The Sun-Sentinel has learned from 2 sources speaking on background that Charlie Crist will leave the Republican Party and run as an independent in this year’s senate election.
Anyone think Meek could pull off an upset now? I’d guess that Crist and Rubio will each end up taking anywhere from 25-35% of the vote, but I don’t know Florida politics that well.
Link to full article below the fold:
For those of you who saw the State of the Union last night, you may remember Obama said he was heading to Florida today to talk about a high speed rail project that was starting today. Well, the addendum here is Gov. Crist, Republican candidate for US Senate, is appearing with The President at the ground breaking ceremony.
Crist took a political pounding for standing with Obama a year ago for promoting the stimulus project. It is now a year later and Crist is doing the same thing all over again. Crist has some political smarts, there would have to be a real reason for him making such a poor political move as he’s beginning to sink in his upcoming primary election. The New Republic is now asking openly if Crist is thinking about changing parties.
http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonath…
I went over to Crist’s website in mid-December (it has changed since then) and noticed there was not much in way of being a conservative with “Republican,” and “GOP” being nowhere to be found and “conservative” listed only once in reference to his fiscal policies (and really, who does NOT run as a “fiscal conservative” these days?).
There was also no issue page in December. There is one now and the issues listed seem rather . . . sensible. The only red flag I see, as a Democrat, is opposition to the Health Care reform bill.
So, what say the lot of ya? Is Crist about to bolt the GOP and join Team Blue?*
*I put my lot down in mid December and said he would join the Dems by Valentine’s Day, so I am a YES. May be a little later than Valentine’s Day, but I’m standing by my prediction.
Loading ...Strategic Vision (R) has a new poll of the Florida Senate race, with some different names being polled than past polls. The poll results are based on telephone interviews with 1200 likely voters in Florida, aged 18+, and conducted February 6-8, 2009. The margin of sampling error is ±3 percentage points.
2010 Senate Democratic Primary
Ron Klein 12%
Kendrick Meek 10%
Pam Iorio 8%
Dan Gelber 4%
Undecided 66%
2010 Senate Republican Primary with Crist
Charlie Crist 54%
Connie Mack IV 16%
Vern Buchanan 10%
Alan Bense 7%
Marco Rubio 4%
Undecided 9%
2010 Senate Republican Primary without Crist
Connie Mack IV 21%
Vern Buchanan 11%
Alan Bense 8%
Marco Rubio 5%
Undecided 9%
2010 Senate General Election
Crist 58%, Klein 24%
Crist 60%, Meek 26%
Crist 57%, Iorio 29%
Crist 58%, Gelber 27%
Mack 32%, Klein 27%
Mack 35%, Meek 25%
Mack 32%, Iorio 30%
Mack 33%, Gelber 20%
Buchanan 24%, Klein 28%
Buchanan 29%, Meek 23%
Buchanan 26%, Iorio 30%
Buchanan 23%, Gelber 20%
Bense 22%, Klein 27%
Bense 28%, Meek 21%
Bense 24%, Iorio 30%
Bense 27%, Gelber 25%
Rubio 18%, Klein 29%
Rubio 26%, Meek 24%
Rubio 19%, Iorio 32%
Rubio 22%, Gelber 17%
Not sure if this poll tells us too much. Clearly, Crist dominates if he runs. If he doesn’t, then the race is wide open.
Among the Democrats, Iorio consistently polled best in the general election match-ups, followed by Klein, then Meek, with Gelber last. Of course, there are huge numbers of undecideds, so it’s impossible to say who would be the strongest general election candidate for the Democrats this far out. When the primary is this open, I hope the DSCC stays out, as I think the strongest candidate tends to emerge from the primary.
Since noone else brought it up I figured I would. Kos sponsored another R2K poll. This one on the Florida Senate race in 2010. It really doesn’t tell us much since many of the candidates have announced they are not running.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyo…
Primary polls:
Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 1/26-28. Likely voters. MoE 4%, 5% for primary samples (No trendlines)
Democratic Primary
Meek 17
Boyd 8
Gelber 3
Undecided 72Republican Primary
Crist 57
McCollum 11
Rubio 4Republican Primary
McCollum 28
Rubio 12
General Polls:
Crist (R) 49
Meek (D) 28Meek (D) 31
Rubio (R) 22Crist (R) 52
Gelber (D) 21Gelber (D) 23
Rubio (R) 23