Before and after photographs of the crosswalk in front of the Pulse nightclub in Orlando in August 2025. (Photo: Florida Phoenix, with permission of Ryan Anderson)
David Silverberg, candidate for the Florida state Senate in District 28, pledged today that if elected he will introduce a bill called the “Colorful Crosswalks Act.”
“There’s no reason that communities can’t show their pride with multiple colors in their crosswalks as long as it’s compatible with public safety,” said Silverberg. “My Colorful Crosswalks Act will make that possible and spell out the details.”
Background: Last year Gov. Ron DeSantis and the state Department of Transportation prohibited all “surface art” at Florida intersections, a form of expression that had been permitted since 2017. In August and September 2025 state workers began painting over multicolored crosswalks across Florida despite protests and resistance from residents and city governments. This included a multicolored crosswalk in Orlando honoring the victims of the 2016 Pulse Nightclub shooting.
“The prohibition of colorful crosswalks was a petty and intrusive act of overreach by what I call ‘Big Tallahassee,’” stated Silverberg. “It was yet another attempt to stamp out freedom of expression by this governor and his cohorts and suppress home rule. If elected I intend to do all I can to encourage freedom of expression and community pride, not suppress it.”
Silverberg is running to represent the 28th Senate District of Florida, which includes Collier and Hendry counties and Lee County east of Route 75.
Silverberg is a Naples resident and retired journalist.
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.
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)
Democratic gubernatorial candidate David Jolly addresses a town hall meeting in Naples’ South Regional Library on Oct. 13. (Photo: Author)
Oct. 19, 2025 by David Silverberg
Even in retirement-heavy Naples, Fla., it takes some kind of special magic to fill a large auditorium for a political speech on a Monday afternoon.
But David Jolly managed to do exactly that when he addressed a town hall meeting at the Collier County South Regional Library on Monday, Oct. 13.
Jolly is the Democratic candidate for governor—and if the turnout, interest and enthusiasm of the crowd was any indication, this campaign and election will certainly be intense. People are fired up—and worried.
But if Jolly is worried, he gives no indication of it.
“Believe. Believe,” he told the crowd. “My wife and I would not be in this race, I pledge to you, if we did not believe that in this moment we’ve got the best shot we’ve had in 30 years to change the direction of this state. When we change the direction of Florida, we impact national politics, we give people across the country the opportunity to look to something that’s different and better. Believe. We here believe.”
It seemed like he had the audience believing him.
It’s one thing to believe—it’s another thing to back up that belief with data, money and, ultimately, votes.
But Jolly thinks he’s got the goods.
Pure Florida
Jolly is probably as Florida as it’s possible to be for someone other than an indigenous native. He was born on Halloween, 1972, in Dunedin and grew up in Dade City.
His father was a Baptist preacher and he was raised on Baptism’s precepts, which he has made clear still affect him as “a person of deep faith.”
It was his higher education that took him out of state, to Emory University in Georgia and George Mason University in Virginia, where he graduated with a juris doctor degree cum laude.
A Republican, Jolly joined the staff of Republican Rep. Bill Young in 1994, who at the time was representing central Florida’s 10th congressional district. Jolly rose through the various staff ranks but left the office in 2007 to work as a consultant and lobbyist. When Young died in office in 2013 at the age of 82, Jolly ran in a special election in March 2014 to succeed him, and won a narrow, 2 percent victory. He then won the general election in his own right in November without either a Republican primary challenger or a Democratic opponent.
As a representative, Jolly trended what might be called center-right, favoring what was the standard Republican litany of positions. He had campaigned to repeal the Affordable Care Act and supported overturning Roe versus Wade. In office he was in favor of tighter border controls, more restrictive vetting of immigrants and worked to maintain the prison in Guantanamo Bay.
But he also veered more centrist on other issues, arguing that regulations were appropriate to keep guns away from criminals, despite his support for the Second Amendment. He also supported the legality of same-sex marriage as part of his belief in personal liberty and opposition to government interference. At the same time, he said his Christian faith made him a believer in traditional marriage.
More particularly for Florida, he supported a ban on oil drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and sought to extend the National Flood Insurance Program to cover businesses and second homes.
As the 2016 election approached, he considered a run for the US Senate seat held by Marco Rubio when Rubio was considering running for another office—but Rubio changed his mind, decided to stay in the Senate and Jolly ran again for the 13th.
This time he was opposed by former governor Charlie Crist, who had transitioned from Republican to independent to Democrat. Still a canny politician, Crist narrowly won the election by 51.9 percent to Jolly’s 48.1 percent.
Changing parties
David Jolly in repose. (Photo: Author)
There was never a single, revelatory moment when Jolly suddenly decided to switch from the Republican Party to the Democratic, he told The Paradise Progressive.
“It was more a journey. It really was,” he said. “I mean, I was a Bush 41 Republican who fought the Tea Party, right? I was an appropriator who voted to keep the government open when they wanted to shut it down. On constitutional issues like marriage equality and eventually on reproductive freedom, I was moving away. On guns, I was moving away.”
He smiles wryly: “I say Republicans didn’t want me and Democrats didn’t need me.”
And then there was the presence and over time Donald J. Trump’s domination of the Republican Party. Jolly was no Trumper. “I fought back and lost that,” he reflects.
“I knew the fight had been lost in my mind, that the party I once belonged to was never coming back and that certainly I was not a sufficient leader to try to bring it back. And I spent six years as an independent, which was the most informative part of my political life, to be untethered from a major party, major party dogma.”
It was at the time he and his second wife were expecting their first daughter that he considered leaving the Republican Party. When he did it, he did so in a very public way.
“I basically announced on Bill Maher that I was leaving,” he said of his Oct. 5, 2018 appearance on Maher’s program. “I said I wanted our kids to know, I wanted my daughter to know, that it’s important to fight for what you believe in. But there came a moment where I was accepting that I wanted her to also see sometimes there are fights you walk away from.”
Or as he put it then, “Somebody else can fight for the dignity of the Republican Party now—it’s not my fight anymore.”
Jolly went on to become a political independent and a commentator for MSNBC, where he was consistently critical of Trump.
Then, this year, after making campaign-like appearances around Florida, including an appearance and speech in Naples on May 17, Jolly announced on June 5 that he was running for governor as a Democrat.
Jolly is well aware that there are critics who question his commitment to the Democratic Party and its principles.
He himself said, “I’m in a very post-ideological space. I really am. I think the left-right spectrum confines us and restricts us.”
However, his time as an independent gave him perspective, “I just got to look at what are the big answers to our big problems?” he said.
What is more, as he said to the crowd at his town hall in Naples: “Is it okay to change your mind?” While the crowd applauded and cheered he concluded: “I actually think it is.”
David Jolly speaks outside the Collier County Courthouse on May 17 of this year. (Photo: Author)
A stark contrast
It’s hardly surprising that as a Democrat, Jolly’s positions are starkly opposite those of Donald Trump or Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) or his leading likely opponent, Rep. Byron Donalds (R-19-Fla.).
But more than partisan, his positions are aimed squarely at the concerns of everyday Floridians and away from broad, national ideological questions.
Overall affordability and the high cost of insurance are key problems to be tackled, in his view.
“The property insurance crisis is the primary reason so many people in Florida are struggling to afford a home,” notes his platform. “From renters to retirees to homeowners, the burden of property insurance continues to make housing costs in Florida unaffordable for many.” He is pledging to make alleviating that problem a key focus of his governorship.
Notably, he is pro-choice. “Reproductive healthcare decisions should be made between women and their doctors, not politicians,” states his platform. He wants Florida to codify the same rules that held during the Roe v. Wade era.
He also recognizes the reality of climate change. “Florida should accept the science of climate change, protect our beaches and state parks, and invest in resiliency throughout the state,” according to his platform.
While supporting the Second Amendment, he thinks that Floridians have suffered enough from gun violence and lax gun laws. As his platform states: “Florida should ban the sale of assault weapons, require universal and comprehensive background checks, explore licensing, and preserve and expand the red flag laws enacted following the tragedy at Parkland.”
The litany goes down the line. But most of all, he emphasizes, he’s running on a platform that transcends party dogma.
And perhaps one of his most compelling positions is his call to treat everyone with “kindness, dignity and respect.”
“Culture wars divide and demonize,” states his campaign platform. “Florida should reject the politics of division and hate, and instead create a home where everyone is valued, respected, and welcomed. We should become a place where everyone is given dignity and equity, regardless of race, creed, or color, and regardless of who you love or the God you worship. Florida should embrace our immigrant community and celebrate their contributions to our state’s culture and economy. It’s time to create a Florida for all people.”
And there’s another promise he makes when it comes to culture, as he confided to his Naples audience.
“I’ll also tell you, one of the things I want to do when we get elected governor is bring back art to the state of Florida,” he said to enthusiastic cheers. “I want to open the governor’s mansion through loan agreements with major art installations. Bring back the art that lets us see who we are, who we could be, who we’ve been. Test the boundaries, bring back culture and theater, and open it up to the people of Florida. Open it up to school kids and everyone else. Otherwise, who else wants to go to Tallahassee?”
But can he win?
Jolly is running in a state where registered Republicans outnumber Democrats by 1.4 million, where the Republican governor won by 22 points in 2022, where his likely opponent is endorsed by Trump and has $31.5 million in campaign funds.
And yet Jolly is not only confident he can win, he radiates that confidence and can convey it to a crowd.
“We’re seeing it on the ground,” he said in response to a question about his path to victory. What’s more, “we’re also seeing it in the data.” Polling backs this up, he insisted. “I feel very comfortable saying we’re in the margin of error. We have a poll that has us leading by one [percentage point]. Donalds’ [poll] has him leading by four.”
But it’s the overall political environment that fuels his certainty. “So very critically, the environment and the cycle is one of dramatic change,” he said.
Why? “It’s because people are angry, they’re worried about their economy, and they don’t trust incumbent politicians right now. And so, yes, for us, that made the decision to get in this race. I really mean this, having been involved in probably 30 races—as a candidate in only three or four—I have zero interest in chasing a generic ballot, as I say. I know there’s an opportunity for change in Florida.
“And layer into that, we have a generational affordability crisis that truly is hitting Republicans as much as it’s hitting Democrats. And so that contributes to this environment.”
He pointed out that recent special elections in Florida have swung Democratic by 15 and 16 points. It has led DeSantis to avoid special elections, for example for his appointed lieutenant governor, Jay Collins, or in counties like Palm Beach. It’s also a trend throughout the country.
“This is a race that allows an Andy Beshear to get elected in Kentucky, a race that allows Steve Bullock to get elected in Montana, and a race that allows David Jolly to get elected in the state of Florida,” he told the crowd in Naples.
But he also acknowledged that the odds present a direct challenge to him: “I have to build a campaign that can win in this moment and win in this cycle.”
That also means closing the money gap. Donalds is reporting $31.5 million in the bank. Jolly has raised $2 million.
But Jolly sees an upward trend and points out that it’s still early in the race.
“We have small dollar donors from all 50 states,” he said in our interview. “Some of the largest investors in American politics have agreed to support us. But others are just ‘wait and see,’ right? There’s no reason for them to spend money in October of ‘25.”
What’s more, the Republican fundraising advantage may not endure.
“I would also say Republicans are very likely about to have a bloodbath of a primary and spend all their money against each other. And what I’m begging Democrats is—and that’s why I said it over and over today—if I’m insufficient, make me stronger.” In other words, he wants to have the dialogue that will enable him to learn and become more effective.
He also dismisses the impact of Trump’s endorsement of Donalds in the general election.
“With a state exhausted by MAGA, it hurts more than it helps,” he observed.
He continued: “The way I look at this race is that 33 percent of the state is probably unavailable to us. I’ll make my case as hard as I can. But if 39 percent of voters are registered as Republicans, I believe we will get 15 percent [of that].” If he can win over that percentage of Republican voters he can negate six points of likely Donalds supporters.
“So I do believe 33 percent of the state is loyally behind Donalds and Donald Trump. But in the midst of a dramatic change environment, to be able to have 67 percent of the state available to us, I feel very, very good about that.”
The possibility still exists that Jolly could face another Democratic challenger for governor. Right now he’s the only Democratic candidate and both in his speech and interview he called on his fellow Democrats not to be part of what has traditionally been called “the circular firing squad”
“Be a part of how we win,” he urged. “Don’t be a part of how you tear us down. Whether that means we have a primary or not, we’ll see. Family conversations aren’t all bad. They can be good. But we just have to remember that this is about Democrats leading a new coalition in American politics. And the only way we do that is if people look at the Democratic Party and see something they want to be a part of. If we fight each other for the next year, nobody’s going to be interested in that.”
Meanwhile, Jolly is taking a leaf from another former Democratic Florida candidate. He said his strategy is to go into communities across the state no matter their apparent ideological tendencies.
“I’m going to do what Lawton Chiles did in 1970. We’re going to go everywhere, absolutely everywhere. Deep red communities, frankly like Naples.” In 1970 Lawton Chiles, campaigning for the US Senate, did a 1,000 mile trek across Florida, visiting every community en route and talking to people along the way. He won the Senate seat and then went on to be elected governor in 1991, passing away in 1998.
Similarly, Jolly intends to visit as many communities as possible and once in those communities he intends to challenge Republicans to reveal their proposed solutions.
“Republican, what are you willing to do?’ he said. “I think we need a safe cap for insurance [i.e., ensuring that insurance can cover all contingencies]. Republicans will call it socialism. So what’s your plan? Can you convince enough people in Naples that you’re going to reduce their homeowner’s insurance, Byron? I don’t think you can. Can you convince enough people that they’re safe from school shootings? I don’t think you can, Byron. So we have to be willing to go into conservative media environments, into conservative communities and have conversations that not only express our values but ask the other side to be held accountable for their view and for their vision.”
A movement within a movement?
A demonstrator at the “No Kings” protest in Naples, Fla., on Saturday, Oct. 18, shows her support for David Jolly amidst the signs opposing Donald Trump. (Photo: Author)
There’s no doubt that Jolly projects a confidence that has been sorely lacking among Florida Democrats ever since Trump won the state in 2016 and DeSantis took the governorship in 2018. It’s a tonic for the crowds that come to hear him and it has electrified audiences, particularly in Naples.
Jolly has the experience, the objectivity and the analytical capabilities to be fully aware of the obstacles he faces, particularly in a state and a country being battered by rising authoritarianism, repression and anti-democratic tricks.
Asked if he worries about threats to the upcoming elections he acknowledges the dangers but is determined to press on.
“I still have faith, but I worry about it,” he admits. “And I worry about other areas of interference shy of Election Day.
“I worry, for instance, as a candidate, that the Trump administration is going to investigate major Democratic candidates across the country. And I worry about that on a personal level. I know there’s nothing [I’ve done] that merits an investigation. But it’s easy for what I believe is the current posture of the president to launch an investigation.”
He also worries that Trump could declare a national emergency on some pretext shortly before the election and somehow try to stop it. But he continues to campaign on the presumption that the election will be free, fair and honest.E
He is also fully aware of the physical danger to candidates and public figures in the current atmosphere. After the assassination of Charlie Kirk, Jolly said that he sat down with his wife and his team and had a conversation about whether to stay in the race. But he—and they—decided the stakes were too big and the outcome too important not to keep campaigning.
He also wanted to send a message to his children. “I guess with our kids, I wanted them to know that the story I’m telling is true. I want them to know we’re trying to change the world. And that, win or lose, it’s a gift.”
Jolly has set an arduous task for himself. His is a campaign that is truly grassroots, he will be campaigning everywhere in a big state; his Naples town hall was already his 81st campaign event and the campaign is still in its early stages. He knows how intense it’s going to get as time goes on and especially in a year’s time when the race has tightened and is nearing the finish line.
But if Jolly is fazed by the prospect, he doesn’t show it. If anything it fuels his resolve.
“I know what is within our power, which is to build a coalition strong enough to win overwhelmingly,” he said emphatically. “And I know that sounds like a wild aspiration in Florida, but it’s why we’re in it. It’s why we’re in this, because if we can build a big enough coalition in Florida to overcome that, then I think that people have spoken.”
He also knows the part he must play to win and that it’s long, exhausting and potentially dangerous. “But,” he continues, “if we win, it’s because Florida’s voters have decided enough is enough—and we’re going to overwhelmingly take back the state.”
A Republican seaside stampede in Florida’s 19th Congressional District. (Illustration: AI for TPP/ChatGPT)
October 7, 2025 by David Silverberg
Correction: The correct name of the company owned by Jim Schwartzel is Sun Broadcasting, which has no ownership stake in WINK TV.
What was promising to be a messy but obscure congressional race for Florida’s 19th Congressional District was suddenly catapulted into national prominence on Tuesday, Oct. 1, when Madison Cawthorn, a 30-year-old former North Carolina congressman and media bad boy announced that he would be running.
Because of his past behavior and erratic record, national and local media suddenly focused on him and the district. But in fact he’s an unlikely candidate with long odds in a crowded field.
The real focus of all this attention is the seat being vacated by Rep. Byron Donalds (R-19-Fla.), who is seeking the governorship.
As of right now there are nine declared Republican aspirants to the congressional seat and a single Democrat.
It’s very reminiscent of the 2020 congressional election when at one point there were 12 Republican candidates scrambling for the seat of retiring Republican Francis Rooney. He stepped down after two terms and the unpardonable sin of saying that the evidence should be considered in Donald Trump’s impeachment trial.
From that scrimmage (which ultimately narrowed to nine candidates) Donalds emerged the victor. Now the seat’s up for grabs again, with a whole new cast of characters—and with a little less than a year until the Republican primary election on Aug. 18, 2026, there may be new entrants.
It needs to be emphasized that it is still very early in the election cycle. Some candidates have not yet posted websites explaining their proposals and positions. They have not yet filed Federal Election Commission campaign finance reports. Nor have they all registered with the Florida Department of State. Candidates have until noon on Friday, April 24 of next year to qualify and more may appear.
This article will survey just the Republican candidates, their backgrounds and platforms. A separate article will evaluate and analyze the race. A third article will profile Democrat Howard Sapp.
But first, a look at the district.
The 19th Congressional District
A map of Florida’s 19th Congressional District. (Map: Ballotpedia)
The District is older, whiter and slightly richer than the rest of the country.
It has a population of 809,197 people according to one estimate based on Census data. That population is 67 percent White, 21 percent Hispanic and 7 percent Black. The median age is 53 years, which is 25 percent higher than in the rest of Florida and 1.4 times higher than in the entire United States. Women represent about 51 percent of its population.
At $52,402 per year it has a higher per capita income than both Florida and the United States and at $76,248 its median income is about the same as the rest of the country but a little higher than the rest of Florida. Even so, it has about a 12 percent poverty rate.
The Cook Political Report, the authoritative survey of congressional districts, rates it solidly Republican. For the 2026 election the Cook Partisan Voter Index is rating it R+14, meaning that in the past two presidential elections, the district’s results were 14 percentage points more Republican than the national average, making it the 88th most Republican district nationally.
The district encompasses two counties, Lee and Collier, both of which are majority Republican in registered voters. In Lee County, of 508,919 registered voters, 48 percent are Republican, 21.9 percent are Democratic, and 29.9 percent are registered as “other,” according to figures from the Lee County Election Supervisor. In Collier County, of 259,982 registered voters, 55.2 percent are Republican, 19.3 percent are Democratic, 22.4 percent have no party affiliation and 2.9 percent are registered to other parties, according to figures from the Collier County Supervisor of Elections.
This is the district that the following candidates are vying to represent in the US House of Representatives.
They are listed in alphabetical order, according to last name.
Madison Cawthorn
A state trooper confronts Madison Cawthorn at the scene of his most recent car crash on April 14, 2025. (Image: TikTok)
The instant he announced that he was running for Congress on Oct. 1, Cawthorn stole the media spotlight in Southwest Florida politics.
The reason is that he previously held the seat for North Carolina’s 11th District from 2021 to 2023. Currently separated from Christina Bayardelle, his wife of one year (from 2020 to 2021), the 30-year old Cawthorn made headlines and raised eyebrows during his brief congressional tenure.
In that time he carved out a role for himself as an extreme, vocal Trumpist and conspiracy theorist who made unsubstantiated assertions and hurled insults at opponents, journalists and fellow Republicans.
He voted to overturn the results of the 2020 election and addressed the “Stop the Steal” rally on the Ellipse that led to the attack on the US Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
Then-Rep. Madison Cawthorn addresses the Stop the Steal rally on the Ellipse in Washington, DC on Jan. 6, 2021. (Image: Madison Cawthorn on X)
His most infamous statement was his assertion in a March 2022 interview that he had been invited to an orgy by a fellow Republican lawmaker (unnamed at the time and ever since) and that he had seen prominent politicians using cocaine in front of him.
He was denounced by fellow Republicans, was the subject of numerous calls for ethics investigations and was the focus of multiple allegations of financial improprieties, favoritism, and House rules violations.
Cawthorn was defeated in a North Carolina Republican primary in 2022, after which he announced that “It’s time for the rise of the new right, it’s time for Dark MAGA to truly take command,” with “Dark MAGA” generally understood to represent vengeful Trumpism.
It was after this loss that Cawthorn purchased a $1.1 million home in Cape Coral and moved there, registering as a Florida voter in 2023.
As he states on his campaign website, “Florida gave me a second chance, and now I’m running for Congress to fight for faith, family, freedom, and the America First values we believe in. Washington is full of snakes, but I’m ready to drain the swamp and defend Florida.” He calls himself “an unapologetic conservative and one of President Trump’s strongest allies.”
As of this writing, Cawthorn was not yet registered with the Florida Department of State as a candidate.
He has, however, considerable familiarity with Florida—and Florida law enforcement.
It was near Daytona Beach, Fla., in 2014 during a Spring Break trip that he lost the use of his legs in a car accident. He was a passenger and the injury left him dependent on a wheelchair. More recently, on April 14, 2025 Cawthorn was the driver when his 2021 Mercedes rear-ended a Florida Highway Patrol car on Interstate 75 in Collier County. He was cited for driving without a license on Aug.19, 2025 and then arrested on Sept. 10 when he failed to appear for his court date.
Madison Cawthorn following his Sept. 10, 2025 arrest. (Photo:LCSO)
Chris Collins
Chris Collins (center) leaves a New York courthouse following his conviction for insider trading in 2019. (Image: ABC7 News)
Like Cawthorn, Christopher Carl “Chris” Collins is another former Republican congressman with a criminal record.
Collins, 75, represented New York’s 27th Congressional District, the area around Buffalo, NY from 2013 to 2019. He was the first member of Congress to endorse Trump for president in 2016.
In August 2018 Collins and his son were arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation for insider trading and making false statements.
The charges related to a company called Innate Immunotherapeutics, where Collins recruited investors while in office. In 2017, when he received news that the company’s medication to treat multiple sclerosis had failed its tests, Collins called his son from a lawn party at the Trump White House and told him to sell the stock before the news was made public. By doing this his son and another close relative avoided nearly $800,000 in losses when the stock’s price plummeted 92 percent the next day.
Collins was charged while he was in the midst of a re-election campaign. He suspended the campaign, then restarted it, then went on to a very narrow victory in the November 2018 election and took office in January 2019.
However, Collins didn’t last long in his seat. On Sept. 30, 2019 he announced his resignation to take effect the next day and that same day pleaded guilty to the charges against him.
“By virtue of his position, Collins helped write the laws of this country and acted as if the law didn’t apply to him,” said US Attorney Geoffrey Berman, after Collins pleaded guilty.
Collins was barred by the Security and Exchange Commission from serving as an officer or director of any public company. In October 2020 he began serving a 26-month prison sentence. But that didn’t last long either—he was pardoned by Trump on Dec. 22, 2020.
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.” He served his prison time in a federal prison in Pensacola.
In June, Collins was one of the first candidates to announce his run for the 19th District shortly after Donalds launched his bid for governor. He is listed as a candidate with the Florida Department of State.
As of this writing Collins did not have a campaign website, nor had he posted any policy positions related to Congressional District 19.
John Fratto
John Fratto as he appeared in his 2024 campaign rap video. (Image: Campaign)
John “Johnny” Fratto, 46, is switching his sights to the 19th Congressional District from the 26th, where he ran for Congress unsuccessfully in 2024.
Fratto’s chief claim to fame in that race was a campaign rap video extolling Fratto’s Trumpist virtues that was filmed at Oakes’ Seed to Table market and was meant to appeal to the district’s Hispanic voters.
“America’s first bloodline mafia congressman versus deep state communist,” said the opening lines of the rap, which continued with a chorus that sounded like: “The man knows, voting Johnny Fratto.”
It didn’t work. Fratto was crushed by Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-26-Fla.), who won by a lopsided 73.2 percent in the Republican primary to Fratto’s anemic 16.5 percent, despite Fratto’s endorsement by local farmer, grocer and political kingpin Francis Alfred “Alfie” Oakes III and Republican political operative Roger Stone.
In 2024, responding to questions from the website Ballotpedia, Fratto stated that he was born in Des Moines, Iowa but then seems to contradict himself with the statement: “Originally from Southern California, I moved my family to Southern Florida to be close to my wife’s family, and to raise my kids in a state that will help them become hard working, honest adults.”
He listed his career experience as “working as an entrepreneur.” He has also claimed to have been an executive producer for TV and movies.
As of this writing, Fratto did not have a campaign website for his District 19 run but he had announced his candidacy on Facebook. He did not post any specific policies or proposals but he has made clear his support for Trump and his agenda in the past. He says he wants to restore the country to “its traditional values.”
Fratto is registered as a candidate with the Florida Department of State.
John Fratto (left) is endorsed by Alfie Oakes (right) in the 2024 campaign rap video. (Image: Campaign)
Ola Nesheiwat Hawatmeh is a registered candidate with the Florida Department of State.
Hawatmeh does not have a campaign website.
A LinkedIn profile states that she is a senior policy advisor, chief executive officer and founder of Mom Me Makeover and OLA Style, apparently a sole proprietorship. She is also listed as a senior policy advisor to Rep. Victoria Spartz (R-5-Ind.) as of December 2024.
The only policy statement attributable to Hawatmeh is an undated Instagram video post, made from an unidentified airport when Hawatmeh was on her way to a week of lobbying in Washington, DC on behalf of the non-profit Moms for America, a national, conservative education advocacy group.
In that post Hawatmeh earnestly says: “Today, reading about 20,000 migrants in Springfield, Ohio, killing dogs, killing cats, ducks in our parks, no accountability. It is our country. Illegals are being placed before American citizens. No accountability for them, but we have to be held accountable if we don’t pay our taxes, if we don’t pay our bills. We have no say as to who our neighbors are now? You want to place illegals in our neighborhood. We have to have a say. Never give up, never give in. Speak up. It’s our America, it’s our country.”
Hawatmeh’s connection to the 19th Congressional District is unclear from any online sources or statements. Nor does she make clear that she resides in the district or the state.
Catalina Lauf
Catalina Lauf in 2023 at a natural products exposition. (Photo: Campaign)
In 2022 Lauf ran for Congress in Illinois’ 11th Congressional District but lost to Democrat Bill Foster with a total of 43.5 percent to Foster’s 56.5 percent.
In 2020 she lost the Republican congressional primary in a field of seven candidates in District 14 to Jim Oberweis who garnered 25.6 percent of the vote to Lauf’s 20.1 percent. (More about Oberweis below.)
Lauf issued a statement to Florida Politics when she announced her Florida run on Oct. 2, the day after Cawthorn made his announcement.
“Southwest Florida deserves bold, principled leadership — leaders in the mold of Byron Donalds, who stand up fearlessly for our values, and who are champions of President Trump’s America First agenda. I was proud to work for President Trump’s administration and now I’m running to continue that tradition of strength, courage, and service for the people of FL-19.”
As of this writing Lauf was not yet registered as a candidate with the Florida Department of State. She had posted a campaign Facebook page but did not yet have a dedicated campaign website.
On the Facebook page she stated that “Like many Americans, Catalina is concerned with the young socialist progressive wing in Congress.”
Dylan Modarelli
Dylan Modarelli (Photo: Campaign)
According to his LinkedIn profile, Dylan Modarelli is chief executive officer of Empire Gems in Fort Myers. He lives in Cape Coral and is in his mid-30s. He’s married with one child.
He is originally from North Bergan, New Jersey but does not state on his professional campaign website how long he has lived in Florida. Nor does he mention any prior political or government experience.
Modarelli’s candidacy is registered with the Florida Department of State.
“I come from hardship, raised in a home where giving up was never an option,” he writes. “When I was just five years old, I lost my father to a heroin overdose, leaving my mother to raise me alone while relying on family donations to survive. Those early struggles taught me resilience, empathy, and the belief that our circumstances do not define our future.”
Without providing dates, he states that he served as a police officer (no mention of where), then entered the emerald trade, building a business.
He’s taking a Trumpist/populist approach. As he says on his Facebook campaign page, he’s “pro-life, pro-freedom, pro-guns.”
“I’m ready to fight. I’m tired of the grifters, the career politicians, and the power hungry elites who have forgotten the people they swore to serve,” he says in a video. “Washington has turned into a playground for the connected and the corrupt, while hardworking Americans are left behind. I’m not here to play their games. I’m here to break them. I’m here to stand up for the working man, the struggling families, the seniors, the veterans, and the forgotten communities. We’ve been ignored for too long, and I refuse to sit quietly while they sell out our future. It’s time to send a fighter to Congress who answers to the people, not the lobbyists. This is our fight and I’m just getting started.”
Unlike most of the other candidates, Modarelli has a platform with defined positions on a variety of issues.
Asked in a Ballotpedia questionnaire what areas of public policy he was most passionate about, Modarelli responded, “I’m passionate about protecting animals. I believe no animal should be killed just because it’s unwanted. I stand firmly against euthanizing healthy animals in shelters.” Indeed, on his campaign website he lists ending “kill shelters” as his third most important issue after promoting affordable housing and declaring war on fentanyl.
One particularly noteworthy issue that Modarelli lists is ending private, for-profit prisons. Florida currently operates 12 for-profit prisons and two concentration camps.
As Modarelli states: “The prison system should focus on justice and rehabilitation not corporate profit. I will fight to end for-profit prisons that prioritize filling beds over public safety, turning incarceration into a money-making scheme.” He adds: “It’s time to bring prisons under public control and ensure they serve the people, not shareholders.”
Jim Oberweis
Jim Oberweis during a lobbying trip to Washington in June 2025. (Image: Fox4News)
Jim Oberweis, 79, is a veteran politician, with a mixed record of wins and losses in his native Aurora, Illinois.
Prior to politics he worked as a teacher and a financial services advisor before buying and running his family’s dairy, which had a product line of what Oberweis calls “the richest ice cream in the world.”
Oberweis began his political career in 2004 when he ran for the Republican nomination for US Senate but lost. In 2012 when he ran for the Illinois state Senate and won in District 25. He made another bid for the US Senate in 2014 but lost to Democrat Dick Durbin. He returned to the state Senate in 2012, was reelected in 2016 and rose to the position of Minority Whip.
In 2020, Oberweis ran for the Republican nomination in the Illinois 14th Congressional District, the area of Chicago’s western suburbs, centered around Aurora.
In that election he faced Catalina Lauf, who is running in the current District 19 election (see above). In a field of seven candidates, Oberweis beat Lauf, who came in third, with only 20.1 percent of the vote to Oberweis’ 25.6 percent.
However, Oberweis lost in the general election to Democrat Lauren Underwood, whom Oberweis claims stole the election.
“As of election night he had won against his Democrat incumbent opponent and was sent to Washington for New Member Orientation where he met Byron Donalds, also a newly elected Congressman,” states Oberweis’ third-person account of the election on his campaign website. “But when 20,000 previously uncounted mail-in ballots were counted, he had lost. The uncounted ballots were never initialed by an election judge as required under Illinois law but were counted anyway. After 3 days of new member orientation Jim was told he might as well go home because things did not look good.”
Oberweis thought he was permanently done with politics and, as the website puts it: “Jim went home, packed his bags and moved permanently to Bonita Springs where he and wife have owned a condominium for 16 years, and became a full-time Florida resident.”
However, with Donalds’ quest for the governorship, Oberweis decided to try again.
Oberweis is a conservative, Trumpist Republican so most of his positions reflect orthodox Trumpism. However, he does weigh in on the local environment by calling for protection of the Everglades. He says more needs to be done to protect against the polluting runoff from cane sugar processing.
“We need to return the natural southerly flow of water through the Everglades which can help reduce the threat of red tide and provide more fresh drinking water,” he states on his website. “Mother Nature is nonpartisan. Hurricanes bearing down on your home don’t care about your political beliefs. We need to do what we can to mitigate damage from future hurricanes.”
As of publication time, Oberweis had not yet responded to a question about his position on Alligator Alcatraz, which opponents say injures the Everglades’ natural environment. He is listed as a candidate by the Florida Department of State.
Oberweis has also made a major commitment to his campaign with $2 million in personal loans and outside donations that raise his total to $2.12 million.
Mike Pedersen
Mike Pedersen takes his leap into politics. (Photo: Campaign via Gulf Coast News)
When most aspirants “jump into the race” it means they’re just announcing that they’re running for office. In May, Mike Pedersen literally jumped out of an airplane and parachuted to earth to make his mark.
Pedersen is a retired US Marine with a 20-year record of active service including 66 combat missions during Operation Desert Storm and deployments all over the world.
Mike Pedersen. (Image: Gulf Coast News)
He graduated from the US Naval Academy in 1979, which would put his age in the 60s, although this is not confirmed on his website or in answers to questions sent to him by The Paradise Progressive. His wife was born in the Philippines, he has three children and eight grandchildren.
He has lived in Cape Coral for 26 years and worked as a pharmaceutical salesman after his active duty, focusing, he states, “on women’s healthcare across Southwest Florida”—although he doesn’t state among his positions whether he supports women’s right to choose abortion.
His positions are, otherwise, conventionally Trumpist: America first, an unmatched military, tightly restricted elections, protection of the Second Amendment, debt reduction, tight borders, a promise to “fight to protect our kids from radical agendas in the classroom and in sports” and “Continue the DOGE Mission” to achieve government efficiency. He does not list any local issues among his concerns on his website.
Jim Schwartzel
Jim Schwartzel attending the Press Club of Southwest Florida. (Photo: Author)
There is no other Republican candidate that is as purely Southwest Florida-born, bred and raised as Jim Schwartzel. A native of the area, he attended Bishop Verot Catholic High School in Fort Myers and Stetson University in DeLand, Florida.
Schwartzel, 49, is a media entrepreneur whom some media outlets refer to as a “mogul.” He announced his candidacy in April and is listed as a candidate by the Florida Department of State.
He’s president of Sun Broadcasting based in Fort Myers, which owns five local radio stations and four television stations. He also owns Gulfshore Life Media, which publishes the magazines Gulfshore Life, Gulfshore Business and The Naples Press. The financial data website Quiver Quantitative puts his net worth at $15.94 million. (Full disclosure: This author writes a monthly, non-political column for The Naples Press.)
Schwartzel is very conservative and does all he can to let the world know it.
This is reflected in his media holdings, which include radio station 92.5 FM Fox News, an all-talk conservative radio station based in Fort Myers.
Another expression of this is the country-western music radio station 93.7 FM, branded as “Trump Country,” whose history provides an interesting snapshot of the Southwest Florida political climate.
On Sept. 16, 2020 the station flipped from a rock and roll format to country-western and renamed itself “Trump Country.” The format lasted only three months. After Trump lost the election, it switched to country-western “Hell Yeah 93.7” under the call letters WHEL. The station went off the air during Hurricane Ian in 2022 and when it returned it was in a Latino current hit format. It then resumed as “Hell Yeah” on October 21, playing contemporary hits. On Inauguration Day 2025 at noon it switched back to calling itself “Trump Country.”
Given his conservative history, it’s no surprise that Schwartzel’s platform is all-out Trumpist. He states that he’s running for Congress “to give President Donald J. Trump the support he needs and to fight for the conservative values that make Southwest Florida strong.” He claims to be anti-career politician and “a straight-talking outsider” who will fight the standard array of MAGA-perceived threats that include “the ruling class of career politicians,” “socialist policies” and “outside political interest groups.”
When it comes to local issues, Schwartzel lists two: water and infrastructure.
On water, he states that he’ll “support common-sense water management policies” but “not the agendas of environmental extremists or special interest groups.”
On roads, he pledges to “push for funding to complete the projects necessary to reduce traffic congestion and enhance safety… .”
Schwartzel has loaned his campaign $1 million, bringing its total to $1.2 million. But while that still trails Oberweis’ total, he expects to surpass it by the end of the year.
To come:
Analyzing where it all stands, what it all means and where it’s all going
Rep. Byron Donalds responds to a question at his town hall meeting in Estero on Monday. (Photo: Author)
April 24, 2025 by David Silverberg
The town hall meeting of Rep. Byron Donalds (R-19-Fla.) held at Estero High School is now in the history books.
This was a lot different from his previous town halls. Not only did it generate a lively turnout, it attracted major media, including CNN, and it was covered extensively by local media, which often give scant coverage to politics. It was raucous and rambunctious and that’s where most of the coverage focused.
But it was a political event a cut above the run of the mill in Southwest Florida and given that Donalds is a declared candidate for governor it provided some indicators of the kind of governor he would be.
So what were the broader implications of the meeting, what deeper lessons can be derived from it, and what did it reveal about the politician, the political dynamic in the district, the state and the nation?
Reading the room
A view of the audience just prior to the start of the meeting. (Photo: Author)
After initial indications that the meeting would be highly restricted, when the event occurred it appeared that virtually anyone who wanted to get in could do so. Even with that, the hall was not filled. This author estimates the crowd at 300 to 400.
An indication of the strength of Donalds’ supporters came early when he came out on stage and they gave him a standing ovation. From this author’s vantage, those standing appeared to constitute a quarter of the audience at most.
Questions were written out on cards and the questioners in the audience were named and acknowledged when the questions were asked. This author counted 18 questions being formally asked during the session. Other questions were shouted from the audience, which Donalds occasionally answered as well. Most questions received lengthy answers.
Other than welcoming the audience and thanking the people who arranged the meeting, Donalds did not make any opening statement other than to say he was not going to get into politics (in the sense of purely partisan discussion) and he was not going to address his gubernatorial bid. Instead he opted to go right to the first question. That question, his answer and the audience’s response set the tone and was a precursor of the direction the rest of the meeting would take.
The question was: “As a member of the Oversight Committee, what oversights are you imposing on Elon Musk and DOGE [Department of Government Efficiency]?”
The question brought prolonged, vigorous applause and cheers. “You like that question,” Donalds joked. He answered that Musk was a special White House employee, similar to others that had been appointed by previous administrations. He specifically mentioned President Barack Obama’s appointment of former senator John Kerry as “climate czar” in his administration to deal with climate change issues.
Because DOGE was not run with congressionally appropriated funds, Donalds said, it was outside the House Oversight Committee’s purview.
“What DOGE is doing right now is they’re going through every agency and they’re examining any contracts or any inefficiencies in spending federal dollars,” he said but was interrupted by shouts and expressions of disagreement, with people pointing out DOGE’s mass layoffs and disruption of government operations.
Donalds’ answer and the response began an uproar that never really died down and Donalds never regained full control of the proceedings.
Nonetheless, he compared DOGE’s actions to those taken by President Barack Obama to increase government efficiency. This kicked the uproar into a higher gear and intensity. “You cannot deny that President Obama famously said that he wanted to examine efficiency or lack thereof in the government. Elon Musk is doing the exact same thing,” which elicited even louder expressions of outrage.
“The Oversight Committee is doing the responsible thing, we are letting DOGE complete its work,” he said. “Most of the budget cuts that DOGE will present have to go through the appropriations process. It goes through the Appropriations Committee and most of the judgments of federal spending will occur there and then get an up or down vote in the Appropriations Committee first and then on the floor of the House” before moving to final approval. “That is the process.”
As he was saying this the calls and shouts from the crowd were mounting in volume, complaining that he wasn’t addressing the broader issues created by Musk and DOGE.
But Donalds continued his defense. “Now, it is actually clear that from the President, who is the unitary executive under our system of government…he wants [Musk] to work in the federal government. So, I find it interesting that people who are upset about Elon right now, were not upset, as I brought up earlier, when John Kerry was going around” doing work for the Obama administration as a special employee.
After trying to calm the crowd, Donalds continued. “Here is the last thing. There is a report that comes out every single year. This is the GAO [Government Accountability Office] report. The GAO report, every single year, says the government wastes more than 250 billion dollars a year. 250 billion!” which also elicited shouts of dismissal. “Over the last 20 years the federal government has wasted 3 trillion dollars. (More about GAO and its report below.)
“I believe that it is in the interests of the people of Southwest Florida and of the United States to examine all inefficiencies in the federal government,” which elicited prolonged applause from his supporters. “If there are concerns [it is] that Elon Musk and his team are going through agencies and cancelling contracts that are inefficient”—which brought an outburst of disagreement from the rest of the crowd.
“When appropriations language is ready, under federal law today, Congress has given discretion to the secretaries of the various Cabinet agencies. So what the DOGE is actually doing is that they are working with Cabinet-level secretaries, who have all been confirmed by the United States Senate, to bring their findings to that secretary and then that secretary is the one who is making the decision because the authority has been given to the Cabinet secretary by Congress. You may not like it but that’s the way the law is written.”
After some of the shouting died down from that, he continued: “As a member of Congress, I actually believe that Congress should not give discretion to the federal agencies, no matter who’s president and Congress should actually prescribe how money is spent in the federal government but the Congress has been derelict in its duty and allowed money to go through the federal branch, the executive branch, and they have given full discretion to the executive branch, which goes around Congress and goes around these issues in the United States of America.”
He continued: “This is where there’s a little bit—a little bit—of public perception. If you examine broad-based polling on government efficiencies, it is popular with the American people.”
Then, he asked a question of his own: “For those in the room upset about DOGE; are you going to be upset when DOGE gets to the Department of Defense?” There was a resounding affirmative response. Then he repeated the question and the response rose higher. “Every recommendation that DOGE makes, is approved by the Cabinet-level secretary and confirmed by the United States Senate.”
Then he stated, “At the Oversight Committee we have to actually observe DOGE do its work first and we’re in the process of doing this, number one. Number two, for true accountability if we truly believe it’s necessary true accountability for DOGE will be found in the appropriations process. At that point, any recommendations that DOGE has made, the Cabinet-level secretary will be reflected in budgetary requests and it will get an up or down vote through the appropriations process.”
Answering that question took approximately 7 minutes.
Analysis: Call and response
Elon Musk wields a chain saw at a meeting of the Conservative Political Action Committee on Feb. 20, 2025 (Photo: Gage Skidmore/Creative Commons)
All the media coverage of the meeting has focused on its raucousness and the anger of the audience. A major question, though, is: why was it so raucous and why were constituents so angry?
It was not because there was any kind of advance planning or “astroturfing” (paid disruptors) to cause chaos. Rather, as was clear from the very first question and answer there was a yawning reality gulf between Donalds and his audience.
Each appeared to exist in a separate universe and there was little to no connection between them. Donalds’ answers, which uniformly defended President Donald Trump, Elon Musk and the regime, also presented a picture that, while presented as factual, was completely at odds with the reality understood and experienced by constituents.
As shown in the first answer, Donalds was putting DOGE in the context of the congressional appropriations process and addressing it as a regular budgetary process. But the audience, like the rest of the American public, is experiencing DOGE as a furious, unchecked, personally-directed purge of the federal government, with massive layoffs, severe cuts to services, disruption of orderly processes, threats to mandated benefits and intrusion into personal information.
Donalds would not acknowledge or address these concerns among his constituents. Instead, he blindly recited the Trumpist catechism and defended the regime’s actions. He did not provide even a hint of sympathy or understanding for constituent concerns. His approach was that if he explained it, or in the phrase he repeatedly used, “if we’re intellectually honest,” it would be sufficient.
He also repeated assertions that were wildly at variance with what the rest of the audience understood to be the truth, prompting amazement and outrage.
(At this point it seems appropriate to address some of the inaccuracies and misconceptions in Donalds’ first answer.
For example, there is no equivalency between previous special presidential employees and Elon Musk. John Kerry was Special Presidential Envoy for Climate of the United States from 2021 to 2024. He represented the United States in climate forums and made recommendations to other government agencies to accommodate climate issues. He did this as a highly qualified former US senator and secretary of state. There were no instant layoffs, agency closings or data intrusions at his command. Elon Musk is a private citizen and profit-driven entrepreneur with no prior government background who has physically wielded a chainsaw to demonstrate his approach to government operations.
The GAO report referenced by Donalds is the annual report on federal programs with fragmented, overlapping, or duplicative goals or actions. As part of its mandate GAO annually suggests hundreds of ways to address problems, reduce costs and boost revenue. It makes suggestions, often of a very technical or financial nature, for achieving those ends. In the 2024 report it made 112 suggestions, recommending for example that “Congress and the Internal Revenue Service should take action to improve sole proprietor tax compliance, which could increase revenue by hundreds of millions of dollars per year,” or saving money by “using predictive models to make investment decisions on deferred maintenance and repair for federal buildings and structures.” It has never recommended—much less imposed—abruptly closing down entire agencies or making mass layoffs. Even so it estimates that its recommendations have saved the US government $667 billion over the past 13 years.
Also, if DOGE and Musk were really just making recommendations to be worked through the appropriations process, all the closings and layoffs would be submitted as recommendations to Congress for consideration during the normal 2025 appropriations process. They would not be implemented until the 2026 fiscal year. They would be examined, debated and then approved by Congress, and conducted in an orderly fashion, not suddenly imposed by executive fiat and lockouts.)
Other assertions that Donalds made during the meeting were:
That the answer to gun violence lies in mental health care rather than any kind of gun restrictions or red flag laws, which he opposes. “It always goes back to the mental health of the shooter,” he said.
That DOGE/Musk access to Social Security information is equivalent to the access allowed to 53 students under President Joe Biden’s administration. (Donalds didn’t elaborate on the source of this information and it is nowhere else on the Internet that this author could discern. It’s not clear whether these alleged 53 students were interns at the Social Security Administration, when, why or where this happened or what they accessed.) As Donalds put it: “It is not intellectually honest to be upset with Elon Musk and not with the 53 students.”
That DOGE/Musk are examining Social Security files to find waste, fraud and abuse and have found 300 alleged recipients over the age of 100. (This claim was debunked by Leland Dudek, the acting commissioner, who said in February that the raw numbers did not reflect actual benefits being paid and that only 89,106 people older than 100 years were listed on Social Security rolls as of December 2024. “The reported data are people in our records with a Social Security number who do not have a date of death associated with their record. These individuals are not necessarily receiving benefits.”)
That the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau (CFPB) is unconstitutional and uncontrolled by Congress. “I want to get rid of the CFPB, it is a rogue agency” and “a terrible agency,” he said.
That Trump’s tariffs are “re-setting the balance of global trade.”
That nuclear power should be the future source of energy in Florida rather than solar power, which Donalds said does not produce sufficient energy. Also, he said discarding and recycling solar equipment is ultimately dirtier and more polluting than nuclear power.
That 60 percent of phone calls to the Social Security Administration for assistance are fraudulent.
That the problem with diversity, equity and intrusion (DEI) lies in the equity portion, since life is inherently inequitable and that DEI programs and practices do not level the playing field. “Equity is an impossible standard to achieve,” he said. The only time Donalds became angry and emotional was when he was giving this answer, which he took personally.
That the US Agency for International Development (US AID) was pursuing programs that were not in the American interest and were even treasonous.
That the No Rogue Rulings Act (House Resolution (HR) 1526), which would restrict the ability of federal district judges to issue national injunctions, and passed by the US House on April 10 with Donalds’ vote, would not pass the Senate.
That illegal aliens have more rights and due process entitlements than American citizens. He charged that President Joe Biden abused the asylum process. Donalds said that he supports illegal alien deportations.
That parents and “community members” have a right to inspect school instructional materials, because they make up the bulk of the taxpaying base but that school boards have final say.
That President Donald Trump has pledged not to touch Social Security and it will not be subject to congressional budget reconciliation but that if it becomes insolvent there will be an automatic cut, so it must be reformed.
That he missed votes in Congress because he was campaigning for Trump.
That he does not vote party when in Congress but “I vote the Constitution.”
That Defense Secretary Peter Hegseth did not violate the Espionage Act when he shared classified operational intelligence in Signal chats.
The most dramatic moment in the meeting occurred when a question was asked whether Israel’s cutoff of water and food to the Palestinians of Gaza was a war crime, along with the deaths of 35,000 Gazans.
Donalds answered that the 35,000 casualty figure was from Hamas, that Israel had been careful in its strikes on Gaza, that Hamas was using both Israeli hostages and civilian Gazans as human shields and Israeli forces had warned them before striking.
He said that the United States would have reacted similarly if Mexican drug cartels had taken American hostages in the United States. “On October 7, it was not an Israeli incursion into Gaza, it was Hamas that incurred into Israel,” he said. “We should stand behind Israel 100 percent and make sure the hostages come home. My stance is to stand by our ally.”
This answer prompted an audience member to stand up and loudly protest on behalf of the Palestinians. She continued to do so until a security officer approached her to remove her and she left of her own volition.
An audience member protests on behalf of Palestinians. (Photo: Author)
Analysis: Omens and portents
First, credit must be given where credit is due: Byron Donalds did not have to hold this town hall meeting at all.
It was a risky idea from the start and no doubt there were voices in his camp arguing against it. He could have easily let it slide and been none the worse for wear. In fact, the head of the Republican Congressional Campaign Committee has recommended that all Republican members of Congress avoid town hall meetings and Donalds could have followed his guidance.
He could have made the meeting a gubernatorial campaign rally but he did not. Nor did the questions seem to be filtered to avoid challenges or controversy.
Beyond subjecting himself to angry constituents, Donalds risked damaging his gubernatorial campaign. Whether the meeting proves detrimental or provides useful publicity remains to be seen but it certainly gave him some local and national headlines.
Contrary to some of those headlines the meeting was not “chaotic” or “in chaos.” Chaos is when punches are thrown, the benches empty and the police charge in with tear gas and tasers. This was certainly rancorous and at times disorderly but it was hardly chaotic. Most people stayed in their seats except when they got up and left, which a significant contingent did early.
But, as stated earlier, what was really in evidence was the vast gulf in the realities between constituents and their congressman.
It was obvious that much of the audience reaction was driven by fear, outrage and worry. The repeated questions about Social Security and DOGE showed key points of concern.
That fear is also fueled by the man in the White House and the tone of hatred, prejudice and rage he exudes to the nation. The day before, those attitudes were on full display in an Easter greeting on the X platform.
President Donald Trump’s Easter greeting on X.
It was no wonder that constituents were fearful, angry and loud in their turn.
A more skillful or empathetic politician would have acknowledged the concerns and explained what he or she was doing to allay them or seek solutions. A more accomplished congressman might have told the audience what he or she was doing on their behalf.
But that was not the approach Donalds took. He was there to recite the Trumpist creed, not connect with the audience. For every question about the activities of Trump, Musk or DOGE he responded with Trumpist talking points and standard Make America Great Again fodder that was often at odds with the audience’s general perception of reality. Several times when challenged about Trump or Musk actions Donalds took refuge in a “whataboutism” response: what about John Kerry? What about the alleged 53 students?
In fact, Donalds’ true constituents appeared to be Donald Trump and Elon Musk. They, at least, will likely be pleased with the meeting results.
Donalds did not reveal himself to be a deep or original thinker in this regard.
After the meeting Donalds was interviewed by the media.
“How do you feel about being a congressman tonight?” asked WINK TV reporter Claire Galt.
“Great. Look, this is part of the reason I signed up for the job a couple of years ago. I do think it’s important to bring information to the electorate,” he replied.
“Did it surprise you?”
“No. I don’t get surprised by much anymore,” he smiled. “You know, you just kind of deal with it as it comes. I could tell from the first question or two what kind of night it was going to be. But that’s alright, it’s part of the business.”
It was a mature and professional answer. It’s also one Donalds should get accustomed to giving—because as long as he remains a faithful Trumpist as he pursues the governorship there are going to be many more nights like the one in Estero.
Rep. Byron Donalds interviewed after his town hall meeting. (Image: WINK TV)
Protesters in Bonita Springs, Fla., demonstrate outside Rep. Byron Donalds’ rally announcing his gubernatorial campaign on March 28. (Photo: Author)
April 16, 2025 by David Silverberg
Rep. Byron Donalds (R-19-Fla.) has scheduled a town hall meeting on Monday, April 21 at 6:30 pm at Estero High School, 21900 River Ranch Rd., Estero, Fla.
This town hall is especially significant—and could be historic—because it is the first one scheduled since he declared his candidacy for governor of Florida on Feb. 25.
Every indication to date is that this will be a highly restricted meeting, intended more as a campaign rally for his gubernatorial race than as an open forum where constituents can freely air their concerns.
The meeting is restricted to voting constituents of the 19th Congressional District (CD19), the coastal area from Cape Coral to Marco Island.
The Donalds website for tickets states that only 700 spaces are available and these have already been taken. Ticketholder access will be confirmed by an emailed response from Donalds’ office, which must be shown, either printed or digital, upon entrance. The emails will not be sent out until 5:00 pm on April 18, according to the website. Guests must arrive between 4:30 and 5:30 pm.
Ticketholders may bring up to four family members but anyone entering over 18 years of age must have identification proving their residence in CD19.
According to the website, “Disruptive behavior will not be tolerated; the office reserves the right to remove protestors or those engaging in out-of-order activity.”
Town halls, past, present and local
“Freedom of Speech,” painting by Norman Rockwell, 1943.
The town hall meeting is a time-honored American democratic tradition, originating in the New England colonies, a place where all citizens were free to speak and in some cases vote on common concerns.
They became especially important in 1795 when Americans debated ratification of the Jay Treaty with Britain, ending the War of Independence.
Ever since then they’ve been a fixture of the American political process, a place for dialogue and discussion with elected representatives.
Since the 2024 election of Donald Trump, town hall meetings with Republican congressional representatives across the country have become especially contentious as constituents have protested and aired deep worries about the course and decisions of the Trump regime. As a result, many Republican representatives are avoiding town halls altogether.
Since the first election of Donald Trump as president and Francis Rooney as the CD19 representative in 2016, town hall meetings in Southwest Florida have taken on an air of urgency and contentiousness.
Then-Rep. Francis Rooney speaks at a town hall meeting at in Bonita Springs, Fla., in May 2017. (Photo: Author)
During his four years in office Rooney held town hall meetings that were extremely well attended to the point of overflowing the capacities of their venues. With Trump using unprecedented rhetoric and making radical moves, constituents expressed alarm and anger at the administration’s policies, which Rooney defended in a rote and workmanlike manner.
Rooney defended town hall meetings, telling the Fort Myers News-Press, they “are critically important because this is democracy at work. This is what our country is built on.”
The last two Rooney town halls were held on the same day, Feb. 22, 2018, in Marco Island and Cape Coral. These occurred eight days after the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla. In stormy gatherings, Rooney defended gun rights and advocated structural improvements to school buildings in response. It didn’t satisfy attendees, who were frantic, emotional and outraged, with participants at times screaming and chanting at him.
Rooney never held another town hall meeting during the rest of his term in office.
Since taking office in 2021, Donalds has held ten town hall meetings including a “roundtable” in Fort Myers and virtual events online, according to his office. Two of these events focused on veterans. He also participated in debates with his Democratic opponent, Cindy Banyai, in his 2020 and 2022 runs for Congress but did no debates in 2024 against Kari Lerner, the 2024 Democratic candidate.
The Estero High School entrance. (Photo: Estero High School)
In announcing the Estero town hall meeting Donalds is going against the Republican trend of avoiding facing constituents, as recommended by Rep. Richard Hudson (R-9-NC), the chair of the National Republican Congressional Committee.
It’s an especially risky move, given his campaign for governor.
However, it appears clear that his staff and campaign advisors are doing whatever they can to minimize any risk of embarrassment or failure. There are several choke points in the attendance process that accomplishes this.
Requiring proof of residency to ensure only constituent attendance makes sense given limited seating in the venue.
However, the fact that ticket applications must be vetted before sending a confirming e-mail likely means that staff is sifting through RSVPs to admit only Republican loyalists. The goal is to ensure that the town hall meeting appears as a campaign rally rather than an open discussion. This would explain the long delay in replying to RSVPs on the website, since people began responding immediately when tickets were first offered on April 8.
Indeed, one person who RSVP’d received a form asking the political affiliations of the family members she intended to bring with her.
A closed, vetted, restricted, supportive meeting can be streamed and used as propaganda in future campaign media.
Another choke point occurs when the meeting gets under way. A frequent technique is to require participants to write questions on cards, which can then be filtered by staff to weed out anything critical or challenging.
While the town hall meeting website does not state whether this technique will be used or not, it is highly likely in order to ensure a controlled, favorable meeting featuring softball questions and statements flattering the candidate.
So, in all, the indications are that this will not be a genuine town hall meeting of discussion and challenge but a carefully controlled campaign rally.
That said, constituents and others who are kept out of the meeting can assemble on public property outside the high school.
Donalds has said previously that any protests at his events constitute “astroturfing.” That’s political slang for the opposite of “grassroots”—i.e., paid, fake actors demonstrating rather than genuine local citizens.
Donalds charged that the protesters who showed up at his kickoff rally in Bonita Springs on March 28 were astroturfers, which they were provably not, and he has pre-emptively charged that protesters at his town hall meeting are the same.
“I would tell any Democrat that wants to come out there and astroturf my town hall, bring it, because we’re going to talk the truth, we’re going to talk about what’s really going on. I’m not afraid of you,” he said on March 5 on the Fox Network show, “The Ingraham Angle.”
However, given Trump’s propensity to project one’s own sins onto opponents, Donalds’ imitation of Trump’s manners and methods, and Donalds’ own lack of a following outside his district (and even within it), an observer has to wonder if any astroturfing going on is in his own camp, to turn out numbers for his events.
Whether astroturfed, vetted, filtered or not, the April 21 town hall represents a potential milestone in the politics of Southwest Florida—and given Donalds’ run for the governorship, in all of Florida and possibly the nation. It may just be a night to remember.
John Morgan discusses his plans to create a new political party in Florida with Dave Elias, political reporter for Gulf Coast News on Feb. 28. (Image: Gulf Coast News)
March 1, 2025 by David Silverberg
John Morgan, the personal injury lawyer of Florida’s incessant and ubiquitous television advertisements, has announced that he is forming a new political party.
As of this writing there are not a lot of details. Morgan announced the new party in a series of X postings.
Here is the sequence, which began at 4:35 pm on Wednesday, Feb. 26. They provide as much detail as Morgan has chosen to make public to date. (Punctuation as posted.)
This party is not for “me” necessarily… it’s for “us”
Both parties have things I like. But what I don’t like is that everything is a bloodsport. It’s all or nothing. Compromise is a dirty word and civility has been abandoned.
The last time America was together was right after 9/11. And I liked that feel. Just like the greatest generation in WW2.
People… we are all on the same fucking team. I didn’t vote for Trump but I’m pulling like hell for Trump. I didn’t vote for Kamala either btw. It’s time for a third choice. If the choice is only vanilla or chocolate… you never get to eat strawberry.
What I have learned with my constitutional amendments and others… is that when an issue is not associated with a party most of us agree on most things.
– Marijuana
– Minimum Wage
– Felons rights
– Fair districts But special interests own the politicians in DC and throughout America.
We need to focus not on me… but US!!
Most laws passed today benefit insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies and other monopolies.
How about some laws for the people?
People told me my constitutional amendments had no chance and that I was a dreamer. Dream it… Do it… #ForThePeople
The next Governor of Florida should do a few things first…
Expunge or clear every criminal record for possession of pot.
Legalize recreational marijuana immediately. I take a gummy every night and enjoy a few puffs every now and then.
Allow people to home grow pot. A no brainer.
And allow the hemp industry to grow and prosper.
Those would be day one and it’s what Florida wants.
Aside from whatever hallucinations might be induced by those puffs and gummies, how realistic is a third party in Florida? Might Morgan succeed in establishing one—and even becoming governor?
An unpromising history
Most people don’t realize it but there are far more than just two political parties in the United States. As of this January there were 55 distinct national-level political parties and 238 state-level parties, according to Ballotpedia.
Only the Republican and Democratic parties are qualified in all 50 states. The Libertarian Party is qualified in 38 states, the Green Party in 23 states and the Constitution Party in 12 states.
In Florida, according to the Department of State, which oversees elections, in addition to the Democratic and Republican parties, there are 14 additional qualified parties:
For the most part third parties have revolved around individuals.
The largest and most successful was then-former President Theodore Roosevelt’s Progressive Party, better known as the Bull Moose Party, which won 27.4 percent of the vote in the 1912 presidential election—eclipsing incumbent President William Howard Taft’s Republicans, who won 23.2 percent.
The logo of Theodore Roosevelt’s Progressive, “Bull Moose” Party. (Art: Wikipedia)
That campaign only succeeded in making Democrat Woodrow Wilson president and the party collapsed when Roosevelt declined to run in 1916 and tried to hand the baton to a successor.
In more recent times third party presidential bids were made in 1980 by John Anderson, a Republican congressman from Illinois who ran against President Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan, and entrepreneur Ross Perot who ran as an independent in 1992 and qualified in all states. He ran again in 1996.
In state campaigns, former professional wrestler Jesse Ventura succeeded in winning the governorship of Minnesota in 1998 as the Reform Party candidate. However, he left that party after a year and joined the Independence Party of Minnesota.
Florida has had a third party governor before.
In 1916, after losing the Democratic Party nomination under suspicious circumstances, Sidney Catts ran as the Prohibition Party candidate and won with 47.7 percent of the vote. (The Prohibition Party still exists and claims to be the oldest one in the United States.)
(Parenthetically, Catts won by pounding two themes: 1) complaining that the nomination had been stolen from him by the Democratic political machine and 2) what one historian described as “an almost psychotic anti-Catholicism.” Catts charged that the Pope in Rome was planning to come to Florida to take over the United States with the help of nuns and monks who were stockpiling weapons in convents and monasteries—along with Catholic immigrants who were flooding the country. While there was never any proof of any of his conspiracy theories, they resonated with rural Floridians.)
So no matter what its basis, there is precedent for a third party gubernatorial bid in Florida—and a victory.
Hungering for a third way
For some time there has been a hunger for a third, centrist political alternative in Florida.
In October 2022 the University of South Florida (USF) released a comprehensive public opinion survey in advance of the gubernatorial election at that time.
In the survey of 600 Floridians, 46 percent said they would be supportive of a third party and the same percentage said they would be likely to vote for a centrist, third party candidate.
The survey also showed the disillusionment with the established parties: fewer than half of respondents had a favorable view of either the Democratic or Republican parties, with only 41percent of Democrats and 43 percent of Republicans backing their own parties.
Both Democrats and Republicans felt that their parties reflected their most extreme wings (24 percent of Democrats and 30 percent of Republicans).
Have things changed in the last two years? Is Donald Trump’s presidency or Gov. Ron DeSantis’ (R) governorship driving a longing for a third alternative? Regrettably, there has not been a similar survey of public opinion in Florida since the USF survey, as best this author can determine. While there will likely be many partisan polls in the days to come, the prospects for non-partisan and objective polling and surveying is uncertain at best.
Morgan may touch a chord with his call for non-partisanship. No doubt he will be commissioning his own polls. But given Florida’s woeful lack of neutral, non-partisan public opinion research, the prospects for a third party will rest on hopes and dreams rather than hard data.
Obstacles
There are enormous obstacles to third party political bids, not least of which is qualifying for the ballot in enough jurisdictions to have a reasonable shot at winning.
Beyond just getting on the ballot, third parties face funding restraints, media indifference, legal obstacles, voter unfamiliarity and a system that is simply built around the assumption of two competing parties—in addition to the vociferous opposition of the existing parties.
A real party aiming at a permanent presence seeks to run candidates at all levels for all open offices. As an example of this, last year Florida Democratic Chair Nicole “Nikki” Fried did extensive and strenuous work getting credible Democrats to run for all available seats. It was a major accomplishment when she filled all the slots—even if the vast majority lost. But she understood the importance of the goal.
In every recent third party instance, the party did not last beyond the candidacy of its founder and chief candidate. People like Anderson, Perot and Ventura never built the infrastructure, organization and networks required to take the party from election to election, through both victories and defeats, and build a roster of officeholders, candidates and aspirants that would allow it to endure.
If Morgan is really going to build a third party and not just a lone, independent candidacy, he needs to recruit and qualify candidates for every office up for election in 2026, from mosquito controller to governor.
The good news for him is that there is over a year and a half before the election; the bad news is that that’s actually not a lot of time for an effort of that magnitude.
Analysis: What to watch
Right now Morgan’s declaration is fueling a lot of media excitement.
Morgan himself remains very vague about the future. “I don’t know. I’m going to just test the waters,” he told Gulf Coast News’ Politics Reporter Dave Elias in an interview on Feb. 28.
He also made the point that leadership of the new party “…doesn’t have to be me” and at 68 years old going on 69, “I would consider it if all the stars lined up.”
This is salutary humility because he really has to decide between a run for governor and starting a new party. Either one is a serious endeavor and will take all his energy, attention and focus.
He could do both and that’s been the historic pattern of third party candidates. But the historic pattern is also that when attempting both, neither is done well.
Morgan certainly has the managerial, political and financial chops to make either endeavor credible: he’s built the largest injury law firm in the country, with offices in all 50 states. He’s succeeded in lobbying through two Florida constitutional amendments. He has an estimated personal and family wealth of $1.5 billion according to Forbes magazine (and $453 million in personal wealth in 2024, according to ImpactWealth.org). He could draw on talent from all over the country.
Whatever he does, if he’s going to be active he has to decide what he’s doing and get going now. As of this writing it is 612 days until Election Day, Nov. 3, 2026.
That may sound like a lot of time but when it comes to starting a real, permanent political party it’s barely the blink of an eye.
Then again, in politics, a single day can be an eternity.
Commentary: A modest proposal…
A potential party logo. (Art: Wikimedia Commons)
John Morgan says he doesn’t know what his new party name will be. He’s thinking of the “Capitalist Party.” If he chooses to go with his law firm’s slogan, it would likely be the “For the People Party.”
Here’s a thought: how about the RINO Party?
Right now RINO is an insult among Republicans, standing for “Republican In Name Only.” It’s usually used against anyone who isn’t a Trump true believer.
Owning political insults is a time honored tradition. Take the political names “Tory” and “Whig.”
A “Tory” was originally an insulting Irish name for “outlaw” (from the Middle Irish word “tóraidhe”) that British politicians hurled at their opponents in the 17th century. Over time those called tories came to own the epithet and informally adopted it as their nickname. During the American Revolution it was what revolutionaries called loyalists.
Similarly a “Whig” was the contemptuous British name for Scottish cattle drovers. It was applied to fanatical Protestants, “Whiggamores,” when they raided Edinburgh in 1648. It was used as an insult and then adopted by a British political faction. In the United States, it became the name of a major political party opposing President Andrew Jackson in the 1830s.
So owning insults with pride has a long history and there isn’t any reason that RINO shouldn’t be used the same way.
Of course, what Morgan calls his party is his business and the party’s but with a RINO (and a rhino) at least they won’t have to look far for a logo and a mascot.
What’s more, RINO doesn’t have to stand for Republican In Name Only. It could also stand for “Really Independent Nasty Opponent.”
And you’d better get out of the way when they’re charging.
The Paradise Progressive 