Session Blows Up as GOP Rifts Emerge

Personal rivalries and Republican factional fights have sent the 2011 regular legislative session boiling over into extra time, House Minority Leader Ron Saunders, D-Key West, said.

House Speaker Dean Cannon, R-Winter Park, has ruffled some feathers in the Senate this session, as he forced the upper chamber to move his shake-up of the Supreme Court through committee to the floor in order to move ahead with budget negotiations. Senators were averse to taking it up in the first place, and struck that provision of the courts bill before passing it. Sen. J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, who clashed with Cannon in 2009 over the budget, consistently expressed displeasure with the House's negotiating tactics over the budget this year.

So, when a budget deal was finally reached, senators took the opportunity on the last day of session to "send a message" to the House. At least, that's Saunders' version of events.

"This is all messaging for next session, they're sending a message to Dean: 'Quit sending us stuff like the Supreme Court stuff, we told you we don't want to take it up, you're putting us in a position as Republicans,'" Saunders said.

The back-and-forth over the immigration bill, which Alexander helped to defeat earlier this week, also came into play, according to Saunders.

"Immigration -- that's the tea party versus the business community -- it's all Republicans fighting. Democrats, we're saying, 'Hey that's your problem.' They're sending messages back and forth and J.D. in particular, I think he was getting kind of tired of the speaker," he said.

The end of session is now stalled after senators placed an amendment on an economic development conforming bill that expanded gambling, which many House Republicans don't want to vote on with the gambling provisions tacked on.

"And like I said, two-thirds of them down there (in the House) don't know any better. I think we need to send a lesson down there," said Sen. Dennis Jones, R-Seminole, before the vote.