Florida passed a ballot initiative Tuesday to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour by the year 2026, the Tampa Bay Times reported.
Amendment 2 on the Florida ballot called for the minimum wage to be incrementally increased over the next six years, according to the Tampa Bay Times.
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President Donald Trump won the key battleground states of Ohio, Florida and Texas and he holds leads in all the others but Arizona as former Vice President Joe Biden’s path to victory narrowed.
Trump so far has been declared the winner in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and West Virginia.
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Tuesday morning on The John Fredericks Show, host John Fredricks welcomed Hogan Gidley, principal deputy press secretary at the White House, to the show to discuss the Trump ground game in Florida and early voting polls of Democrats and Republicans.
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Over 50 million Americans have voted early with 11 days remaining until Election Day, far surpassing the 47 million early ballots cast in 2016.
While nearly every state has begun early voting, Texas, California and Florida lead the way, with 6.3 million, 5.8 million and 4.2 million ballots cast in each state, according to the U.S. Elections Project.
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A Florida US Postal Service worker is accused of stealing a mail-in ballot, dozens of political flyers and 4 prepaid debit cards in a scheme that may have started nearly two years ago, federal authorities said Monday, the The New York Post reports.
Crystal Nicole Myrie, “embezzled letters, postal cards, and mail which came into her possession intended to be carried or delivered by her,” according to a criminal complaint.
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A free-speech group has repeatedly warned the University of South Florida about the unfairness and unconstitutionality of its coronavirus guidelines.
The Southeastern Legal Foundation has now sent three letters to the public university in Florida, warning it about problems with both its approaches to student gatherings and coronavirus tracking and reporting.
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Monday morning on The John Fredericks Show, host John Fredricks welcomed the 10th congressional district of Florida candidate (R) Vennia Francois to the show to discuss her ground game against Democratic incumbent Val Demings.
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President Donald Trump traveled to Fort Myers, Florida Friday to give a speech focusing on health care costs, Social Security and other issues that impact senior citizens. In his speech, the president sought to reassure elderly voters, who have borne the brunt of the coronavirus pandemic, that he cares about them, and is doing do everything he can to protect and defend them.
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Police were called to the Florida home of Brad Parscale Sunday after the well-known Trump campaign operative allegedly threatened to harm himself.
Fort Lauderdale Police Chief Karen Dietrich told The Sun Sentinel that the “encounter” was brief and without additional incident.
“We went out and it was very short. We went and got him help,” the police chief said.
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Democratic nominee Joe Biden leads President Donald Trump in six of the most competitive battleground states as both candidates amp up their fundraising efforts and place multimillion dollar ad buys just over seven weeks out from the election, according to a Daily Caller News Foundation review.
In 2016, Trump pulled off an upset win after flipping Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Now, those three states, in addition to Arizona, Florida and North Carolina, are likely to decide the winner of November’s presidential election.
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Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is committing at least $100 million to help Joe Biden’s presidential campaign in the crucial battleground state of Florida.
Bloomberg’s late-stage infusion of cash reflects Democrats’ concerns about the tight race in a state that is a priority for President Donald Trump. A victory for Biden in Florida, the largest of the perennial battleground states, would significantly complicate Trump’s path to reaching the 270 Electoral College votes needed to secure a second term.
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President Donald Trump is winning the Cuban vote by large margins in one of the most contentious counties in Florida less than three months before Election Day, a new poll published Tuesday found.
Cuban-Americans in Florida’s Miami-Dade County support Trump over Biden by 38 points, according to a Bendixen & Amandi International poll. The poll, conducted Sept. 1 to Sept. 4, found the former vice president narrowly behind overall Hispanic voters in the county, with Trump leading 47% to 46%.
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Election officials in three battleground states wouldn’t say when the U.S. can expect the results from November’s presidential race, and an official in a fourth state said the timing is uncertain.
Numerous news reports have indicated that election results could take a week to return due to the coronavirus pandemic and an increased reliance on mail-in ballots. Accuracy and timing will be especially crucial in the battleground states that will likely determine whether President Donald Trump will serve another term or be ousted by former Vice President Joe Biden.
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A viral report of a sudden surge of coronavirus cases in infants in a single county in Texas is inaccurate, a local official said on Saturday.
On Friday, the top health official for the Corpus Christi area said at a press conference that the county currently has 85 cases of newborns with coronavirus.
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Trump supporters in Florida were celebrating the president’s birthday Sunday with caravans, flotillas and parades throughout his adopted home state.
In Palm Beach County — home of President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort — separate caravans of trucks, motorcycles and boats were riding along highways and the intercoastal waterway at various times in the morning. The organizers were part of the president’s Florida re-election effort.
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After President Donald Trump took to Twitter to threaten pulling the Republican National Convention out of Charlotte, N.C, other southeast states with Trump allies as governor have offered to host the convention.
The GOP convention is scheduled for late August in Charlotte. North Carolina entered phase two of its reopening plan amid the coronavirus pandemic last week under Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper, who has been cautious in lifting restrictions.
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The Saudi national who shot three Americans at a military base in Pensacola, Fl., in December had been in contact with Al Qaeda before the attack, according to law enforcement officials.
Cell phone evidence links Second Lt. Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani, a Saudi Air Force cadet who trained at the Naval Air Station Pensacola alongside American military officials, to the terrorist organization, according to government officials who spoke with the New York Times. The FBI discovered cell phone communication between Alshamrani and an Al Qaeda operative from before the December 2019 shooting spree.
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President Donald Trump warned 3M on Twitter Thursday night that it will “have a big price to pay” after the company was accused of various wrongdoings surrounding its production of N95 respirator masks.
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U.S. Republican Sen. Rick Scott of Florida on Saturday released what he described as a 30-Day Plan to help America get back to normal following the spread of the coronavirus.
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Tuesday’s upcoming presidential primary contests with a combined 577 delegates up for grabs will move forward as planned despite the coronavirus pandemic.
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The governor of Florida is expected to sign a bill requiring parental consent for minors to get abortions.
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Miramar, Florida-based Spirit Airlines decided it likes the Volunteer State’s spirit and has decided to move its control center to Franklin.
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A man driving a Chevrolet van plowed through a Republican group’s voter registration tent outside of a Walmart in Jacksonville, Florida, on Saturday, the local sheriff’s office said.
Florida Sens. Marco Rubio and Rick Scott suggested it was a politically motivated attack.
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A Florida police officer who was in the running for chief of his local department was temporarily suspended last week after the Miami Herald outed him for liking comments on Facebook that were critical of U.S. Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-MN-05) and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI-13).
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The Florida House will investigate “Chinese meddling in taxpayer-funded research” following a series of resignations at the Moffitt Cancer Center, a research nonprofit created by the Legislature in 1981 at the University of South Florida in Tampa.
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President Donald Trump, a lifelong New Yorker, changed his primary residence from Manhattan to Palm Beach, Florida, court documents show.
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A former City of Adamsville Public Works employee allegedly stole a city-issued fuel card and spent it on himself, including during a visit to Florida, according to a new audit from Tennessee Comptrollers.
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A comprehensive report by the Federation for Immigration Reform (FAIR) breaks down the cost of illegal immigration to U.S. taxpayers: $115.9 billion annually.
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Gov. Ron DeSantis wants the Florida Supreme Court to issue an advisory opinion on whether convicted felons must pay all fines and fees before their voting rights are restored under Amendment 4, the November 2018 ballot measure approved by 64.5 percent of state voters.
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There were more hepatitis A cases reported in Florida during the first seven months of 2019 than were reported in the last seven years combined, spurring state Surgeon General Scott Rivkees to declare the outbreak a public health emergency.
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On Wednesday’s Tennessee Star Report with Steve Gill and Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Gill and Leahy spoke with Laurie Cardoza-Moore from Proclaiming Justice to the Nations about William Laston the principal, who at Spanish River High School in Boca Raton Florida decided to teach that the Holocaust did not exist in his school curriculum. Towards the end of the segment the Tennessee Star Report discussed her current petition which can be found online at PJTN.org. asking for the resignation of Ilhan Omar. Gill: A Florida principal came under fire for saying he can’t say the Holocaust is factual or a historical event. He denied the Holocaust. William Latson wrote in emails last year that were published in the Palm Beach Post on Friday, a week ago. The comments came after a mother of a student inquired how the Holocaust was being taught at the school. The guy had been the principal at Spanish River High School. The curriculum included education on the Holocaust but the lessons could not be taught in a factual or historical basis according to the principal. Laurie Cardoza-Moore…
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by Jason Hopkins Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis signed legislation into law Friday that bans “sanctuary cities” in the state, fulfilling a pledge he made while on the campaign trail. DeSantis — at a ceremony in the Okaloosa County Board of Commissioners alongside Florida GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz — added his signature to SB 168. The bill requires state and local governments to honor retainers made by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and to cooperate with federal immigration authorities. Furthermore, the bill prohibits local governments from adopting “sanctuary” policies that protect illegal immigrants, requiring them to notify ICE when an individual subject to a detainer is released from their custody. “Earlier this year, Governor DeSantis asked the Florida Legislature to present him with meaningful legislation to uphold the rule of law and ensure that no city or county jurisdiction can get in the way of Florida’s cooperation with our federal partners to enforce immigration law,” Helen Ferre, a DeSantis spokeswoman, wrote in a Thursday email, according to Wesh 2. “Public safety is paramount and local law enforcement agencies can and should work with the federal government to ensure that accountability and justice are one in our state,” Ferre continued.…
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The new voter protection director for Florida Democrats told party activists on Saturday that they should assume there will be a recount during next year’s presidential election. “We are going to be prepared,” Brandon Peters (pictured, foreground) told a packed room of Democratic activists at the state party’s Leadership Blue 2019 meeting at Walt Disney World in Orlando. Peters, who was hired by the state party last month, said there will be teams of volunteers trained in how to monitor county canvassing boards for recount problems around the state, should one take place in the 2020 presidential election. Florida became famous for recounts after the 2000 presidential election, and last year there were recounts in three statewide races. The Florida Democratic Party is the second state Democratic party in the nation to hire a voter protection director, behind the Georgia Democratic Party. Peters said by July 2020 he hopes to have 15,000 lawyers and volunteers in place around the state to address any voter problems. Those problems include making it difficult for ex-convicts to register after Florida voters last year passed a constitutional amendment restoring voting rights to as many as 1.4 million felons and creating earlier deadlines for…
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by John Haughey Russian hackers gained access to voter information files in Washington County, a sparsely populated Republican-dominated Panhandle county, where 77 percent of its 11,000 votes cast in the 2016 presidential election went to Donald Trump. The revelation was reported by The Washington Post Thursday night, citing two unnamed officials “with knowledge of the investigation,” who said Washington County was one of the two Florida counties breached by the Russian military spy agency, the GRU, in the days before the November 2016 election. The Washington Post also cites two unnamed Florida sources that the second county the FBI maintains was penetrated by the GRU in 2016 is “a mid-sized county on the East Coast of the state.” The disclosures have further inflamed already angry state officials, including Gov. Ron DeSantis, and Florida’s congressional delegation, who are demanding the FBI and the Trump Administration be more forthcoming in discussing with them and county election officials what its investigation has uncovered. “The public needs to know which counties were hacked and what steps are being taken to hold the bad actors accountable,” U.S. Rep. Stephanie Murphy, D-Orlando, said during a bipartisan Washington D.C. press conference staged by five of the…
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One in 290 properties in Osceola County, Florida started the foreclosure process during the first quarter of the year – the 16th highest foreclosure rate among U.S. counties with at least 100 foreclosures nationwide, according to an ATTOM Data Solutions analysis of property data. Osceola County’s foreclosure rate was the highest in the Sunshine State. A total of 482 properties in the county had foreclosure filings during the first three months of 2019, the data showed. That’s out of 139,796 housing units countywide. The foreclosure rate in the county was up 79.9 percent from the same period a year earlier. ATTOM Data’s analysis included data from 2,200 counties nationwide, accounting for more than nine-tenths of the country’s population. Nationwide, nearly 162,000 properties began the foreclosure process in the first quarter, a 14.74 percent decrease over the first quarter of 2018, according to the company. County Foreclosure Activity in Q1 2019 Rank County Name State Name Housing Units Q1 2019 Properties with Foreclosure Filings Foreclosure Rate (Housing Units Per Foreclosure Filing) % Change From Q1 2018 1 Cumberland Tennessee 29,072 367 79 1,495.65 2 Cumberland New Jersey 56,332 497 113 50.15 3 Atlantic New Jersey 127,809 722 177 -36.16 4…
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by John Haughey A bill approving a decade-long, multi-billion dollar plan to extend three toll roads into rural “corridors” was formally sent to Gov. Ron DeSantis Monday as opponents intensified demands he veto the measure and launched a week of scheduled protests. DeSantis has 10 working days to veto Senate Bill 7068, the proposed Multi-Use Corridors of Regional Economic Significance [M-CORES] program. Even if he does not sign it, the bill becomes law on May 28. SB 7068 – Senate President Bill Galvano’s session priority – earmarks $45 million to establish regional task forces to study M-CORES, the state’s most significant highway-building project since the 1950s, approved by the Senate, 37-1, and by the House, 76-36. M-CORES would build the 150-mile Heartland Parkway from Lakeland to Naples, push the Florida Turnpike 40 miles west to link I-75 with the Suncoast Parkway, and extend the Suncoast 150 miles north to Georgia. Construction would begin in 2022 and end in 2030. M-CORES would be funded through license plate tag revenues – $1.1 billion over a decade – shifted from the state’s general fund into the State Transportation Trust Fund [STTF]. But SB 7068 appropriates $45 million for Fiscal Year 2020, M-CORES’s…
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by John Haughey Gov. Ron DeSantis cited a need for judicial restraint in January when he appointed three new Florida Supreme Court justices he said would strictly adhere to the state constitution and statutes as they are written. DeSantis has now revealed he also has a dim view of legislative activism, issuing the first veto of his tenure in Tallahassee by rejecting a bill prohibiting local governments from banning single-use straws. House Bill 711, passed by House 87-23 on April 25 and by the Senate, 24-15, four days later, would impose a five-year suspension of local bans of plastic straws. The bill, sponsored by Rep. Toby Overdorf, R-Stuart, originally addressed recycling issues but later amendments attached the moratorium on straw bans, a proposal included in several of the 50-plus state preemption bills filed during the recently concluded session, including HB 1299, sponsored by Rep. Spencer Roach, R-North Fort Myer, the so-called “Governmental Powers Preemption Train,” that died in committee. “A number of Florida municipalities, including Sanibel, Fort Myers Beach and Miami Beach, have enacted ordinances prohibiting single-use plastic straws,” DeSantis wrote in a veto message released Friday night. “These measures have not, as far as I can tell, frustrated any…
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by John Haughey It took combative committee hearings and marathon floor debates to overcome “third rail” resistance to expanding Florida’s school choice voucher program, but none of that rancor was evident Thursday at a private Miami Gardens school where Gov. Ron DeSantis signed the hard-fought bill into law. “I personally believe, as a matter of philosophy, that parents know what’s best for their kids,” DeSantis said while flanked by Lt. Gov. Jeanette Nunez and bill sponsor Sen. Manny Diaz, Jr., R-Miami, at William J. Kirlew Junior Academy, a Seventh-day Adventist K-8 school with a predominantly African American student body. “What this will do, in one fell swoop,” he added, is offer “opportunity for thousands and thousands of low-income students.” With that, DeSantis signed Diaz’s Senate Bill SB 7070 into law, creating the $130 million Family Empowerment Scholarship, which will be offered to 18,000 students next fall. The new school choice program prioritizes students from families with incomes at 185 percent of the federal poverty level – $47,637 annually for a family of four – although students from families with annual incomes at 300 percent of the federal poverty level – $77,250 – would be eligible to attend a private…
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by George Rasley Jeb Bush is to Republican politics what the little mechanical moles are to the arcade game Whack-A-Mole; an annoyance that bursts forth according to some malevolent algorithm and the faster you beat it down the quicker it pops back up. With the Florida legislature about to pass a bill prohibiting Florida local governments from implementing so-called sanctuary policies, Jeb! has surfaced to opine that sanctuary cities in Florida were “not a problem.” (Despite Jeb Bush’s opposition the bill passed yesterday and Florida now has a tough anti-sanctuary city law.) Said the former governor and failed Republican presidential candidate: This is one of those new political issues where it’s designed to make a point rather than to solve a problem. I’m not sure we have this problem. But it could be in the last few years something has changed. As our friend John Binder of Breitbart documented, this is what the Democrats have been saying before and during the current debate in the legislature, and it’s not true. As Binder pointed out, the left-leaning fact-checking site PolitiFact debunked Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum’s claim that there were no sanctuary cities in the state, writing, “Whether Florida has sanctuary…
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by Evie Fordham Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis appears set to sign a bill creating a program to import prescription drugs from Canada after the Republican-backed legislation passed the state Senate. The bill passed the GOP-controlled Florida House 93-22 on April 11, reported The Associated Press. The Washington Examiner characterized the legislation as a move to lock down “the gray vote.” It passed in the state Senate 27-13 on Monday morning. “The United States pays more for prescription drugs than anywhere else in the world,” DeSantis said after the bill’s passage in the state House. “In Florida, we can change that by employing safe, common sense solutions such as importing FDA approved prescription drugs from Canada.” Opponents of the bill have called the policy socialist and point out that only one other state, Vermont, has taken steps toward a similar program, although it faces federal hurdles. “For starters it is one of [Independent Vermont Sen.] Bernie Sanders’ ideas,” Grover Norquist of conservative group Americans for Tax Reform said April 22. “The rest of the world has damaged their ability to invent new drugs. We invent the drugs. Then they put price controls on them. And some politicians in Florida want to bring those price controls into Florida, a…
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Hurricane Michael made landfall in the Florida Panhandle on Oct. 10, 2018, as a high-ended Category 4 Hurricane, causing catastrophic damage to the Panama City, Mexico Beach and Cape San Blas areas. Since that time, the news cycles have moved onto other events and the people in the Panhandle have felt forgotten. In an article by the AP’s Mike Schneider, homeless numbers in Panama City area are up around 7,800 according to local officials. The homeless number includes at least 4,700 homeless students. This area is still in need of assistance, and many different organizations have been in the area helping in this disaster response, to include Samaritan’s Purse, Mercy Chefs, and many more. Along with outside organizations helping those affected by the storm, there have been local churches that have stepped in to help their neighbors. Most of the local churches sustained damage to their structures, but they are making the most out of what they have. One such church is the Springfield Community Church. The church sustained heavy damage to their fellowship hall and youth chapel, and in the days and weeks following the hurricane landfall they pulled together to feed local residents. Every Thursday and Friday vehicles…
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by Evie Fordham Republican Indiana Sen. Mike Braun, co-sponsor of a recently introduced bill banning ex-members of Congress from lobbying Congress, told The Daily Caller News Foundation in an interview that his bill would help get Congress out of a “rut” — but he’s not expecting the legislation to gain traction anytime soon. “I think that here you’d attract better people if you didn’t have them make a career out of it,” Braun said. “But so many incentives are put in place with pensions, the ability after you’re done to become a lobbyist, so you do nestle in and then you start maybe not making the right long-term decisions. You basically make a decision: what will be best for me to nestle in further, be around here longer.” Braun and Republican Florida Sen. Rick Scott are the cosponsors of the Banning Lobbying and Safeguarding Trust (BLAST) Act, introduced Feb. 28. Braun connected the legislation to his reform agenda, including doing away with taxpayer-funded pensions for members of Congress. Although the lawmakers are “barking up the right tree,” their solution might not be realistic, a government transparency expert told TheDCNF. “You generally do see more of a reform agenda from some of the newer members…
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Deputy State Superintendent Dr. Eric Hall is leaving the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction (NCDPI) for a new job in Florida schools. Hall will be taking the role of Chancellor for Innovation at the Florida Department of Education in March. According to a press release by NCDPI, Hall’s new job includes overseeing the implementation of things such as “workforce and computer science education, expanding school choice and K-12 standards.” “Throughout his career, Dr. Hall has shown his dedication to student success and to using innovative strategies to spread that success in support of public schools,” said Florida Commissioner of Education Richard Corcoran in the statement. “I thank Superintendent Johnson for his gracious support of Eric’s career and family and am happy to welcome Eric home to the Sunshine State.” “This is an unbelievable opportunity to continue to work at the state level,” said Dr. Hall. Hall said he was looking forward to working in Florida and that both Gov. DeSantis and Commissioner Corcoran have great ideas and a great vision for education in the state. “I think the thing I am most proud of is to be able to really work and build good, strong teams,” said Hall about…
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by Lindsey M. Burke Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced Friday that the state legislature intends to establish Equal Opportunity Scholarships designed to end the current waiting list on the tax credit scholarship program – a move the Republican chief executive supports. The Florida Tax Credit Scholarship – which provides scholarships to eligible children to attend a private school of choice, and which is financed through corporate donations – currently has a waitlist of an estimated 13,000 families. As the Tampa Bay Times reported, DeSantis would like those waiting students to have an immediate school choice option. “If the taxpayer is paying for education, it’s public education,” regardless of where the student attends, DeSantis said. [The liberal Left continue to push their radical agenda against American values. The good news is there is a solution. Find out more ] He also said: We have parents who are lining up for a tax credit scholarship. They would not do that if the program was not succeeding. … The question for us now is, should we be satisfied there is a growing waitlist, or should we build off the successes? He is indeed correct to want to build off the success of the Florida Tax Credit…
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A Florida commissioner who suggested that Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI-13) might “blow up Capitol hill” was publicly reprimanded by her colleagues during a Wednesday night meeting. According to the South Florida Sun Sentinel, Hallandale Beach Commissioner Anabelle Lima-Taub’s recent comments were the subject of a Wednesday night meeting, where her colleagues voted to issue a public reprimand. They accused Lima-Taub of promoting bigotry, fueling hatred and creating a hostile environment for Muslims, the Sun Sentinel reports. Lima-Taub, however, argued that she never once “mentioned Muslim or Islam,” and suggested that media in attendance were contributing to her “demise.” “I never ever mentioned Muslim or Islam. I repeat, I never ever mentioned Muslim or Islam. I do not hate or discriminate against any group, including Islam,” she said Wednesday, and revealed that she was receiving numerous death threats over her comments. Protesters on both sides of the debate showed up to Wednesday night’s meeting, causing multiple recesses throughout the meeting. The Sun Sentinel reports that more than 200 people gathered outside the meeting space in support of Lima-Taub. “She’s a patriot,” one protester said. “We live in a democracy and what’s happening today with her own peers is not a democracy.”…
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by George Rasley Florida’s Hallandale Beach City Commissioner Anabelle Lima-Taub recently called for the removal of U.S. Representative Rashida Tlaib, a Michigan Democrat, with a petition on Facebook saying, “a Hamas-loving anti-Semite has no place in government!” and calling her a “danger.” Commissioner Lima-Taub is right about Rep. Tlaib, she is a danger, and she is a Hamas-loving anti-Semite. Tlaib supports anti-Israel boycotts. She also defended former CNN contributor Marc Lamont Hill after he was fired for calling for the elimination of Israel and endorsing violence against Jews. What’s more, Tlaib recently trotted out the old trope about American Jews having “dual loyalty,” a particularly ironic charge for Tlaib to make, given that she once wrapped herself in a Palestinian flag, and has vowed to “be a voice” for her relatives in the West Bank and declared that her “passion for justice is rooted in my beautiful Palestine.” Tlaib openly associates with anti-Israel extremists, such as Abbas Hamideh, who heads a “right of return” advocacy group — and has equated Zionism to Nazism and called Israel a “terrorist entity.” Abbas Hamideh was invited to and attended a Detroit swearing-in reception and dinner party for Rep. Tlaib, where he posed…
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Andrew Pollack, the father of a teenage girl who was killed in a school shooting in Florida last year, was appointed to the state Education Board by outgoing Gov. Rick Scott. Scott appointed Pollack to the board Friday. Pollack, whose daughter Meadow was one of 17 people killed at a Parkland, Florida, high school, Feb. 14, 2018, still needs to be confirmed to the seat by the state Senate. Pollack, 52, who became a school safety activist after the shooting, told the South Florida Sun Sentinel, “What I hope to accomplish is accountability at a local level, to hold school boards accountable and superintendents accountable.” The governor, who will be stepping down from his post next week, was elected in November to the U.S. Senate. He had said during the campaign he would serve out his term as governor, which ends Jan. 9. Nikolas Cruz, a student at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, has been charged with killing 17 people. Police say he used a semi-automatic AR-15 rifle. The mass shooting caused a larger debate nationwide regarding gun control measures, and also led to a local investigation. Safety commission report Pollack’s appointment to the Education Board came days after a report…
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by Neetu Chandak A preliminary report released Thursday found U.S. police officer deaths on duty increased by 12 percent in 2018 from 2017. The National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund, a non-profit dedicated to making police officers’ work safer, found 144 police officers died between Jan. 1 and Dec. 27. Nearly 129 police officers died in the same time frame in 2017. The leading cause of death was gun-related followed by traffic-related incidents. Other forms of death included being struck by a train, having a heart attack and drowning. “The rising number of law enforcement officer deaths in 2018 is disappointing news after a decline in 2017,” the fund’s CEO Craig W. Floyd said in a press statement. “Sadly this reminds us that public safety is a dangerous job and can come at a very steep price.” Texas, Florida, California, and New York had the highest number of officer deaths with 11 each, according to the data. The District of Columbia along with 14 states did not have any police officer fatalities. The number of deaths could change as the numbers are not final, according to the fund. The report comes as an illegal immigrant allegedly shot and killed…
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In the wake of the hard fought win by former House of Representatives Republican Ron DeSantis in the Florida governor’s race, legislators in the state House and Senate are inspired to try again to move two bills that would have a chilling effect on the ability of businesses to hire illegal aliens and for local governments to harbor them from federal law enforcement. An immigration restriction group headquartered in Washington, DC, the Federation for Immigration Reform (FAIR), reported the news about the bills to its members on Friday. Although the legislature does not reconvene until March 2019, committees will discuss the bills during January and February. E-Verify On December 11, Representative Thad Altman (R-Melbourne/Indialantic) introduced HB 89 which would among other provisions: ~ Require all private employers to register with E-Verify and use it for all employees hired after January 1, 2020; ~ Require all state agencies, local governments and public contractors to verify new employees hired after July 1, 2019; ~ Set up an enforcement process where private employers could lose their business licenses for employing illegal aliens; ~ Require the state’s Department of Economic Opportunity to report illegal aliens to ICE. Many, including the leadership of FAIR, believe that mandatory…
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by Peter Hasson The left-wing activist group that accosted Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi at a movie theater in June received half a million dollars in 2017 from an organization funded by left-wing billionaire George Soros in 2017, documents obtained by The Daily Caller News Foundation reveal. Organize Florida, the group that hounded Bondi from a Florida movie theater, received $500,000 last year from the Open Society Policy Center (OSPC), according to OSPC’s most recent tax forms. OSPC is the advocacy arm of Soros’s Open Society Foundations, which the billionaire uses to advance his left-wing worldview around the globe. OSPC awarded the grant to Organize Florida to “support policy advocacy,” according to the group’s tax forms. Organize Florida activists yelled at Bondi, a Republican ally of President Donald Trump, about the president’s immigration and health care policies during the protest in June. One of the protesters spit on Bondi’s head, she said afterwards. WATCH: https://youtu.be/HqScWovwPe8 Other targets of Organize Florida’s protests include women’s health centers that don’t perform abortions. OSPC did not respond to a request for comment regarding the grant to Organize Florida, and whether the activists’s actions toward Bondi are consistent with OSPC’s mission. – – – Peter Hasson…
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