In a statement on Friday afternoon, Florida Republican U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio weighed in on the cut, cap and balance plan that congressional Republicans are backing.

Whats at stake here is Americas credit rating, and the people that give us our credit rating have been very clear that we cant just raise the debt limit. They also want to see a plan to see how we are going to deal with our debt, said Rubio. The president hasnt offered a plan to do that. The Senate Democrats who run the Senate have not offered a plan to do that.

Marion County School Board member Jackie Porter filed her paperwork with the state to run for theSenate seat currently held by Sen. Evelyn Lynn, R-Ormond Beach. While Porter is running as a Republican, she could face a primary fight against state Rep. Dorothy Hukill, R-Port Orange. The seat currently represents parts of Clay, Marion, Putnam and Volusia counties and it may change during redistricting -- but, as of now, this would be an interesting GOP primary battle. Frank Bruno is running on the Democratic side.

The Republican National Committee is calling a new Spanish-language television ad from the Democratic National Committee airing in Florida "scare tactics and political theatrics." The DNC ad itself was a response to a Florida Spanish-language ad from Karl Rove's Crossroads GPS group.

There was no monthly change in the statewide unemployment rate last month, as an Agency for Workforce Innovation report released Friday shows the jobless rate remained at 10.6 percent in June.

The rate is 0.8 percent less than June 2010, but there are still 982,000 unemployed workers in a work force of more than 9.23 million. Florida added 4,300 jobs in June, much less than the 28,000 gained in May, when the state led the nation in job creation. So far this year, the Sunshine State has added 85,500 jobs.

Former Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota is not getting much support in the polls for his bid for the Republican presidential nomination -- but he is getting the backing of a bunch of Florida House members.

Florida had the seventh-highest rate of long-term unemployment in the nation last year, according to a Wall Street Journal chart.

The Washington Post is reporting that First Coast Republican strategist Susie Wiles has resigned as campaign manager for former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsmans bid to be the Republican presidential nominee.

While all eyes are focused on the last space shuttle flight that concluded in the morning, Thursday marks the anniversary of the second American in space.

With the space shuttle Atlantis touching down on Thursday, a chapter of space exploration ended -- and a new poll found that Americans are not happy about it.

Freshman U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio received some major national exposure on Thursday morning when he was the subject of a profile on NBCs morning Today show. Rubio stressed in the profile that he is not a presidential or a vice presidential hopeful in 2012 -- but the NBC profile did play up that the new senator was starting to turn away from the tea party movement which helped propel him into office.