What's wrong with making every presidential candidate running for the GOP nomination attend the Sunshine Summit if they want to be on the Florida ballot? That's a rhetorical question. Nothing is wrong with it. Not a single thing.
Party Chairman Blaise Ingoglia and the RPOF leadership are proposing just that. The rule change, to be voted on Friday, is not without its critics, although I have no idea why anybody except maybe Jeb Bush would have a problem with it.
You want to be on the ballot? Come and engage the electorate. Show your face to Florida's Republican grassroots. Nothing could be fairer than that to the voters -- the people of Florida. Remember them in all this. Celebrate them.
Candidates, every one, breeze into Florida for low-key, high-dollar fundraisers, or put forces on the ground collecting checks for often hundreds of thousands of dollars so the money can be spent ... where? In Iowa and New Hampshire? In states that, combined, don't have an electoral vote total amounting to even half of Florida's? It's crazy and it's disrespectful. Florida counts.
Bob White, chairman of the Republican Liberty Caucus, disagrees with Ingoglia and other new-rule proponents.
White says, "It is not the proper role for party insiders to unilaterally determine who may or may not appear on the Republican Presidential Preference Primary ballot. This proposed ballot access ‘rule,’ if passed, would set a dangerous precedent. It would disenfranchise voters and risk alienating thousands of party activists leading up to the general election in November."
A little over-dramatic, don't you think? Right now, the way RPOF rules are drawn, the party chairman has all the power -- literally. He or she decides who makes the primary ballot in Florida. Four years ago, for example, if Chairman Lenny Curry had wanted to rig the ballot for Mitt Romney, he had the sole authority to submit only Romney's name. He could have locked everyone else out. He didn't, of course, but it was his prerogative,
The potential for abuse is maintaining the status quo -- no qulification at all, the only ticket to the Florida GOP ballot being the blessing of the party chair.
The point is, if anybody is alienated, White can blame the candidates themselves who will have created the predicament. For heaven's sake, let's look at what's being "demanded" here: Candidates have to show up for the Sunshine Summit and give a 25-minute speech. That's it. Then they can sign papers and presto, they're qualified for the Florida primary in March -- one of the most important in all of the 50 states. It will cost them no more than a ticket to Orlando.
Where is the dangerous precedent? How does this new rule, if adopted Friday, do anything but good? The Republican Party of Florida has never had rules for qualifying before. Other states have them, and boy, do they ever.
You want dranconian? Look at South Carolina, where the Republican qualifying fee is $40,000. Look at Virginia, where to make the ballot candidates have to get 800 signed petitions in each of the state's congressional districts, submitting them in sealed plastic containers.
Some candidates claim they want to skip Florida because its favorite sons -- former Gov. Jeb Bush and U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio -- leave them too far behind to be competitive in the Sunshine State. The race might have started out with Bush and Rubio in the lead, but last time I looked at the polls, the two were mercurial in their home state, as in every other -- up one week, down the next.
Sure Jeb doesn't like the proposed new rule. He's no fool. The more rivals he can get to stay away from Nov. 13-14 's Sunshine Summit, the better his chances, the greater his exposure on his important home turf.
One last point. The 2015 Sunshine Summit is expected to draw 2,500 Republicans from throughout Florida. In time, with this new rule in place, the event could become as heady and kinetic and worthy of world attention in the Republican race as the 40,000-strong Iowa Fair is now.
This is a great rule proposal with so many positives. Every candidate on every other level of government has to qualify for the ballot. When you think about it, it makes no sense for Florida's party leaders to wave presidential candidates through the gate like turnpike drivers with a SunPass they never paid for.
Reach Nancy Smith at nsmith@sunshinestatenews.com or at 228-282-2423. Twitter: @NancyLBSmith
