to victory is steep. The odds are long. But I believe the journey is worth making.
The state of the stampede in Florida’s 19th Congressional District. (Illustration: AI for TPP/ChatGPT)
March 6, 2026 by David Silverberg
For an ordinarily quiet corner of Florida, the 19th Congressional District certainly generates a lot of ferment when a seat is open—and the stampede to succeed Rep. Byron Donalds (R-19-Fla.) reflects it.
The 19th covers the coastal area from Cape Coral to Marco Island.
Last October when the race was last covered by The Paradise Progressive, there were nine Republicans competing for the Republican Party nomination for Congress and one Democrat.
As of this writing, there are still nine Republicans but one has dropped out, one seems to have disappeared and there’s a new entrant. On the Democratic side, there are now two candidates seeking their party’s nomination.
Where’s Chris?
Chris Collins (center) leaves a New York courthouse following his conviction for insider trading in 2019. (Photo: AP/Seth Wenig)
By far the most active Republican congressional campaigner is Christopher “Chris” Collins, 75, who has been sending campaign mailings to Republican voters and running numerous television advertisements, including a very pricey one during the Super Bowl.
But despite the significant amounts of cash this campaign is already spending, there are no records of it or of his candidacy on the Federal Election Commission (FEC) website tracking federal candidate expenditures for the 2026 election.
Under the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 candidates for federal office are obligated to file quarterly reports of their fundraising and contributors, including the specific names of individuals and organizations donating and the amounts. Collins filed as a candidate with the Florida Department of State in June 2025. If he started raising and spending campaign money last year he should have begun filing reports then.
The Federal Election Commission’s spreadsheet of candidate finances as of March 4, 2026. Chris Collins’ campaign is missing. (Chart: FEC)
The Paradise Progressive reached out to the Collins campaign to ask directly about its absence from FEC records but received no response. A similar query to the FEC also failed to receive a response.
If Collins or his campaign failed to file their required reports they could be subject to investigation, audits, fines and other penalties.
It wouldn’t be the first time Collins has been in hot water.
Unsurprisingly, in his campaign literature and advertising Collins never mentions his 2019 guilty plea to insider trading—and his conviction and imprisonment.
Instead, Collins is touting his record as the first congressman to endorse Trump in 2016—and that’s pretty much it. All the issues and policy positions listed on his website are national and his positions are pro-Trump. He pounds the message home with every communication, whether print or broadcast. His TV ad features a clip of Trump saying: “Chris Collins, right from the beginning, he said, ‘Trump is gonna win.’ Now, I love him.” Collins’ mailing touts a “100% pro-Trump voting record” and he calls himself a “successful businessman & job creator.”
The label “successful businessman” might not quite stand up to scrutiny, in light of his prior history.
As previously recounted, Collins is a convicted inside trader who was tried and sentenced to 26 months in prison in 2020. He only served two months and nine days of the sentence—in federal prison in Pensacola—before being pardoned by Trump.
It’s also worth mentioning the exact nature of the crime, the trial and the punishment. (The full press release with the detailed story from the US Department of Justice is available for reading and download at the conclusion of this article.)
From 2013 to 2019, Collins represented New York’s 27th Congressional District, the area around Buffalo, NY.
While in office he recruited investors for an Australian company called Innate Immunotherapeutics, which was developing a drug to treat multiple sclerosis. It was the company’s only product and its entire fortune was based on it.
On June 22, 2017 Collins was attending the Congressional Picnic on the White House lawn when he received an e-mail that the drug had failed its trials.
As the DoJ press release stated: “The negative Drug Trial results were highly confidential, and, as an insider who owed duties of trust and confidence to Innate, CHRISTOPHER COLLINS was obligated to keep the Drug Trial results secret until Innate publicly released them.”
Instead, 16 minutes after he received the e-mail, Collins called his son from the White House lawn and told him to sell their stock. The son passed on the inside information to relatives and other parties, saving around $800,000 in losses when the stock plummeted 92 percent the next day.
Insider trading this blatant did not go unnoticed and Collins was charged while he was campaigning for re-election in 2018. He won that race, took office in January 2019 and mounted a combative, Trump-like defense against the charges. However, in September he resigned the day before he pleaded guilty. As part of his punishment the Security and Exchange Commission barred him from serving as an officer or director of any public company.
Collins purchased a home on Marco Island and told a judge in 2019: “I’m now a Florida resident and will be FL for a while as the press settles down and moves on.”
Apparently Collins decided the press had settled down and moved on or that Southwest Florida Republicans were too ignorant or indifferent to a criminal record for it to matter. Perhaps taking a cue from a presidential felon, he decided that jail time was no impediment to election.
Beyond his past, it bears mentioning that nowhere in his literature, ads or website does Collins focus on or mention issues specific to the 19th District and Southwest Florida. There’s no mention of water, or insurance, or—most notably—affordability, the difficulty of Southwest Floridians to keep up with constantly rising prices.
Collins is attempting to coast to victory solely on his loyalty to Trump. Obviously, he is hoping that takes him over the finish line in the Republican primary election on Aug. 18.
Fratto falls
Johnny Fratto from his 2024 campaign video in District 26. (Image: Campaign)
John “Johnny” Fratto, 46, is the first candidate to officially call it quits.
In 2024 Fratto sought the seat of incumbent Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-26-Fla.) in the neighboring district but was crushed in the primary. His chief moment of fame came with the release of an energetic but barely coherent rap video touting him as a “bloodline mafioso.”
Last year he declared his intention to run in the 19th. According to the FEC, he raised $630.51 and spent $1,168.90 as of the end of 2025.
However, this candidacy didn’t last long.
On Wednesday, Feb. 25th, Fratto announced that he was suspending his campaign and endorsing fellow Republican Madison Cawthorn, 30, a former representative from North Carolina. Fratto said that Cawthorn, who has a criminal record, crushed his competitors in a debate in Naples, sponsored by the Women’s Republican Club of Naples, according to Jacob Ogles, writing for the news site, Florida Politics.
Fratto is instead going to concentrate on his latest entrepreneurial startup: MAGA Beer.
The beer is noteworthy not only for its political promotional approach but for what it reveals about the Make America Great Again mindset. As it states on its website: “MAGA Beer isn’t just a drink, it’s a time machine back to America’s golden era.”
And when was that “golden era?” According to MAGA Beer, “In the 1980s, America was bold, proud, and full of ambition. It was the era of muscle cars, blue jeans, backyard barbecues, small-town diners, and Friday night football games. The beer industry was at its peak, with brands like Budweiser and Coors defining the working-class American experience. That’s the spirit we’re bringing back.”
It does indicate somewhat where MAGAs want to go but those who actually lived through the 1980s might have a different view. Survivors of the decade might also remember a recession, 14 percent inflation, Federal Reserve prime rates of 20 percent, a savings and loan crisis followed by a market bubble and a stock market crash.
That’s a lot to get into the taste of a beer. But who knows what ingredients can be thrown into a vat these days?
The loss of Lady Liquid Death?
Catalina Lauf at a natural foods exhibition in 2023. (Photo: Campaign)
Catalina Lauf, 32, is no longer on the Florida Department of State’s list of congressional candidates for the 19th District, creating uncertainty about the viability and continuation of her candidacy. However, there has been no formal announcement of suspension of her campaign.
Lauf gained some attention on Jan. 11 when she accused the “liberal leadership” of WINK-TV of firing popular meteorologist Matt Devitt at the behest of “RINO hack, possibly a closet DEM” Jim Schwartzel, a competing Republican candidate. She stated Schwartzel owned WINK, which he adamantly denied.
While her website is online it appears inactive and lacks any policy positions on any subject. Nonetheless, she has posted on Facebook, where she announced endorsements from Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-13-Fla.) on Feb. 11, Rep. Burgess Owens (R-4-Utah) on Feb. 6 (he subsequently announced his retirement), and Sen. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) on Jan. 22. FEC figures show her raising $433,749.57 and spending $218,005.45 as of the end of 2025.
Attempts to reach the Lauf campaign for clarification of the campaign’s status by this author were unsuccessful.
The nuclear entrant
Richard Youschak. (Photo: LinkedIn)
As though to fill the gap created by the withdrawal of Fratto, on Jan. 29, Richard “Ricky” Stephen Youschak III, of Fort Myers, filed to run.
There’s no campaign website, policy positions or public statements from Youschak. A LinkedIn profile and Facebook postings mention a Richard Youschak III who graduated from the University of Florida in Gainesville last May with an advanced degree in nuclear engineering. While he’s listed as a candidate in the Florida Department of State website and there is a candidate by that name in the FEC, there are no campaign contribution filings.
“Growing up, I lived in the Sanibel – Fort Myers area and attended Canterbury School,” states the LinkedIn profile. He earned a private pilot’s license and is an avid flyer. “When I’m not building hours in my Texas Aircraft Colt, I enjoy hiking, diving, and exploring Florida’s forests and coasts.”
A Democratic duo
While District 19 Republicans will have nine candidates to choose from in the Aug. 18 primary, as of this writing, Democrats will have two.
Howard Sapp (Photo: Campaign)
Howard Sapp, 60, is a lifelong Fort Myers native with a distinguished local lineage: the nephew of activist Fort Myers Councilwoman Veronica Shoemaker and son-in-law of former Lee County Commissioner Melvin Morgan.
A retired air traffic controller, Sapp graduated from Fort Myers High School and then earned a bachelor of science degree in biology and chemistry from Edward Waters College in Jacksonville. He then went on get a second bachelor degree in theological studies from Northwestern University and is a credentialed minister.
Sapp is currently chief executive officer for the Source of Light and Hope Development Center, a non-profit support center for at-risk youth in foster care, and he’s long worked on community building and improvement. He ran for the Florida House District 78 covering Fort Myers in 2024 and was defeated by Republican Jenna Persons-Mulicka, 59.9 percent to his own 40.1 percent. As of the end of last year he had raised $35,700 for his campaign, according to the FEC.
Remarkably, of all the candidates and certainly in contrast to all the Republicans, Sapp is putting his campaign’s focus on local issues: cost of living, affordable housing, clean water, quality education, reasonable insurance and effective healthcare. He wants to restore the integrity of federal agencies like the Department of Education, the Federal Reserve, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. He supports unions and opposes workplace immigration raids.
He’s the only candidate to explicitly take a stand in favor of women’s right to choose abortion and have access to low or no-cost contraception.
Victor Arias (Photo: Author)
Victor Arias, 65, is an attorney in Fort Myers.
He was born in the Dominican Republic and raised in the Douglas Housing Projects in Manhattan, New York. Rising from the projects, he earned his bachelor of arts degree from Hamilton College in Clinton, NY and his law degree in the State University of New York Buffalo Law School. He moved to Florida and was admitted to the state bar in 1991.
For seven years he served as school board staff attorney in Lee County and also in St. Lucie County.
Given his familiarity with school issues, in 2024 Arias ran for Superintendent of Lee County Schools after that was made a partisan, elected position in 2022. He was defeated by Republican Denise Carlin by 68 percent to 32 percent. He has not filed any campaign finance reports in 2025.
On his campaign website, Arias states that he’s running “to cut the red tape for veterans, protect Medicare for seniors, defend the water quality that drives our economy, and bring real representation to Florida’s 19th District.”
A forum featuring Howard Sapp and Victor Arias, moderated by this author, is scheduled on Tuesday, April 7, at 5:30 pm, at the Bonita Springs Public Library, 10560 Reynolds St, Bonita Springs, Fla.
To read the full text and download the Department of Justice release:
“Former Congressman Christopher Collins Sentenced For Insider Trading Scheme And Lying To Federal Law Enforcement Agents”
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) will stepping down next year after eight years in office—and 39 people are running to replace him.
That’s according to the Florida Department of State as of Feb. 18. The cutoff date for candidates to qualify for the ballot is June 12 and there’s no telling how many more people will declare themselves candidates by then.
Of course, of the 12 Republicans, 11 Democrats and 16 candidates from other parties, non-party affiliates and write-ins currently declared, only a very small handful are considered serious, credible contenders for the seat.
Among these is Rep. Byron Donalds (R-19-Fla.). He is certainly the leading contender for the Republican nomination.
For the past four years Donalds has represented the 19th Congressional District of Florida, a coastal area running from Cape Coral at its northern end to Marco Island in the south.
Because this is the home of The Paradise Progressive and Donalds is the highest-ranking federal official in Southwest Florida, he has been the subject of considerable coverage in these pages, and that coverage can now help inform all Florida voters about the person who is seeking to lead them.
This article focuses only on Donalds, what kind of governor he would be and what policies he might pursue, rather than personal issues or scandals.
It is, as anything looking into the future must be, highly speculative; a sort of “thought experiment” as Albert Einstein would have called it.
The Republican race
The Republican assumption in this race is that the primary election, taking place on Tuesday, Aug. 18, will decide the contest.
Because Republicans have over a million-voter advantage in registrations, the candidates are clearly calculating that the primary will be the decisive election, with the general election on Nov. 3 a mere formality.
Accordingly, to date the Republican campaigns are clearly aimed at a narrow base of extreme, committed Make America Great Again (MAGA) party members who are certain to vote and who respond to Donald Trump-like appeals.
As a result, in imitation of Trump, the campaigns have been petty, personal and insulting. Candidates have attacked opponents’ failures, crimes and weaknesses. They are questioning each other’s loyalty to Trump himself, allegiance to his agenda and belief in his infallibility.
What is missing in this approach is virtually any discussion of running Florida, how the state will be managed, what policies will be pursued and how to handle the challenges it will face in the future.
Donalds has massive advantages in this race, chief among them Trump’s urging him to run before he declared in February 2025. Trump’s Feb. 20 X-post at that time was a “complete and total endorsement” after years of snubs, indifference and neglect.
Donald Trump’s endorsement of Rep. Byron Donalds on Feb. 20, 2025.
Trump’s blessing opened the endorsement and money floodgates.
That flood included endorsements from 17 members of the Florida congressional delegation, 27 sheriffs, three quarters of state Republican legislators and numerous donors—perhaps most importantly, Elon Musk.
It also included a cascade of cash. The campaign reported raising over $45 million during 2025.
Clearly, there’s a belief by many in the state that a Donalds victory is all but assured and they want to bask in his favor.
So what would Florida likely be like under Gov. Byron Donalds?
Goodbye Tallahassee, hello Mar-a-Lago
The Tallahassification of Mar-a-Lago. (AI for TPP/ChatGPT)
For all intents and purposes, under a governor Byron Donalds the capital of Florida might as well move from Tallahassee to Mar-a-Lago.
As Donalds puts it in his first priority listed on his campaign website: “Enact the Trump Agenda: Byron is committed to implementing President Trump’s agenda to Make America Great Again.”
Make no mistake: Donald Trump will be governor of Florida in all but name. That’s because Donalds has pledged his fealty to Trump so completely, extravagantly, and excessively that the idea of a shred of independence or autonomy or even a stray individual thought is unimaginable.
That’s not to say that Trump is likely to be deeply involved in the day to day running of the state. He’s got a whole world to run—and he’s still trying to prove that he won the 2020 election. It’s doubtful that he has much interest in insurance rates or water purity beyond the confines of property that he actually owns outright (Mar-a-Lago, Trump National Golf Club in Jupiter, Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, and Trump National Doral in Miami, plus adjacent properties and affiliated branded properties).
But it’s also unimaginable that Donalds would make any major move, take any major initiative or even breathe in any way contrary to the desires of Trump. What is more, this is an impression that Donalds himself has nurtured and promoted, especially with a non-stop stream of Trumpist social media posts, particularly on X. He has mounted an indefatigable and unrelenting defense of all of Trump’s most extreme excesses.
For MAGAs this will no doubt be cause for joy. They will be dwelling in the belly of the beast, a Trumptopia that is even more purely ruled by him than the nation he currently dominates. But it also means they will be even closer to the man himself and his rages, unpredictability, and sheer meanness and feel them even more acutely than elsewhere.
For those who oppose his hatred, prejudice and rage—or who are the targets of it—there will be no recourse, salvation or haven in the Sunshine State. A governor Donalds is unlikely to ever make an effort to protect them. The state will no longer effectively be independent—and woe to any state politician who dares to think anything other than Trumpthought or exhale a breath of heresy from Trump doctrine. Certainly no such heresy on any subject is likely to come from the governor himself.
A foreigner-free Florida?
The new welcome to Florida under a governor Byron Donalds? (AI for TPP/ChatGPT)
Given his blindly loyal Trumpism and reflecting his and the Florida Republican Party’s anti-foreigner sentiment, as governor Donalds will likely continue and intensify the state’s efforts against all foreigners of all origins and legal statuses on all fronts.
From the time he rode down the elevator in Trump Tower in 2015 Trump has been anti-foreigner. His first and most infamous declaration was that Mexicans were “rapists” and “criminals” and he has not deviated from those perceptions during his entire time in public life.
Trump considers immigration (other than by white, eastern European women he marries) as an invasion that has to be stopped and reversed. Accordingly, upon taking office his second time he began a nationwide purge, not only of undocumented migrants, but of immigrants of all kinds from virtually all other countries (especially, as he once put it, “shit hole” countries).
He is certainly seconded in this by his Deputy Chief of Staff, Stephen Miller, of whom Trump once reportedly said “If it was up to Stephen, there would only be 100 million people in this country — and all of them would look like him.”
Certainly, both the legislative and executive branches of Florida’s government have enthusiastically joined this effort to date. Indeed, where there has been disagreement between the governor and the legislature it has been in differences over the severity of their anti-migrant, anti-foreigner measures. Florida has also been the most enthusiastic state in the union in forging bonds between local law enforcement and federal immigration authorities, with all of its 67 counties and its cities signing 287(g) agreements, sometimes under duress from the state’s governor and attorney general.
Ironically, this comes in a state that before Trump was one of the most diverse in the nation and benefited from foreign contributions and investment. In Florida, especially Miami, immigrants and refugees from around the world flocked to find refuge and built businesses and communities that reflected their origins and enriched the state. In the state’s groves and fields migrants—many undocumented and minimally paid—picked its fruits and vegetables. They also built its buildings, staffed its hotels and resorts and were the sinews of a robust economy.
Beyond businesses and labor, foreign tourists and visitors were a key element in the state’s tourism industry, filling hotels, buying tickets and flocking to Disney World and Universal Studio in Orlando. Even here DeSantis pursued an anti-woke cultural crusade that succeeded in attacking the Disney corporation to the point where the company chose not to make a billion dollar investment in new facilities.
Donalds has proven himself a willing standard-bearer in Florida’s fight against foreigners of all sorts.
When the city council of Fort Myers in his district hesitated to sign on to the 287g program, Donalds was quick to condemn them.
“These officials that don’t understand their role, which is to implement a federal and state law, not circumvent and create sanctuary cities,” he said in an interview on the conservative NewsMax channel. “They simply need to be removed from office. They’re not going to follow the law. It’s that simple.”
He also ostentatiously defended the actions of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) directorate of the Department of Homeland Security.
On Jan. 21, after American citizen Renee Good was killed by ICE agents in Minneapolis, Donalds posted on X: “What Democrats are doing to obstruct, impede, and sabotage ICE is treasonous. The American people granted President Trump a mandate to deport illegal aliens and Make America Safe Again. As Governor, any Florida official who blocks these lawful actions will be removed from office.”
After Alex Pretti was killed by ICE agents on Jan. 24, Donalds told NewsNation: “Nobody wants to see any American lose their life like this…But we also have to be honest about what’s happening in Minneapolis. You have paid agitators. You have a coordinated operation going on in Minneapolis for the sole purpose of doxing ICE officers, impeding ICE officers, stopping them from following and executing federal law.”
While he denied saying that Pretti was a paid agitator he said, “I’m not saying that. I’m saying that what people are seeing on their phones and on news networks around the country is the result of paid protests and paid agitators.”
Ironically, for all its Trumpist loyalty, the state that created the Alligator Alcatraz concentration and detention camp to facilitate Trump’s anti-foreigner effort is also being shortchanged by that president. Despite spending $600 million to build camps and round up, detain and deport migrants, when it came to promised federal reimbursement, Florida’s state government is belatedly discovering another aspect of Trump management—his infamous welching on promises and commitments.
As governor Donalds will no doubt spend whatever he thinks—or is told—it takes for the state to curry Trump’s favor and carry out his wishes, no matter how extreme, harsh or unconstitutional. However, like so many others he will likely discover for himself that a Trump promise isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. Still, Florida taxpayers are unlikely to ever hear him complain or make an effort on behalf of the hard-earned dollars they pour into state coffers.
Public de-education
The future of Florida’s public schools and universities? (AI for TPP/ChatGPT)
Florida public education is unlikely to find a friend in a governor Byron Donalds. Indeed, it looks like it will be facing an enemy.
Public education is not something that is top of mind in the current gubernatorial race. Only Republican candidate James Fishback has mentioned it and that only to pledge that he would mandate student uniforms and local businesses should provide student meals.
Public education is being squeezed from all sides in Florida. The current governor attacked it as part of his anti-“woke” crusade and reached down to remove, replace or endorse opponents of local school board members he didn’t like. Republican politicians inveigh against it. At every legislative session measures are introduced to restrict or regulate it, whether that applies to classroom content, teacher conduct or state funding. A private voucher program for parents to send children to non-public or parochial schools that came at the expense of public education was voted into being by the legislature and left Florida with $400 million in unused vouchers. Teachers are viewed with suspicion by vocal MAGA parents and even the teachers’ expressions of personal opinion—like heretical statements criticizing the late Charlie Kirk—have been cause for investigation and suspension.
A governor Donalds coming into this mix would likely add a massively anti-public education force. Donalds can be expected to always side with private, anti-public education activists, favor private, for-profit schools and shortchange funding for public education at every opportunity—and this would come on top of the end of federal standards and funding given the dissolution of the Department of Education.
Teachers’ unions can expect no favor, no support and no mercy from a governor Donalds’ office.
As Erika Donalds put it in a 2022 Fox Business interview: “Teachers unions are the enemy of our children when it comes to their education in America.” There’s no reason to believe that her husband holds any different opinion.
Nor would higher education likely be spared. Accreditation, tenure and board membership of Florida universities were all attacked under DeSantis for a variety of perceived sins, particularly for practicing diversity, equity and inclusion. He put very expensive cronies in charge of colleges, who in turn enriched their friends.
There is nothing to indicate that this would be any different under Donalds and in fact it would likely get worse.
Public un-health?
A child with measles is examined by a doctor. (Photo: World Health Organization/Danil Usmanov)
Florida is arguably the most regressive state in the nation when it comes to public health. Under a governor Byron Donalds it would likely regress to the Middle Ages.
As in the rest of the world, the COVID pandemic of 2020 to 2022 marks a break point in Florida’s history of public health provision. It was a time when a small but extremely vocal minority of people, encouraged by a dismissive President and a complicit governor, turned against science and the whole edifice of modern health protections, favoring instead unproven potions, quack prescriptions and conspiracy theories.
As a congressional candidate and then as a congressman, Donalds inserted himself into local debates over mask mandates (he was against them), vaccination mandates (also opposed), and consistently opposed federal efforts to protect the population at large from the ravages of COVID.
“Biden and the radical Left are coming for your freedom,” he wrote in a fundraising e-mail on Aug. 12, 2021, which warned that President Joe Biden might intervene against a mask mandate ban put in place by Gov. Ron DeSantis in Florida. “They’re trying to use the federal government to FORCE Anthony Fauci’s anti-scientific mandates and lockdowns on Florida and take away our ability to make our own decisions.”
While never denouncing vaccines per se, Donalds did what he could to feed vaccine skepticism and fight all recommendations to protect the public from COVID and its variants. (For a full discussion of this, see “The Donalds Dossier: Anti-vaxxer or not?”)
Ironically enough, Donalds himself tested positive for COVID on Oct. 16, 2021, causing Trump to shun him and not even mention him in remarks when he came to Fort Myers that day. (Donalds recovered after a two-week quarantine.)
Nor has Donalds been any kinder to health care insurance and coverage for Floridians, whom he believes don’t need “full-blown, gold-plated” health insurance coverage.
“The biggest thing we need is we need a system where there are catastrophic health care plans … You can have a health care policy around catastrophic care, but that doesn’t really mean you need a full-blown gold-plated health care policy,” he said in a radio interview in October 2025.
He also said at the time that he wanted to get rid of the Affordable Care Act (better known as “Obamacare”)—this in a state that, with 4.4 million enrollees, has the highest number of enrollees in the country.
A big question is whether if elected governor Donalds would keep on the state’s current Surgeon General, Dr. Joseph Ladapo, who has been DeSantis’ anti-vaxx, anti-mandate, anti-public health right hand man. Ladapo announced in September 2025 that the state would be abolishing all vaccine mandates for schoolchildren—“Every last one of them is wrong and drips with disdain and, and, slavery, okay?” he said of mandates, emphasizing all “are going to be gone for sure.”
It didn’t take long for measles, a previously suppressed disease, to break out in Florida, with one center being Ave Maria University in Collier County. That outbreak is still ongoing and appears to be increasing as of this writing.
So the record indicates that a Byron Donalds governorship would be devastating for Floridians’ health and healthcare—this at a time when previously suppressed or eradicated diseases are making a comeback, widespread vaccination is under attack and public health agencies are being dismantled at the federal and state levels.
In November 2025 Trump reversed a 10-year moratorium he had previously imposed on allowing oil exploration and exploitation in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, along with other sensitive locations. The moratorium was imposed in the runup to the 2020 election to gain the favor of Florida voters.
All of these are assaults on the natural environment and all will acutely affect the state of Florida—and they come on top of challenges to the environmentally sensitive state like climatic warming, intensifying storms and sea level rise.
Donalds is a member in good standing of the climate change-denying contingent in Florida, which includes the past and current governors and the Republican majority of the state legislature, which has gone so far as to outlaw the term “climate change” from state documents.
When asked in 2023 if he thought there was a correlation between heat waves and climate change Donalds simply replied “No, I don’t.” He has opposed what he called “weaponization” of Section 401 and fought efforts by President Joe Biden to stop water pollution.
In the case of oil drilling, Donalds did sign on to a letter along with seven other Florida representatives disapproving of Trump’s action, saying that drilling would interfere with operations at Eglin Air Force Base in the Panhandle. It was his only action to protect the Florida environment from Trump’s drive to encourage pollution, despoliation and exploitation in the service of the fossil fuel industry.
As governor—and as a submissively Trumpist governor at that—Donalds cannot be expected to defend Florida’s natural environment, protect its waters or safeguard its Gulf shores from oil pollution and defilement. He will most likely go along with Trump’s insistence that climate change is a “hoax” and do everything he can to eliminate measures to contain, restrain or prepare for it.
This comes on top of a strong movement in the Florida state government to “pre-empt” local governments’ efforts to take immediate steps to prepare or counteract the undeniable effects of climate change in their immediate areas.
Indeed, the pre-emption movement affects a broader swath of life in Florida. Driven by developers, many of whom are also state legislators, it is designed to eliminate all local barriers to development and exploitation.
Adding to this is an assault on the funding sources of local government by the governor and his allies to end property taxes. Florida Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia is seeking the power to overhaul local budgets and remove officials in the name of his Florida Agency for Fiscal Oversight (FAFO, a deliberate play on a profane definition). Ostensibly intended to root out fraud, waste and abuse in local government financial matters, in fact it appears to be an attempt to end all local autonomy.
The logical end result of these efforts and the state over which a governor Byron Donalds would preside, would be a fully paved over Florida, run entirely from the governor’s office at Trump’s direction, with no local autonomy of any kind. There would be no conservation of the natural environment and the air, land and sea would be completely polluted. Natural barriers or wetlands would likely be paved over and no longer protect the population, which would be utterly at the mercy of intensifying hurricanes and rising waters.
Further, Florida would likely cease to be a major citrus-producing state, its trees ravaged by citrus greening, its reliance on citrus imports destroyed by Trump’s tariffs and its groves sold to developers for housing developments.
Ironically enough, Florida’s great natural renewable energy resources, its sun and wind, which might at least mitigate climate change would not only be neglected but would likely be actively opposed by both Donalds and Trump.
Trump is known for his pathological fear and hatred of wind turbines for generating energy. There are currently no wind farms in Florida or offshore, so this is a phantom menace and there certainly wouldn’t be any built under a governor Donalds.
But Florida was making efforts to develop its solar generation capabilities and this too Donalds has opposed.
There can be no clearer statement of his attitudes on this subject than the headline on a 2023 op-ed under his byline for the Fort Myers News-Press: “The Dishonest Fantasy of Wind and Solar.”
“In sum, I’m not opposed to wind turbines and solar panels, but if we seriously want an affordable, reliable, secure ‘green energy’ grid, we cannot rely on the dishonest fantasy of utilizing spiky intermittent energy sources like wind and solar,” he argued. “Instead, we must embrace nuclear power and include nuclear in future green alternative energy discussions. Ultimately, we must base our future energy-related decisions on logic and objective facts—not politics.”
The high likelihood is that this op-ed wasn’t really written by Donalds but by a nuclear energy lobbyist—because in his second term, Donalds signed on as a shill for the nuclear power industry.
In the 2023 Congress Donalds sponsored 14 bills related to the nuclear power industry, mostly deregulating it or in some way favoring it, often in a highly technical manner. None had anything to do with his district, the concerns of its residents, or fell within his usual areas of expertise. (The nuclear industry also didn’t get much for its investment since none of his bills went anywhere.)
Donalds benefited greatly from fossil energy industry political action committees (PACs) and seven of them contributed a total of $25,500 to his campaign in the 2024 cycle. Fossil fuel PACs included those from the companies Sinclair, Valero, Marathon and Exxon Mobile as well as NextEra Energy, a utility infrastructure company, and Duke Energy, an energy holding company. Also contributing was the overall trade group for fossil fuels, the American Fuels and Petrochemical Manufacturers Association PAC.
The race card
Michelle and Barack Obama depicted as apes in a Xerias_X video reposted by President Donald Trump on Feb. 6. (Image: Truth Social via Laura Loomer on X)
If elected, Byron Donalds would be Florida’s first black governor.
It’s not a precedent or breakthrough that he’s playing up. On the contrary, he’s doing all he can to get Floridians to overlook his race.
In an atmosphere where racism is condemned and merit emphasized, this would be unremarkable. However, that’s not the current atmosphere.
On Feb. 6, Trump re-posted a 55-second artificial intelligence-generated video by the extreme X-site Xerias_X depicting former President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle as apes. The video didn’t end there: it depicted a variety of other Democratic figures as African animals, including US House Minority Leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-8-NY) as a meerkat or lemur, former President Joe Biden as a baboon and former Vice President Kamala Harris as a tortoise. At the end of the video, all the animals bow before Trump as a lion king.
The animal-politicians bow before Lion King Trump in the Xerias video reposted by the White House. (Image: Truth Social via Laura Loomer on X).
The video was a clear display of Trump’s utter contempt for other politicians, the public, and his blatant, undisguised racism—with the exception of the unfailingly devoted and politically useful cover of Byron Donalds.
But of all the Republicans, the one black candidate, the person who stood most to be offended, whose outrage was most to be expected, was silent. His office released a statement to the Tampa Bay Times that “Team Byron Donalds has called the White House and learned that a staffer had let POTUS down”—accepting uncritically the White House explanation that the posting was the work of a staffer, who remains unnamed to this day.
And that was all there was.
Donalds’ reaction—or non-reaction—is instructive of his likely actions and attitudes if elected governor. Florida’s minorities, of all kinds, will find no aid, assistance or support from this governor if they face challenges or prejudice. Racism will go unanswered. And any Trump excess or outrage will not only be uncritically accepted, it will likely be defended, rationalized and when directed, implemented by this governor.
Indeed, Donalds’ whole political career is built on a gargantuan contradiction that will be unavoidable if he accedes to the highest office in the state.
“I am everything the fake news media tells you doesn’t exist,” Donalds stated in his opening campaign video when he first ran for Congress in 2020. “A strong, Trump-supporting, gun-owning, liberty-loving, pro-life, politically incorrect black man.”
He hasn’t changed positions since making that statement. But increasingly, holding to that Trumpist faith means accepting authoritarian coups, mob and state-sanctioned violence, concentration camps, constitutional violations, mind-boggling corruption, election rigging, dictatorial dominance and increasingly overt and extreme racial prejudice.
Byron Donalds would not be in a position to seek the governorship of a state that was once slave-holding and secessionist, segregationist and lynching-prone if not for the giant steps away from that barbarity over the last 160 years. If not for Emancipation, he would be a slave. If not for Martin Luther King Jr. and the civil rights movement, he would not be able to vote. If not for the Civil Rights Act, his children would be consigned to second-class schools and separate water fountains. If not for repeal of Florida’s miscegenation law in 1969, he would not have been able to date—much less, marry—his current spouse. If not for the election of Barack Obama, who showed that Americans could accept a capable black man and elect him president, he could not aspire to the state’s highest political office or even the highest office in the land.
Instead, he has embraced a movement and man who wants to go in exactly the opposite direction, to return to a time when in his view America was “great.” But when was that time? Was it before the Supreme Court’s Dred Scott decision of 1857, which ruled that a black man could never be an American citizen? What is more, this is a president who is ferociously and aggressively turning back the clock and trying to bend the arc of history to an imagined time when prejudice reigned, racial violence was common, and intolerance ruled—and there was no place in that world for an ambitious black man like Byron Donalds.
As a loyal, submissive, Trumpist governor, this is what Byron Donald can be expected to bring to Florida.
Donalds may well win the Republican nomination on Aug. 18. But when Florida voters go to the polls in the general election on Nov. 3, they will have a choice. Assuming the election is held as scheduled, assuming every legitimate voter is allowed to cast a ballot, and assuming that the votes are counted fairly, accurately and reported truthfully, the people of Florida can chart a very different destiny for their Sunshine State—if they dare.
A call for a New American Revolution and New Amendments to the United States Constitution
Presented at the Progressive Voices Lecture Series at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Greater Naples, Feb. 4, 2026 by David Silverberg
Text as prepared
If anyone doubts that Donald Trump regards himself as a king, “they should just look at the artificial intelligence-generated images Donald Trump posted of himself in the past year.” The author making his presentation. (Photo: June Fletcher)
In 1655 the French King Louis the Fourteenth reportedly said, “L’Etat, c’est moi” – “I am the state” (or literally, “the state is me.”).
This past January 8th, President Donald Trump was asked in a New York Times interview if there were any limits to his global power and he replied, “Yeah, there is one thing: my own morality, my own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
Think about that for a moment. He is “The only thing” that can stop him. He didn’t say Congress. He didn’t say the courts. He didn’t say the people. He didn’t say the Constitution. Just himself.
And he also didn’t say international law, which was the context of the question. On that, he said, “I don’t need international law.” Direct quote!
My friends, it pains me to say this but America has just had its Louis the Fourteenth moment.
Let’s take a moment to let all this sink in.
On its 250th birthday, the United States has become exactly what its founders worked and fought and struggled against: a dictatorship, a monarchy – and as I pointed out last year, monarchy doesn’t necessarily mean the title “King.” “Mono” means “one” “archy” means power – one power – and today we are a monarchy just as surely as we were before independence in 1776.
And if anyone doubts it, they should just look at the artificial intelligence-generated images Donald Trump posted of himself in the past year.
Note those crowns!
We’re not yet a complete monarchy. The Constitution has not been formally abolished. We still believe and act as though we have the rights granted us by the Bill of Rights. We’re gathered here tonight legally in the belief that our ability to do so is entirely proper. I believe that the words I’m speaking to you now are protected by the First Amendment.
But the President and all those around him are on a path toward ending that Constitution and those rights—and they make no secret of this. Donald Trump said he would be a dictator and during the course of last year he proceeded to expand his powers and disregard the law, legitimized by a Supreme Court ruling saying he had immunity for his official actions. And then we’ve seen the seizures and shootings on the streets of Minneapolis.
Now, I could spend the entire rest of this talk enumerating his sins, his crimes and his outrages. But I have other things to get to. Rick Wilson, the Florida pundit and Lincoln Project co-founder who remotely addressed a gathering here last year, has published what is essentially a new Declaration of Independence on Substack, that lists all this.
If you want to read this later, I recommend that you take a picture of it and the Internet address.
The essential question that confronts us is: What do we do about this? What can we, as normal, everyday, non-violent, law-abiding citizens, people who don’t hold public office and aren’t in the public eye, do about it?
I have a few thoughts, which I hope you find worthy of consideration.
First, all my suggestions are non-violent and lawful. I still believe in the law and obeying it. American law still provides us with tools for change and great latitude for action. We still have numerous avenues of appeal, redress and change.
Having said that, I believe that the situation and the threat are so dire, we need a New American Revolution. Not a violent overthrow of what we had before but what I’ll call a restorative revolution. We need to restore the rights, the checks and balances and the democracy that existed before Donald Trump usurped them.
But we have to look at the effort holistically.
Remember something: The Trump presidency is not merely an administration in the mold of past presidencies. It’s a political, social and cultural revolution of its own that seeks total control. It aims to utterly oppress, dominate and subjugate Americans and the world to the whims, the hatreds, the prejudices and the rages of one single man. It’s an attack on everything we had before he became president and everything this country has meant for the past 250 years. It’s truly American carnage.
Everyone who values democracy, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the rule of law and who takes action should see himself or herself as part of a new American revolution. This goes beyond Republican or Democratic labels. And it goes beyond any single, particular action. We need to view the demonstrations in Minneapolis and the protests at the Government Center on Route 41 in Naples as connected, they’re all part of the same movement. We have to see the lawsuits and the vigils against Alligator Alcatraz as part of the same effort as the midterm elections and the grassroots organizing that has to be done there.
I would hope that if we see all these individual efforts as a single mass effort, unified with a common purpose, we can be more effective—at least conceptually—than if we only look at those efforts as individual and fragmented. All these actions together have a cumulative effect.
The actions we take are aimed not just at protesting this president’s illegal actions but at reversing their worst abuses and restoring sanity, dignity and decency to our government.
The list of reforms and changes that are needed are long. Anyone can come up with his or her favorites.
We also have to recognize that nothing is quick in a non-violent movement. Whatever their aims, non-violent mass movements are always marathons. They take long-term, persistent pressure on a multitude of fronts. But history has shown that they can work.
But as a start, one goal has to be to end the domestic terrorism of ICE, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement directorate of the Department of Homeland Security, DHS.
On a personal note, from 2004 to 2013 I was editor of a magazine called Homeland Security Today, so I watched the department and this particular directorate evolve.
ICE was created in 2002 by combining the Immigration and Naturalization Service and the US Customs Service. It was intended to prevent bad people and bad things from getting into the country.
So I know what ICE was supposed to be—as opposed to what it’s become.
Every country has to protect its borders and regulate its immigration. That’s a fundamental function. But ICE under the second Trump administration is a violent, lawless, unaccountable force of domestic terrorism, like Mussolini’s Blackshirts or Hitler’s Brownshirts.
ICE was intended to protect the American people from terrorism. Under Trump and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, its mission has become imposing terror and purging the Hispanic and foreign-origin population of the United States.
Sadly, I don’t think it can be redeemed. When sanity returns, its functions need to go to other agencies or a new agency with a different name. But ICE today is too twisted and tainted to remain as is. It needs to be demobilized and dispersed and those guilty of crimes prosecuted and the whole thing overhauled.
So that’s an example of an immediate, practical measure. But I want to look beyond the moment.
There are two revolutionary proposals that I think are particularly important, if less emotionally-charged than the many others people want to pursue. Both are constitutional amendments and could be enacted if the Constitution and its mechanisms remain in force—i.e., if they aren’t abolished altogether, which, by the way, Trump has threatened to do.
One amendment, which would be the Constitution’s 28th, would state that:
“The President of the United States shall be subject to the laws and penalties of the United States in his or her official and personal capacities.”
It is absolutely astonishing that this would have to be passed but when the Supreme Court ruled in 2024 that the president has legal immunity for all his official actions, they opened the gate to the outlaw dictatorship we’re suffering under today. This president is above the law and he knows it and he’s exploiting it. That can never be allowed to happen again. As the Supreme Court’s motto on the lintel of its building declares: “Equal justice under law” and that equality needs to be restored. Everyone—and I mean, everyone—has to be subject to the law.
Another amendment, which would be the 29th, would state:
“No Person shall be eligible to the Office of President who has not served in a prior elected office or held a military position of command. No Person previously found guilty of a crime by a jury of his or her peers, or found guilty of insurrection, or previously impeached and removed from office for high crimes and misdemeanors, shall be qualified to hold the office.”
No more criminals as President! This amendment is intended to ensure that never again can an utterly inexperienced, grossly unqualified, completely unfit individual attain the power of the presidency. Never again should the American people face the prospect of a criminal candidate running—or governing—from prison. It simply says: criminals need not apply.
Those are just a few suggestions.
Now, I put these and other ideas into a website post called “Manifesto for an American Rose Revolution” that went live on January 2nd.
A rose revolution? Why that?
Well, perhaps this is sentimental on my part but I—and maybe everyone in this room—can remember the Kennedy Administration.
And maybe you can remember when Jaqueline Kennedy created the White House Rose Garden.
It was a small area, only 125 feet long and 60 feet wide (38 meters by 18 meters) outside the Oval Office of the White House. But it was a place of beauty, elegance and grace that reflected the First Lady’s own.
The Rose Garden is no more. Trump paved it over to create a hideous patio.
What’s more, having destroyed the garden, he created an exclusive “Rose Garden Club” for his cronies, which costs a million dollars to join.
Well, you know, Trump believes that as President he owns the White House. He believes he can alter or destroy it as he pleases. He demolished the East Wing to replace it with a massive, gargantuan ballroom bearing his name, whose cost keeps ballooning and he has even more desecrations in mind.
But the White House doesn’t “belong” to the person who temporarily occupies it. It belongs to the American people. We’re the homeowners’ association. What’s more, every resident of that house is just a temporary tenant who holds it in trust for the next occupant.
The same can be said of the country as a whole. Trump thinks he owns it.
Folks, the time has come for the American people to take back their house—and their homeland.
And if there’s any one moment that will mark their success, it will be when that hideous patio is dug up and smashed and its pieces distributed as souvenirs and roses bloom again in the people’s garden.
That’s why I think a Rose Revolution is a good idea. The color “rose” is neither blue nor red; it includes a wide variety of shades and everyone and anyone can be part of it.
This is not just about a garden, of course.
Winston Churchill once said, “Democracy is the worst form of government—except for all the others that have been tried from time to time.”
The great thing about democracy, and the reason I believe in it so, is that it’s a form of government built on hope and courage and possibilities. We can all remember when Tim Walz thanked Kamala Harris for bringing joy back to politics. Democracy isn’t just about the way people are governed, it’s about enabling the pursuit of happiness—and giving people the hope and tools to achieve it.
By contrast, monarchy, dictatorship, autocracy are built on despair, and submission and hopelessness. In that kind of government there can be no success without the monarch’s approval or—especially with this president—getting his piece of the action. This is a presidency run on threat and fear and extortion.
So a Restorative Revolution, a New American Revolution, a Rose Revolution – whatever you want to call it – is not just about legislation or protests or particular measures, it’s about restoring joy and hope and dignity and decency and democracy and ending a reign of fear and intimidation. It’s about upholding the true values of America and restoring the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. And everyone has a role to play.
Now, I know that a single blogger typing in an obscure corner of Florida, throwing out some ideas, is hardly earthshaking. Believe me, no one is more conscious of the odds and the obstacles and the prospect of oblivion than I am. This talk may go up on the Internet along with billion and one other posts and comments and disappear completely into that great blogosphere in the cloud, or the sky, or whatever.
But you never know how history will play out—and this should inform all our actions. The one thing we can be certain of is that if we don’t do anything then nothing will ever be done.
I’m inspired in this by a hero of mine, Thomas Paine.
January 10th marked the 250th anniversary of the publication of Paine’s little pamphlet, “Common Sense,” which can truly be said to have sparked the American Revolution.
Who was Thomas Paine? Well, when he wrote Common Sense he was a nobody. He’d been a failed businessman and husband. He’d done some writing in his native England but of little more than local note. He’d immigrated to America in 1774 and was so sick from the passage that he had to be carried off the ship.
But he immediately grasped the potential of America and he had hope and could see the possibilities in change. He hated monarchy and oppression and he conveyed it to all the English inhabitants of North America. All he had to work with was language and logic and he put them to use, proving that anyone can have an impact.
Common Sense is as relevant today as it was in 1776 when it was published. I encourage everyone to make the effort to read it—and it does take some effort.
But even more immediate and relevant to us today is an essay that Paine wrote after Common Sense called The American Crisis. He wrote it during the darkest days of the American Revolution. He was a member of the Pennsylvania militia. American forces had been defeated in New York and pushed back through New Jersey. The army seemed about to dissolve and it looked like the revolutionary cause was at an end. The story is that he started writing an essay using a drumhead as a writing table.
It was under these circumstances that Paine penned the most famous paragraph he ever produced. Everyone knows the first sentence. But it’s worth listening to the entire paragraph because it’s every bit as relevant and as inspirational today as it was 250 years ago. We need to heed it.
I’m going to read it and I’m going to get through it.
“THESE are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated.”
So with that in mind, it’s time to start shaping America’s next 250 years.
Meteorologist Matt Devitt and family. (Photo: Facebook)
On Saturday, Jan. 10, Matt Devitt, chief meteorologist at WINK TV in Fort Myers, Fla., published a Facebook post that unleashed a hurricane as strong as any he covered in his ten years at the station.
“LIFE UPDATE: After 10 years, my time with WINK News has come to an end after being let go from my role as Chief Meteorologist on Thursday. This decision was not one that I expected or agreed with and was not given the opportunity to say goodbye on-air. It was a complete shock to me, my family and fellow coworkers.”
Since that announcement it’s fair to say that Southwest Florida has erupted in speculation, accusations and equally complete shock.
An outside observer might be puzzled by all this. But that observer needs to realize that in Southwest Florida, broadcast weather forecasters play a special role. They’re not just on-air presenters: amidst the drama and stress of hurricanes they’re foxhole buddies who know incoming from outgoing rounds and can tell you when to duck; they’re pillars of calm despite fearsome storms and howling winds; they’re guides who lead the way to safety and sunlight. Local people who come through a hurricane feel as though they shared the danger with the meteorologists who were continuously on television throughout the ordeal.
They’re not just talent, they’re weather gods.
Matt Devitt was an outstanding example of the breed.
Southwest Floridians are flooding social media with posts and opinions about the dismissal. The story has gone far beyond the confines of the local viewing area and is being covered by such national and international news outlets as Newsweek, The Hindustan Times in India and The Daily Mailin Britain.
It has also taken on a political dimension, shaking the race for Congress in the 19th Congressional District, the coastal area from Cape Coral to Marco Island.
The story continues to develop and breaking news could come at any time.
However, while things may change, this article is intended to provide background and context, to analyze the nature and intensity of the controversy, and to explain to the world why this event is is a cyclone in what is usually a very hot and sleepy corner of America.
What we know
There are only two authoritative sources of information on this story: Matt Devitt and the person who fired him; or in terms of facing the public, WINK TV. Neither are talking. (The Paradise Progressive reached out to both without result.)
Since Devitt was the one who broke the story, here is the rest of the post he put on Facebook:
“Serving our Southwest Florida community for the past decade has been an honor and privilege, especially through Hurricanes Irma, Ian, Helene and Milton. I always gave you everything I had with one goal in mind: keeping you safe and informed without the hype.
“While this chapter ended differently than I hoped, I wish WINK News, along with my previous coworkers and weather team, the best.
“I will still be providing weather updates on this page, it just won’t be on TV anymore. My new Facebook name is being changed to Matt Devitt Weather, which you’ll see shortly. In addition to sending Facebook messages, you are always welcome to email me at MattDevittWX@gmail.com.
“I’m taking a brief pause professionally to reset and be with my family. I’ve missed them and I’m looking forward to every minute. I’ll keep you all updated on what’s next.
“Thank you to everyone who has reached out with support, it has meant more to me than you know.”
There has been no official statement from WINK. Indeed, an internal memo was circulated warning WINK personnel not to discuss or comment on the matter in any form or forum, on any platform, on the telephone or in any way whatsoever. There has not been any broadcast comment from the station.
The one comment that came out was from WINK meteorologist Lauren Kreidler, who also posted on Facebook: “Please give my weather team & I grace as we navigate this change ourselves… I did not have any involvement in this decision.”
The players
Matt Devitt in 2021. (Photo: Facebook)
Matt Devitt is a Florida native. A long time weather watcher, in 2004 he was a student intern at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for four months, according to his LinkedIn biography. He attended Pennsylvania State University starting in 2006, interning at WFLA-TV in Tampa in 2008.
The following year he worked as a researcher at the National Science Foundation where he was part of a project titled “Evaluation of Community Emergency Response Teams in Hillsborough County, Florida: A Pilot Study.”
“The centerpiece of the program was an intensive, interdisciplinary research experience where I actively engaged in a faculty-mentored research project focused on hurricane hazards and social vulnerabilities of individuals and communities,” he wrote on his page. “As a capstone experience, I showcased my research project at a university-community symposium held at the end of the nine-week session.
After graduation in 2010 Devitt worked for 10 months as an on-air meteorologist at KTEN-TV in Denison, Texas, moved to KHBS-TV in Rogers, Ark., for a year and then was at WSAV-TV in Savannah, Ga., for nearly four years.
He came to WINK in February 2016, initially as morning meteorologist and then moving up to Chief Meteorologist in March 2021.
WINK TV, the station where Devitt was employed, is the oldest television station in Southwest Florida and the fifth oldest in the state. (Figures on its audience and reach are not publicly available.)
The station was founded by Arthur “Mickey” McBride, a tycoon who started the Cleveland Browns football team. McBride was born in Chicago but made his fortune in Cleveland where he worked his way up from a job as circulation manager for the Cleveland News, organizing the newspaper’s newsboys in their often-violent battles for territory. He branched out into real estate and taxicab companies.
In 1946 McBride bought Fort Myers’ first radio station, WINK, and then expanded it into television. It began broadcasting on March 18, 1954.
Today the station is still owned by the McBride family through their Fort Myers Broadcasting Company. It has a shared services agreement with other broadcasters like Sun Broadcasting, a Univision channel and others.
WINK TV had to evacuate its studio in September 2022 when it was flooded during Hurricane Ian. It began broadcasting from a shared broadcast center in north Fort Myers.
In March 2024 the station elevated Jamie Ricks to general manager. He started as a local sales manager at WINK in 2007 and rose to director of sales in 2024 before becoming general manager.
Jamie Ricks (Photo: LinkedIn)
There have been big and sometimes jarring changes at WINK in the last two years. From a physical standpoint, it moved its news operations into a brand new and revamped studio at a new location in the community of Gateway, in central Lee County, about ten miles east of its previous Broadcast Center. The change was announced on Tuesday, Jan. 13.
Stormy bonds
The weather itself plays a role in this drama.
For those unfamiliar with it, Southwest Florida is officially a near-tropical climate (Zone 10B in the Department of Agriculture Plant Hardiness scale). It has two seasons: wet and dry.
The dry season runs roughly from November to April. The weather is relatively monotonous; there’s little rain, almost constant sunshine and at most some temperature variation as different fronts come through. It often ends with droughts, water restrictions and wildfires.
The wet season runs roughly from April to November. As the summer wears on there are near-daily thunderstorms, sometimes severe.
But what really makes the wet season wet are the tropical storms and hurricanes that usually blow in from the Gulf of Mexico or across the peninsula from the Atlantic. Hurricane season officially begins June 1 and ends on Nov. 30.
(Editor’s Note: The latest Trump-appointed director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, David Richardson, said when he took office that he was unaware that there was an official hurricane season.)
Southwest Florida is a climatologically sensitive region and very vulnerable to damage from extreme weather events. It has been repeatedly battered by catastrophic storms, none more so in recent years than 2022’s Hurricane Ian.
As a result, weather, even in the dry season, is a major preoccupation in the region and that’s reflected in its broadcast TV stations. The two major stations, WINK and WBBH (NBC2) and WZVN (ABC7) (the latter two combined as Gulf Coast News by Hearst Television) usually lead off their evening newscasts with weather reports, even in calm times.
As an indication of the importance of weather in the area, in 1994 NBC2 and ABC7 joined together to invest in their own Doppler radar, which was upgraded in 2021. In 2022 WINK countered by upgrading its own radar to Doppler 3X, which, as it never tires of repeating, is three times more powerful and accurate than its competitor.
Both of these were major investments to provide greater accuracy for weather forecasts.
The primacy of weather is also reflected in the robust and extensive meteorological teams of the stations. Both stations employ numerous knowledgeable and very professional meteorologists.
Allyson Rae is the chief meteorologist at Gulf Coast News, as Devitt was at WINK.
Especially when hurricanes threaten or hit the region, the teams go into emergency, around-the-clock mode. The reports are constant and the reporting takes on life and death urgency as viewers watch for evacuation orders and emergency announcements.
Devitt was especially good at this. In 2022 during Hurricane Ian, with the WINK studio flooding, he stood at a laptop on a stand with what looked like a single spotlight on him, calmly providing real time reports of flooding, tidal surge, and especially destructive rotating winds on a street-by-street basis.
(On a personal note: During Ian, this author and his wife watched him report on a rotation nearing our neighborhood, giving street-by-street coordinates as it hovered nearby and we prepared to take shelter. Mercifully, our home was spared.)
That kind of immediate, frightening, life-and-death reporting and forecasting forges a bond between a weather forecaster and the audience that goes well beyond the usual talking heads on television.
In addition to his coolness and competence under pressure, Devitt was otherwise a jovial and often-humorous presence both in his weather reports and his social media postings, which were considerable on a wide array of platforms. He shared insights, unusual weather phenomena and encouraged audience input with photos and alerts.
It all built a friendly, immediate and trusted persona that made him the highest rated weather presenter in the market and boosted WINK ratings.
These are some of the reasons that his firing came as such a shock in Southwest Florida and why the reaction has been so emotional.
Shock, dismay and anger
Reaction to Devitt’s announcement was immediate and overwhelming. Mostly, it expressed itself in social media postings and comments and the dominant moods were dismay and alarm.
It even expressed itself in petitions to reinstate him. One petition on Change.org to “Bring back Matt Devitt to Wink weather,” had 2,956 signatures as of this writing. A second one, “Reinstate Matt Devitt as a weather forecaster” had 107.
The other reaction was powerful curiosity over the cause of the firing, which neither Devitt nor WINK provided. As a result, the event was like a Rorschach blot that anyone could interpret.
One social media commenter guessed that the cause was a January 6 Facebook post from Devitt that pointed out the rising heat in Southwest Florida, accompanied by a chart.
“NEW: Data is in for 2025 and it shows it was the 10th hottest on record for the city of Fort Myers in Southwest Florida. Data goes back to 1902 (123 years). With that said, the past 7 years straight have all been in the Top 10 hottest.
Yes, it can still get occasionally cool or cold at times during hot years. It’s about *average* temperature over 365 days.
There are several contributing factors to the warmth in recent years. One of the most obvious that I’m sure you see all the time is the rapid development of Southwest Florida. If you replace cooler grass and trees with asphalt, concrete and buildings, materials that absorb heat, you’re expanding the urban heat island. As a reminder, I don’t do politics on this page. That’s just the pure physics of the situation. We’ll see what 2026 has in store ahead, I’ll keep you posted.”
The chart accompanying Matt Devitt’s Jan. 6 Facebook post. (Chart: Facebook)
Given debates over overdevelopment as well as the controversy over climate change and the state government’s determination to ignore it, there was speculation that Devitt was being punished for even cursorily acknowledging what President Donald Trump has called a “hoax.”
However, a much more detailed and credible theory came from Beach Talk Radio, an online news station and website based in Fort Myers Beach.
Citing what it called “rock-solid sources inside the WINK-TV building,” the station made the following post on Facebook:
“BREAKING:
“Our rock-solid sources inside the WINK-TV building have confirmed that Matt Devitt was fired with 2 months left on his 5-year contract. He was given 3 weeks severance after nearly 10 years of outstanding weather reporting to the Southwest Florida region.
“The reason Matt was fired, from what we are told, was because the new boss did not like that he was taking extra time during his dinner breaks to help his wife with their newborn baby. He even requested to come into work earlier so he could go home earlier and that was denied (his shift was 2:30PM to midnight). The suits expected a one hour dinner break to be no longer than one hour. They called what Matt did insubordination, a violation of his contract, dragged him into the GM’s office and fired him on the spot last Thursday. He has a non-compete agreement for one year.
“Maybe Matt should go back and add up all the extra hours he put in during all of those hurricanes and see what the boss has to say about that.”
Fury and politics
The Beach Talk Radio report sparked fury from one notable Southwest Florida viewer who posted on X: “If this report is true the entire WINK senior management should be fired and matt devitt [sic] reinstated with back pay.”
That was retired US House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who lives in the Quail West development of Naples.
As Devitt stated in his Jan. 6 Facebook posting, “As a reminder, I don’t do politics on this page.” But that didn’t stop the Devitt affair from immediately going political and the place where it erupted was in the crowded District 19 congressional race.
The electoral politicking began with X posts by one of the Republican candidates, Catalina Lauf. Responding to Gingrich’s puzzlement over the firing, she wrote on Jan. 11: “I have the answer, sir! @newtgingrich “My primary opponent, Jim owns WINK. It’s clear in SWFL that he is a RINO hack, possibly a closet DEM. His liberal leadership fired the beloved @MattDevittWX who brought so much hope to SWFL during Hurricane Ian.”
Catalina Lauf (Photo: Campaign)
The “Jim” is Jim Schwartzel who owns Sun Broadcasting, which shares facilities with WINK. Schwartzel is also running for the Republican nomination in District 19.
Jim Schwartzel (Photo: Author)
Schwartzel has never claimed any ownership in WINK and he was moved to issue his own denial on X:
“For political reasons, some are circulating the false claims that I own or control WINK News.
“I want to be clear: I do not own WINK TV or WINK News. I am not employed by WINK and I have no role in its parent company, Fort Myers Broadcasting Co.
“I own Sun Broadcasting Inc., which owns and operates 92.5 FOX News radio, 93.7 Trump Country radio, as well as other radio and media properties.
“Any statement to the contrary is either misinformed or a deliberate lie.”
Beach Talk Radio responded to the statement:
“Thank you Jim for pointing out the obvious but everyone in Southwest Florida with a brain knows how the radio station, WINK-TV and The CW are all intertwined. You carry WINK News on the CW for crying out loud. WINK does the weather on YOUR radio station. What you did not deny in your post was that you were in on the firing of Matt. Were you or were you not one of the 3-4 people that knew it was coming down even before Matt did? If you have nothing to do with WINK why would you be in that loop? Post that denial so the local voters know. Or, if you did know, and gave your OK, just be honest with the voters and tell them you OK’d Matt being fired so they know when they vote in the pimary. The people you are asking to vote for you have a right to know. This isn’t about politics. It’s about honesty.”
As of this writing, there had not been a response by Schwartzel.
Until Devitt or WINK break their silence, there is no authoritative account of the actual reasons for the firing and everything else is speculation, no matter how seemingly informed. No doubt lawyers on both sides have imposed an absolute cone of silence over all the principals. Readers and viewers should be very skeptical of everything they read and hear.
If indeed the fight was over Devitt taking over an hour for dinner, one can put forward a theory—and this needs to be emphasized, a theory—of the nuts and bolts of the dispute.
Devitt lives in Babcock Ranch and when WINK moved its studio ten miles eastward to Gateway, there was no way Devitt could get home in time for dinner with his family and return to the studio in one hour. If he tried, he’d only be able to ring the doorbell before having to turn around and head back. Given his schedule, he’d never again have a weekday dinner with his family or see his newborn in the evening except on weekends. It’s a dilemma every working parent can recognize.
But outsiders can only speculate. There may have been other issues of pay, contracts, interpersonal relationships, a purge of older employees and all the other myriad irritants and issues that make up life in the workplace today.
What is undeniable is that by doing this without grace or manners or consideration for viewers or any public explanation, WINK management really shot itself in the foot—and possibly somewhere else more painful. Did they really think the firing wouldn’t come to light? That this disappearance wouldn’t be noticed?
In response to the firing, people are turning off the station and deleting its application from their mobile devices and announcing it on social media. For all its promotion of its listening tours, WINK doesn’t seem to be listening when its viewers really have something to say. There is absolutely no doubt that revenue is going to take a big hit, along with ratings.
But at least it’s a near-guarantee that no one at WINK will take more than an hour for dinner. It’s a win if one wants to count it that way.
The political responses seem crude and stupid. Schwartzel doesn’t have ownership of WINK and unless Lauf can document and prove her accusations they should be ignored (and writing as a liberal progressive, he’s no Dem!). And if Beach Talk Radio has the goods—even though its details are impressive—it should get its source (or sources) to go on the record.
There are also likely larger reasons for the angst and anger over Devitt’s firing.
The assault on the media has finally hit home in Southwest Florida with the arbitrary dismissal of a trusted and even loved on-air personality. At the national level CBS, WINK’s network, has seen its news operation eviscerated by its new editor in chief, Barri Weiss, who is clamping a Trumpist hood over its operations and killing its credibility. Even in entertainment, the network will dismiss comedian Stephen Colbert and end The Late Show altogether in May in deference to Donald Trump’s hatred and pettiness.
But more, the general atmosphere of fear and threat and menace, with arbitrary snatches and killings in the streets, raids by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, a concentration camp just down the road in the Everglades and creeping and relentless authoritarianism is like the atmosphere of danger and menace as a hurricane approaches, its winds blowing and its clouds lowering and its mortal danger becoming ever more apparent. People are tightly wound, tense and worried.
Perhaps that’s why when a television personality whom so many Southwest Floridians see as a friend, a guide and a guardian, someone trusted and reliable in the worst storms, is suddenly snatched away, it’s a shuddering shock that goes well beyond just the usual round of on-air personnel changes.
This story is only beginning. If WINK managers thought it would fade away they are much mistaken. It will all depend on the principals, of course, and their decisions. Devitt has to make known what he intends to do. WINK can maintain its silence but it will come at growing costs.
Like any hurricane, it’s not until the winds die down and the waters recede that the real damage will be known. But also like any hurricane, it will take a long time for all to revive and recover—and that’s not something that can be done with a wink.
Matt Devit reporting during Hurricane Ian, 2022 (Image: YouTube/WINK)
On the 250th anniversary of the publication of Common Sense and amidst an American crisis, it’s time to re-learn its lessons—and apply them
The author’s copy of Common Sense. (Photo: Author)
Jan. 10, 2026 by David Silverberg
Back in 2002, during a visit to Colonial Williamsburg, Va., I came across a shop selling a facsimile of the pamphlet Common Sense. I wanted to read it the way a colonial would have read it, in the same form.
That proved a bit challenging. There are s’s that look like f’s. It uses British spellings like the frequently-used word “honor” as “honour.” It’s full of old usages like the word “hath,” which evolved into today’s “has,” “doth,” which evolved into “does,” and “‘tis,” which evolved into “its.” At the bottom of each page is the first word of the next page, to guide the printer in the proper order. Still, for all that, it’s worth persisting.
It’s a small publication: my copy measures 4 and ¼ inches by 6 and ¾ inches (10.8 cm by 17.1 cm) and is 80 pages long, not including the covers. The first editions were between 47 and 50 pages.
This little pamphlet was published exactly 250 years ago on this day, January 10, 1776.
It proved to be an intellectual earthquake that birthed a new nation.
There is a story that the author, Thomas Paine, was so enthusiastic and excited upon receiving his printed copies that he opened up the window of his lodging and started throwing copies to people passing by in the street. The story has never been historically verified, but even if untrue, it should be true. Paine knew he had written an original and powerful work. As he foresaw, it went on to shake the American colonies and ultimately the world.
On this day 250 years later, Common Sense is as relevant—and as urgent—as it was on that other January day. Indeed, today Paine might have called it No Kings!
OF MONARCHY AND HEREDITARY SUCCESSION
In Common Sense, Paine set himself the task of convincing American colonists that they should create a separate, sovereign state independent of Britain.
His first task in doing this was to demolish the legitimacy and authority of monarchy, then ruling the colonies, as a form of government.
Paine was writing about the English monarchy but his arguments went much further: he opposed monarchy in its fullest sense: “mono,” Greek for “one” and “archy,” Greek for “power” or “authority.” He was against one-man rule of any kind.
Knowing his audience, Paine first drew on Biblical references to show that monarchy was not only anachronistic but profane.
“Government by kings was first introduced into the world by the Heathens, from whom the children of Israel copied the custom,” he wrote. “It was the most prosperous invention the Devil ever set on foot for the promotion of idolatry. The Heathens paid divine honours to their deceased kings, and the Christian World hath improved on the plan by doing the same to their living ones. How impious is the title of sacred Majesty applied to a worm, who in the midst of his splendor is crumbling into dust!”
He recounted all the arguments over kingship when the ancient Hebrews debated whether to anoint a king but his main point was that worshipping a single man violates the scriptural covenant with God.
“And when a man seriously reflects on the idolatrous homage which is paid to the persons of kings, he need not wonder that the Almighty, ever jealous of his honour, should disapprove a form of government which so impiously invades the prerogative of Heaven.” Monarchy, he wrote “in every instance is the popery of government.”
He also had no use for hereditary succession, which, he wrote, was another evil that added the “degradation of ourselves” to “an insult and imposition” on future generations.
All men having been created equal, “no one by birth could have a right to set up his own family in perpetual preference to all others for ever, and tho’ himself might deserve some decent degree of honours of his contemporaries, yet his descendants might be far too unworthy to inherit them.”
Ultimately, all kings—and autocrats of any kind—for all their pretensions, ultimately have humble, if not disgraceful, origins.
He put this in a way that strikes a very contemporary chord: “This is supposing the present race of kings in the world to have had an honorable origin: whereas it is more than probable, that, could we take off the dark covering of antiquity and trace them to their first rise, we should find the first of them nothing better than the principal ruffian of some restless gang, whose savage manners or pre-eminence in subtilty obtained him the title of chief among plunderers… .”
Kingship, monarchy and autocracy of any kind, he argued, “opens a door to the foolish, the wicked, and the improper, it hath in it the nature of oppression. Men who look upon themselves born to reign, and others to obey, soon grow insolent.” [Emphasis ours.]
What was more, hereditary monarchy didn’t ensure peace as its advocates argued; quite the contrary, as a form of government it opened the gates to wars foreign and civil and constant strife, he argued.
“In short, monarchy and succession have laid (not this or that kingdom only) but the world in blood and ashes. ‘Tis a form of government which the word of God bears testimony against, and blood will attend it.” And further, “Of more worth is one honest man to society, and in the sight of God, than all the crowned ruffians that ever lived.”
The immigrant
Thomas Paine, as depicted circa 1792. (Art: Laurent Dabos/National Portrait Gallery, UK)
The person who penned these words was born in Thetford, Norfolk, England on Feb. 9, 1737 to a humble tenant farmer who also made stays, the ribbing in women’s corsets. His father, Joseph, was a Quaker and his mother Frances was Anglican.
Paine attended grammar school at a time when schooling was not legally required. He apprenticed as a staymaker to his father and mastered the craft but then left home to become a privateer—a credentialed pirate—at the age of 19. Once he returned home he took up staymaking and opened his own shop.
Before 1774 Paine’s life was a chronicle of tragedies and failures. His business went broke and his wife died in labor along with their child. He separated from his second wife. He held a variety of low-level government jobs, ran businesses that failed and taught school for a time.
After moving to Lewes in Sussex in 1768 he became involved in civic affairs and began his first political writing. However, his string of professional setbacks continued.
In 1774 Paine moved to London where he was introduced to Benjamin Franklin, the lobbyist representing the American colonies. Franklin suggested that Paine emigrate to America, specifically the colony of Pennsylvania, and provided Paine a letter of recommendation.
Paine took the suggestion and arrived in America on Nov. 30, 1774, so sick from the passage that Franklin’s doctor had to have him carried off the ship. It took him six weeks to convalesce but once he did, he took an oath of allegiance to the Pennsylvania colony and took up work as editor of Pennsylvania Magazine.
At 38 years of age, Paine had finally found his niche.
‘TIS TIME TO PART!
Having demolished the legitimacy of monarchy as a form of government and specifically a form of American government in Common Sense, Paine now had to urge Americans to seek independence and do it right then.
“Now is the seed-time of Continental union, faith and honour,” he argued. To put it off independence was to simply postpone an inevitable conflict to a future generation.
He rejected all prospects of reconciliation. The battles of Lexington and Concord had occurred the previous April 19 followed by the battle of Bunker Hill the previous June. “All plans, proposals, &c. prior to the nineteenth of April, i.e. to the commencement of hostilities, are like the almanacks of the last year; which tho’ proper then, are superceded and useless now.”
If they sought independence the colonies were not merely establishing a new nation, they were creating a new world full of promise, he argued: “The Sun never shined on a cause of greater worth,” he wrote. “‘Tis not the affair of a City, a County, a Province, or a Kingdom; but of a Continent—of at least one eighth part of the habitable Globe. ‘Tis not the concern of a day, a year, or an age; posterity are virtually involved in the contest, and will be more or less affected even to the end of time, by the proceedings now.”
Then his pen fairly screamed off the page in what today would be an all-caps tweet: “Every thing that is right or reasonable pleads for separation. The blood of the slain, the weeping voice of nature cries, ‘TIS TIME TO PART!”
Hints and suggestions
But if the king were overthrown and America was independent, what would follow?
Paine acknowledged the fear and uncertainty plaguing undecided Americans. “If there is any true cause of fear respecting independance, it is because no plan is yet laid down. Men do not see their way out,” he wrote.
He decided to “offer the following hints” and in answering this question Paine laid the intellectual groundwork, not only for the revolution that followed, but for the government that rose out of it. He has never been given the full credit due him for his role in creating the ideas that shaped the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the United States itself.
Writing later in the year in the Pennsylvania Evening Post, he proposed a name for the new country: “until, as other nations have done before us, we agree to call ourselves by some name, I shall rejoice to hear the title of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, in order that we may be on a proper footing to negotiate a peace.”
That suggestion came to pass.
In Common Sense he suggested that the colonies explain themselves to the world: “Were a manifesto to be published, and despatched to foreign Courts, setting forth the miseries we have endured, and the peaceful methods which we have ineffectually used for redress; declaring at the same time, that not being able any longer to live happily or safely under the cruel disposition of the British Court, we had been driven to the necessity of breaking off all connections with her; at the same time, assuring all such Courts of our peaceable disposition towards them, and of our desire of entering into trade with them: such a memorial would produce more good effects to this Continent, than if a ship were freighted with petitions to Britain.”
That manifesto was published seven months later as the Declaration of Independence. Just as Paine suggested, it was addressed to “a candid world” and set forth the principles, reasons for separation and complaints of the new nation.
Paine may have had a hand in drafting or editing the Declaration since his initials appear on a draft. But when the Declaration was published in July, it was published at the back of the Pennsylvania Magazine that Paine edited as a special feature, a surprising place for such a monumental document. Still, that publication marked its first appearance in an American magazine and appeared at the same time as newspapers carrying it as breaking news.
In Common Sense Paine proposed creating districts in each colony and annual assemblies of delegates to a Continental Congress, with a rotating president. Indeed, along the lines of this suggestion, the colonies founded a Continental Congress, which evolved into the House of Representatives.
Paine’s use of the word “president” was notable. At the time “president,” meaning “one who presides” (literally, from the Latin, “praesidens,” derived from “prae” or “before” and “sedere,” “to sit”) was not a widely used honorific. Ultimately it would be adopted as the title of the nation’s chief executive.
He proposed “A Committee of twenty six members of congress, viz. Two for each Colony.” This became the Senate.
“The conferring members being met, let their business be to frame a Continental Charter, or Charter of the United Colonies; (answering to what is called the Magna Charta of England) fixing the number and manner of choosing Members of Congress, Members of Assembly, with their date of sitting; and drawing the line of business and jurisdiction between them: Always remembering, that our strength is Continental, not Provincial.”
This “Charter” came to fruition as the Constitution of the United States.
Then he addressed another big issue.
“But where, say some, is the King of America? I’ll tell you, friend, he reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind like the Royal Brute of Great Britain.”
When the Charter was adopted, Paine proposed: “let a day be solemnly set apart for proclaiming the Charter; let it be brought forth placed on the Divine Law, the Word of God; let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve of monarchy, that in America the law is king. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be king; and there ought to be no other.”
Once the ceremony adopting the Charter was completed, Paine suggested that the ceremonial crown be taken down, smashed to pieces and the pieces distributed to the crowd, symbolizing NO KINGS!
An asylum for mankind
Paine fully understood that what could be created was entirely new.
“The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind,” he wrote. “…We have every opportunity and every encouragement before us, to form the noblest, purest constitution on the face of the earth. We have it in our power to begin the world over again,” he wrote.
He also stood straightforwardly for freedom of religion, religious diversity and open immigration.
When he suggested the Charter he argued that it should be “Securing freedom and property to all men, and above all things, the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience… .”
He went further in advocating “liberal” religious “diversity,” specifically using those terms: “For myself, I fully and conscientiously believe, that it is the will of the Almighty that there should be a diversity of religious opinions among us. It affords a larger field for our Christian kindness: were we all of one way of thinking, our religious dispositions would want matter for probation; and on this liberal principle I look on the various denominations among us, to be like children of the same family, differing only in what is called their Christian names.”
Those ideas went on to be embodied in the Bill of Rights and the first sentence of the First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof… .”
What is more, he saw America as a haven such as the world had never before known and he put it in passionate and emotional terms: “O! ye that love mankind! Ye that dare oppose not only the tyranny but the tyrant, stand forth! Every spot of the old world is overrun with oppression. Freedom hath been hunted round the Globe. Asia and Africa have long expelled her. Europe regards her like a stranger, and England hath given her warning to depart. O! receive the fugitive, and prepare in time an asylum for mankind.”
As Paine conceived it, that was what America was founded to be; a haven and asylum for those seeking free faith and freedom.
Bestseller and author
A statue in Burnham Park, Morristown, NJ, of Thomas Paine writing the pamphlet “The Crisis” on a drumhead. (Photo: Diane Durante, used with permission)
Common Sense was a viral hit.
Paine estimated that it sold 100,000 copies. That would have been in a colonial population of about 2 million. Its sales may have been much higher and there were likely many unauthorized editions. It took pride of place next to the Bible in colonial homes. It was read aloud in taverns and at public meetings. It may very well be the bestselling American publication of all time and certainly the most widely circulated.
Paine deliberately kept his name off the publication, according to one telling, because he feared retaliation by the English government. However, as he put it in a note in the third edition: “Who the Author of this Production is, is wholly unnecessary to the Public, as the Object for Attention is the Doctrine itself, not the Man.”
Paine donated his proceeds to the Continental Army, which he joined after independence was declared.
During the conflict Paine marched with the troops and penned a series of pamphlets called “The American Crisis.” It was during the darkest days of the Revolution at the end of 1776 after defeats in New York that he sat down, writing on a drumhead according to legend, and penned what would become what was probably the most famous paragraph he ever wrote, starting with the words, “These are the times that try men’s souls.”
In 1777 Paine was named secretary to the Congressional Committee on Foreign Affairs but clashed with the leadership and resigned. He was sent on a fundraising mission to France, where he worked with Benjamin Franklin, and then traveled to other countries in Europe to raise funds.
After the revolution Paine traveled back and forth from America to Britain, writing and pamphleteering the whole time.
As the French revolution broke out he became a passionate advocate for French republicanism, writing the tract Rights of Man in 1791 to counter Edmund Burke’s anti-revolutionary Reflections on the Revolution in France. He was granted honorary French citizenship and elected a member of the National Convention although he didn’t speak French.
As passionately republican though he was, Paine was a moderate in the spectrum of French politics and opposed execution of King Louis XVI. When radicals took over and initiated the reign of terror, Paine was imprisoned.
The story is that he was sentenced to be guillotined. However, the night before executions jailers would mark the cell doors of the condemned with chalk. Paine got the chalk mark but because the door was open, it was on the inside of the door and was overlooked the next morning.
A deliberate mistake? No one will ever know for sure but Paine was spared. He was released and readmitted to the Convention after the radicals fell.
Paine kept writing and pamphleteering, ever independent and contrarian. He advocated a French invasion of England and overthrow of the king, opposed Napoleon Bonaparte as “a charlatan,” attacked George Washington for not coming to his aid during his imprisonment and called him treacherous, hypocritical and unworthy of his fame.
He returned to America in 1802 on the invitation of President Thomas Jefferson and published The Age of Reason, submitting religious faith to his searching and intense logic.
“I believe in one God, and no more; and I hope for happiness beyond this life,” he wrote. “I believe in the equality of man; and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavoring to make our fellow-creatures happy.”
It was widely read but also widely condemned.
Paine died in New York City at the age of 72 on June 8, 1809. Only six mourners came to his funeral, two of them black freedmen honoring his consistent opposition to slavery. Quakers would not allow him to be buried in the cemetery he requested and the location of his bones—if they still exist—are unknown today.
Thomas Paine’s death mask. (Photo: WikiMedia Commons)
Legacy, relevance—and immediacy
When he started writing Common Sense, Paine had only two tools at his disposal: language and logic.
He was just another immigrant to America, someone unremarkable and ordinary in daily life, in no way prepossessing or outstanding. His greatest asset was the letter of introduction from Benjamin Franklin. Otherwise, he had nothing.
But he was caught up in the spirit of America and it inspired him to express his thoughts. He could not know if his ideas would meet public approval or even be noticed. Still, the concept of starting anew, of a continent full of potential, of creating something better, of righting wrongs and seeking freedom were so inspiring that he made the effort.
That effort and the pamphlet it produced created the intellectual framework for the American revolution. But more, it created a mindset and outlook and birthed fundamental principles that molded American thinking and behavior that have lasted 250 years.
Until now.
The Enlightenment ideas in Common Sense were attacked when they were published. They have been under threat ever since. In the 20th century they came under attack from European Fascism. But those ideas inspired defiance and resistance. Ultimately, they triumphed with the democracies and went on win over a part of the world that called itself “free.” With the fall of the Soviet Union they swept the part of the world that had been under the Communist heel and went on to spark color revolutions and the Arab Spring.
Today the ideas of Paine and Common Sense are under attack in the country whose birth they inspired and by a president whose office Paine conceived.
They are threatened by a man who sees himself as king, one who is most “foolish,” “wicked,” and “improper” as Paine warned.
All of Paine’s admonitions against the concentration of power in a single man’s hands, about elevating one person high above other people, about immunity from the law, about the potential for insolence, corruption and arrogance, are suddenly blazing anew in the person of Donald Trump.
What is more, they are under direct physical attack. The killing of Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis at the hands of masked and unaccountable agents and long before her, the death of Heather Heyer in Charlottesville, Va., at the hands of a neo-Nazi, are attacks on Common Sense and its ideas of law, justice and democracy. As Paine would have put it, “the blood of the slain, the weeping voice of nature” cries out for redress.
But Paine also understood that in addition to revolt and resistance, freedom required friendship and cooperation among all people of like mind. He put this very well in Common Sense.
“WHEREFORE, instead of gazing at each other with suspicious or doubtful curiosity, let each of us hold out to his neighbor the hearty hand of friendship, and unite in drawing a line, which, like an act of oblivion, shall bury in forgetfulness every former dissention. Let the names of Whig and Tory be extinct; and let none other be heard among us, than those of a good citizen; an open and resolute friend; and a virtuous supporter of the RIGHTS of MANKIND, and of the FREE AND INDEPENDANT STATES OF AMERICA.”
But as he learned—and as Americans are learning now—good intentions are not enough. Today, at a time of duress as acute as that 250 years ago, it makes sense to draw on Paine’s wisdom written in the cold and misery of failure and crisis. It’s his most famous paragraph and one that sheds light in even the darkest times, and one so immediate that it might have been written this morning. But as it did then, today it provides inspiration to persist and look to the dawn of the day after tomorrow.
“THESE are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated.”
Art: Dennis Goris
To read and download a full PDF of Common Sense from Google Books, click below.
Floridians face a fork in the road in the year ahead in this artificial intelligence-generated illustration. (Art: AI for TPP/ChatGPT)
Jan. 5, 2026 by David Silverberg
This year Florida voters will face choices that will determine how they live their lives as well as the direction and destiny of their state—even more so than in “normal” election years.
At the top of the list will be the race for governor.
Then there is election of a senator. The current senator, Sen. Ashley Moody (R-Fla.), is running in her own right after being appointed in January by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) to fill in the unexpired term of Marco Rubio, who was appointed Secretary of State.
The race for Chief Financial Officer will be unusually important and competitive this year as well and the race for Attorney General will see the incumbent, James Uthmeier, creator of the Alligator Alcatraz concentration camp, defending his seat.
On the same ballot will be elections for offices at all levels including members of the House of Representatives but also state, county and municipal offices. Because President Donald Trump will be on the road stumping for his candidates, Floridians should expect some Trump rallies to boost their chances.
In the legislature two major issues will dominate the session that begins Jan. 13, or possibly a special session: whether to redistrict Florida in mid-decade and whether to abolish property taxes.
Beyond these political occurrences, Florida is scheduled to host two major scheduled events this year: Miami will be one of 11 American cities hosting Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) World Cup games.
In December, Miami will again be the host city for the G20 summit of the world’s leading economic powers at the Trump National Doral Miami resort and spa.
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) is term-limited and so his seat is up for grabs.
Media coverage of the race conveys the impression that only three Republicans and two Democrats are seeking their parties’ nomination.
In fact, as of Jan. 3 there were 11 Republicans, 9 Democrats and 14 non-party, independent, other party and write-in candidates running for Governor, according to the Florida Department of State.
Declared candidates for governor, as of Jan. 3, 2026. (Chart: TPP from FDoS)
The ultimate filing deadline is noon, June 12, 2026, so this list can be expected to get perhaps a bit shorter as candidates drop out—but more likely a lot longer.
It’s in this kind of situation that a free and independent media should play its democratic role in winnowing the field to what are generally considered the “serious” candidates.
On the Republican side, the leading candidate is Rep. Byron Donalds (R-19-Fla.), who was endorsed by President Donald Trump even before he declared his candidacy in February. Donalds has also been endorsed by businessman Elon Musk, other large donors and a slew of Republican officeholders in the state and has a reported war chest of $40 million. However, this includes contributions to his congressional campaign, which the Federal Election Commission ruled must be refunded to donors, a dispute that was unresolved as of this writing.
Two other credible Republican candidates are former Florida House Speaker Paul Renner, and businessman James Fishback.
Hovering in the wings are Lt. Gov. Jay Collins (R) and Florida First Lady Casey DeSantis, who was long considered a possible contender. By the end of the past year she had not definitively stated her status one way or another, although a run seemed doubtful, and Collins had not declared his candidacy, despite much media speculation.
On the Democratic side the leading contender is David Jolly, a former congressman and converted Republican who has been actively campaigning throughout the state. To the degree that he has any serious challenger within the Party, it comes from Jerry Demings, the Orange County mayor and former sheriff.
(Editor’s note: The most notable candidate in the running, based entirely on name alone, is Republican Shea Cruel. A Cruel versus Jolly race would generate headlines for the ages.)
Two big issues hovering over the gubernatorial race are the degree to which the new governor will continue DeSantis’ culture war against “woke” and policies—particularly against immigration and migrants—and the new governor’s relations with Trump if Trump is in office during the governor’s full tenure.
Despite the seriousness of these issues, the contest on the Republican side has already turned nasty and personal and can expected to become more so as Primary Election Day, Aug. 18, approaches. Candidates clearly see the race turning on personal factors and there is no indication this will change as the year progresses.
(The Paradise Progressive will be covering the gubernatorial race and candidates in much more detail in days to come.)
The Senate race
Sen. Ashley Moody (R-Fla.) will be defending her seat this year. Serving as the state attorney general, she was appointed senator by DeSantis in January when sitting senator Marco Rubio was named Secretary of State. In this election Moody will be seeking the office in her own right.
There are already a slew of candidates both on the Republican primary side and among Democrats and independents.
An early Democratic opponent, Joshua Weil, who made a name for himself as a very effective fundraiser in a special congressional election, dropped out of the race in July due to medical conditions. Alexander Vindman, a resident of Broward County and retired US Army colonel whose whistleblowing on Trump’s phone call leading to his first impeachment, has also fueled speculation about a Democratic run for the seat.
However, Moody as the incumbent has the clear advantage in name recognition, funding and endorsements. She won attorney general seats twice in statewide races in 2018 and 2022, although without serious opposition.
However, the unexpected always lurks around the corner.
Candidates for Florida’s Senate seat as of Jan. 3. (Chart: TPP from FDoS)
The Chief Financial Officer race
The state of Florida created the office of Chief Financial Officer (CFO) in 2002, consolidating several finance-related positions into a single Office of Financial Regulation.
This is an elected, Cabinet-level position that is third in line to succeed the governor after the lieutenant governor. There have been four CFOs since its creation, three Republicans, one Democrat as well as a brief acting CFO.
Blaise Ingoglia (R) is the fifth CFO, appointed in July 2025 when the previous one, James “Jimmy” Patronis, stepped down to run for a congressional seat in a special election in the 1st Congressional District to replace the resigning Matt Gaetz.
This year Ingoglia is running to fill a full, four-year term in his own right.
Ingoglia served as a state senator from the 11th District, which covered the largely rural Citrus, Hernando, and Sumter counties and part of Pasco County. Before that he served as a member of the state House of Representatives.
Ingoglia, originally from Queens, NY, moved to Spring Hill, Fla., in 1996 where he worked in real estate and then entered politics in 2008.
Ingoglia has been a consistently extremely conservative politician, often pushing the most radical ideas on issues like immigration enforcement, voting accessibility and taxation.
While there are 6 candidates running for the office, the most credible other candidate is state Sen. Joe Gruters (R-22-Sarasota) who is currently also serving as chairman of the Republican National Committee (RNC). He was also former treasurer of the RNC and served as chair of the Florida Republican Party from 2019 to 2023.
Gruters received Trump’s “complete and total” endorsement for CFO in 2024 and is promoting himself as the true America First, Make America Great Again (MAGA) believer, in contrast, he says, to Ingoglia. At the same time DeSantis attacked Gruters as insufficiently conservative.
There is only one non-Republican candidate for the office, John Smith, an Orlando businessman with a hurricane storm shutter business, who is running as non-party affiliated. As of Jan. 3 there were no Democratic Party candidates.
Smith’s candidacy closes the Republican primary to non-Republicans, effectively disenfranchising Democratic voters unless a Democratic candidate appears before the deadline. In this he is effectively functioning as what is known as a “ghost” candidate.
Unless the field changes, this will be a cramped, internecine Republican Party battle based on the fervor of the various candidates’ belief, the purity of their extremism and the ability to appeal to a hardcore MAGA base. It will likely be decided in the August 18 primary.
Candidates for the position of Florida CFO as of Jan. 3.(Chart: TPP from FDoS)
Attorney General
This year James Uthmeier (R) will be defending his seat as Florida Attorney General against a Republican challenger and two Democratic Party candidates.
Uthmeier, 38, was appointed in February 2025 to take the place of Ashley Moody when she was made senator by DeSantis. Prior to that he served as the governor’s chief of staff.
In his short time as Attorney General, Uthmeier has proven an aggressive, heavily ideological and outspoken partisan.
Uthmeier’s Republican opponent is Steven Leskovich, a trial attorney who has lived in Florida for 30 years and states that he’s running to defend the Constitution, eliminate corruption, fight crime, “and political weaponization in the justice system.”
There are two Democratic candidates.
Jim Lewis is a political aspirant who previously ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic attorney general nomination in 2022 and mayor of Fort Lauderdale in 2023 as well as a variety of other state and county offices.
Jose Javier Rodriguez served in the Florida House and Senate and was Assistant Secretary of Labor for Employment and Training from April 2024 to the end of President Joe Biden’s term in office.
Candidates for the position of Florida Attorney General as of Jan. 3. (Chart: TPP from FDoS)
Commissioner of Agriculture
While the Florida Commissioner of Agriculture has broad responsibilities and authorities to support and regulate the state’s agriculture, consumer protection and environment, the office is usually a non-controversial one. However, as a Cabinet position it has also proved a platform for aspiring statewide candidates.
In 2018 Nicole “Nikki” Fried won the seat, the only Democratic Party candidate to attain statewide office that year. After leaving office in 2023 she became chair of the Florida Democratic Party. In 2018 Adam Putnam was the leading contender for the Republican gubernatorial nomination until Trump endorsed DeSantis.
This year, as of Jan. 3 there were three candidates for Agriculture Commissioner: Republican Matthew Taylor, Democrat Chase “Andy” Romagno and non-party affiliated Kyle Gibson, who is currently seeking petition signatures to run for governor, rather than commissioner.
Candidates for the position of Florida Agriculture Commissioner as of Jan. 3. (Chart: TPP from FDoS)
Midterms and The Big Rig
Florida appears on the brink of joining Trump’s effort to gerrymander congressional districts nationwide in order to determine the election’s outcome in his favor. Given his use of the word “rig,” “rigged” and “rigging” to denote manipulation of a process, it seems only appropriate to dub his gerrymandering project “The Big Rig.”
It is very difficult to say how the rigging process will play out in Florida. At the end of the year, as the legislature began its early committee hearings, DeSantis and House Speaker Rep. Daniel Perez (R-116-Miami) were both pushing for it. However, DeSantis was floating the idea of a special session while Perez wanted to get it done by the end of the regular session on March 13. By contrast, Senate President Sen. Ben Albritton (R-27-Bartow) was more cautious and in agreement with DeSantis.
Regardless of the timing, there seems agreement to rig Florida’s districts among the legislature’s Republican supermajority. Democrats, as to be expected, are opposed and are backed by grassroots opponents. However, when the House held its first procedural committee hearing on redistricting, the public was shut out and no comments from the floor were allowed—no doubt a preview of what is likely to be a forced, arbitrary and undemocratic effort by lawmakers.
If Florida does rig its congressional map, every federal representative and challenger will be affected. Even if Republicans pick up some additional ostensibly Republican districts, that may not matter as much as it would in previously “normal” elections. There is also virtually no doubt that any new map will be challenged in court.
However it ultimately turns out, the battle is already introducing a new level of tumult and turmoil in this year’s already roiled Florida political scene.
Affordability and the property tax debate
Life for everyday Americans is getting more expensive and difficult. The only person who seems to disagree with this assessment is President Donald Trump, who has dismissed discussion of affordability as “a Democratic hoax.”
Florida Democrats, like their counterparts across the country, recognize voters’ stress and are making affordability key plank in their 2026 platform.
“Prices are rising, period. And we are seeing Republican politicians pander to DC and squabble amongst themselves instead of fixing the problem, so Democrats are offering ideas,” Florida House Democratic Leader Rep. Fentrice Driskell (D-67-Temple Terrace) told a press conference on Dec. 8.
The Democrats are already offering legislation to make inroads on high costs but as a minority in a supermajority Republican legislature, the road to passage is steep and the odds are long.
In Florida the affordability crisis is especially acute and the result of a variety of factors like the high proportion of seniors on fixed incomes.
But playing a major role are natural factors like prevalent and frequent disasters like hurricanes, which drive up insurance costs while at the same time making insurers flee the state. Furthermore, climate change is driving up the risks to the state’s residents while the Republican-dominated state government determinedly denies its existence. That in turn dampens efforts to build climatic resilience, increasing the state’s vulnerability to disasters, which in turn drives up costs and insurance rates, in a vicious cycle.
This has had the practical effect of devastating Florida’s low-cost labor pool, which previously provided migrant and immigrant labor, particularly in the construction, hospitality, tourism and agricultural sectors. That in turn has driven up the costs of goods and services as labor becomes scarcer and more expensive, the cost of which is passed on to consumers.
(Additionally, Trump’s threats to Canada and his enmity to visiting foreigners has dampened a once-robust tourism industry important to Florida’s economy.)
That their own policies might be exacerbating the affordability crisis for Floridians is not an admissible notion for the Florida Republicans in power, so they must seek some relief in a different remedy.
Taxation has never been popular in Florida and now DeSantis wants to take anti-taxation to a new level and abolish property taxes altogether.
Florida is already a low-tax state. It has no income tax, estate or inheritance taxes. Its tax collection is very low per capita. Most importantly, it features a homestead exemption that reduces the assessed, taxable value of a lived-in home and limits annual property tax increases.
DeSantis floated the idea of ending property taxes in his annual State of the State address on March 4, 2025.
“While Florida property values have surged in recent years, this has come at a cost to taxpayers squeezed by increasing local government property taxes,” he said. “Escalating assessments have created a gusher of revenue for local governments—and many in Florida have seen their budgets increase far beyond the growth in population. Taxpayers need relief. You buy a home, pay off a mortgage—and yet you still have to write a check to the government every year just to live on your own property? Is the property yours or are you just renting from the government?”
Since then the debate over the future of property taxes in Florida has been percolating at a relatively low level but this year when the legislature convenes on Jan. 13 it will be coming to a full boil.
Local governments depend on property taxes to provide basic services, income for schools and infrastructure maintenance and improvement—and the revenue has hardly been a “gusher.” Experts and local officials have been making the case that an end of property taxes would cripple their operations.
“Local governments would lose fiscal autonomy as they would no longer collect property taxes, and they would become dependent on the state for funding (whether it is for schools or other public services like police and fire services),” warned the Florida Policy Institute in an in-depth paper, “A Risky Proposition: Weakening Local Governments by Eliminating Property Tax Revenue,” issued in February.
At the same time CFO Ingoglia has been prowling the state in imitation of Elon Musk and the now-abolished Department of Government Efficiency (locally renamed FAFO, which has a profane generic meaning but in this case stands for the Florida Agency for Fiscal Oversight).
Ingoglia was trying to highlight what he said was wasteful spending by local governments but they pushed back.
“This whole thing is a made-for-television event, and it’s specifically made for television for the CFO’s re-election,” said Seminole County Commissioner Lee Constantine (R-District 3) at a forum in November. At the same event Broward County Democratic Commissioner Steven Geller (D-District 5) was similarly scornful. “Check the numbers,” he said of Ingoglia’s audit of his county. “Because they are fictitious. Made-up. Phony. False.”
In addition to its impact on local governments, experts are warning that abolishing property taxes would have to be made up with sales taxes that fall most heavily on the least wealthy Floridians, the working and middle classes, while benefiting the rich. Florida is already the most “regressive” tax state in the nation and ending property taxes would make the burden even more extreme.
Realtors have also warned that ending property taxes would drive up home prices by 9 percent, repelling new home buyers and renters from the market.
These are thorny, difficult and ultimately increasingly emotional issues that will likely dominate the legislative session and all of 2026.
Two paths diverged
The year’s elections will take place amidst an increasingly fragmented Republican legislative majority.
The days of automatic obedience to DeSantis when he was running for president are over. State Republicans, especially House Speaker Perez, are proving contrarian and intractable—or skeptical and independent, depending on one’s point of view.
This is in no way implies a repudiation of Trumpism. In fact, during the 2025 session the battle between DeSantis and Perez was over who was more passionate and committed in the service of Trump’s hatred of migrants and immigrants. DeSantis viewed the proposals by Perez and the legislature as too weak and when the legislature passed its own TRUMP (Tackling and Reforming Unlawful Migration Policy) Act, (CS/SB 2B), DeSantis vetoed it.
While the rest of the country may be revolting against Trump’s threats and bullying, in Florida legislative pushback against an equally bullying and autocratic state government remains relatively tepid and weak.
Ultimately, the fissures and faults in Florida’s governance will have to be resolved by the primary and general elections this year.
It’s as though Floridians stand at a crossroads: one path leads into sunshine and a brighter future, the other into a dark, watery swamp—and as every Floridian knows, where there’s water, there may be alligators.
When you live in Florida, you have to pick your steps with care, whether in the streets, by the streams—or in the voting booth.
The Paradise Progressive 