As Florida's primary nears, Trump hints at using 'emergency' powers for the general election
Commentary on the news from a Florida perspective
Trump won’t rule out election takeover
President Donald Trump signaled that he’s willing to declare a national security emergency to take over American elections.
“Let me just say stranger things have happened,” Trump said, after a far-right media host implored him to exert sweeping control over the upcoming midterms during a post-midnight interview.
“I’ll leave it at that,” the president added.
As Democracy Docket reports:
The comments are just the latest in a string of alarming remarks Trump has made about U.S. elections. He previously said he wanted to “nationalize” voting and regretted not ordering the military to seize ballots and election machines after his loss in the 2020 presidential election.
The president has no power to control elections. Instead, the U.S. Constitution exclusively grants states and Congress the authority over election administration.
But despite those constitutional limitations, Wayne Allyn Root, a host on the Real America’s Voice TV network and one of Trump’s favorite right-wing media figures, urged the president to subvert democratic elections through executive fiat.
No president has ever declared a national emergency or used wartime powers to run, alter, or cancel elections.
However, Trump has tried to unilaterally change elections twice, first through an executive order last year and second through a separate order earlier this year. Courts have blocked both orders.
Source: Democracy Docket
Trump delayed rule that could have tracked Cyclospora outbreak quicker
Last month, when an outbreak of explosive diarrhea began spreading around the country, health officials started searching for the source of the disease. The sooner they figured out where the parasitic Cyclospora infection was coming from, the quicker its spread could be limited.
It took much longer to figure that out than it should have.
Why?
Because the Trump Administration delayed the implementation of a food safety rule that should have gone into effect at the first of the year requiring food suppliers to respond within 24 hours to demands from health officials looking to trace food contamination.
Why did Trump stall the start of this rule?
To give food suppliers more time to figure out their internal procedures.
Said another way, the federal government, whose No. 1 job is to protect Americans from harm, put the interests of corporations over its own citizens.
Sources: The New York Times and Bloomberg Law
Florida official’s real estate holdings undisclosed
Blaise Ingoglia has been touring the state and preaching the importance of government fiscal transparency and accountability.
He’s the state’s chief financial officer, appointed to the job by Gov. Ron DeSantis. Now he’s running to keep his job, facing an opponent in the Republican primary on Tuesday and eventually the winner of the Democratic primary, in which either Earle Ford or Annette Taddeo will be the candidate.
But Florida Bulldog reports that state and local records show Ingoglia has omitted from his public financial disclosure more than a hundred properties tied to him through his companies.
That could be a violation of Florida’s ethics laws with civil penalties up to $20,000, and sanctions ranging from a public reprimand to removal from office, the Bulldog reports.
Besides being the state’s CFO, Ingoglia is a homebuilder with a reported net worth of more than $30 million.
Source: Florida Bulldog
Misleading ballot initiative rewritten
Earlier this month, a Tallahassee judge ruled that the wording that the Legislature concocted in writing its so-called property-tax “relief” ballot initiative was, to be kind, just a little biased.
The ballot measure’s original title was:
“Save Our Homes From Excessive Property Taxes.”
Nothing prejudicial about that, right? Well, Judge David Frank didn’t like it and ordered it rewritten. It now reads:
“Increased Homestead Exemption; Lower Cap on Increases in Non-Homesteaded Property Assessments.”
Not nearly as provocative—in fact, it’s downright dull—but it at least is closer to what the bill is about.
It will appear on the ballot in November, and if 60% of voters approve it, homestead property tax exemptions will increase, but no provisions have been made for how to supplement the tax dollars cities and counties will have taken away for essential services—which is why it is widely opposed.
(Nothing prejudicial about that comment either, right?)
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