Priorities USA, a major Democratic super PAC, formally declared Florida one of the battlegrounds for the 2020 election, which means digital campaign ads are coming soon and won’t ease up until after a  president is picked.

Florida, along with Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan, will be flooded with digital ads in the ramp-up to the election that will pit Republican President Donald Trump against the eventual Democratic nominee, Guy Cecil, chairman of Priorities USA, said during a conference call with reporters Tuesday.

Florida’s top financial regulator was fired Thursday by Gov. Ron DeSantis and Cabinet members, after a controversy sparked by an employee lodging a sexual harassment complaint.

But that isn’t expected to end two months of public skirmishing between ousted Office of Financial Regulation Commissioner Ronald Rubin and state Chief Financial Officer Jimmy Patronis, whose handling of the harassment complaint has also led to an investigation.

Florida lawmakers over the past decade have adopted bills designed to grease the “talent pipeline” in competing for high-tech economic development.

Doing so is also a priority of the Florida Chamber of Commerce’s campaign “to champion the best possible education and close Florida's talent gap.”

But at least one component of Florida’s employers remain concerned about finding the quality workforce they need to compete – small businesses, especially those with five or fewer employees.

House Veterans Affairs Committee member Gus Bilirakis, R-Fla., this week had his proposal to expand the Fry Scholarships pass the House. This is the Bilirakis proposal that applies to survivors of National Guard and Reserve members who served in recent operations and died of service-related causes while not on active duty. 

“The Fry Scholarship provides Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits to the children and surviving spouses of servicemembers who died in the line of duty while on active duty after September 10, 2001,” Bilirakis’ office explained. 

A Florida congresswoman is continuing her fight to crack down on online booking scams. 

Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration is asking an appellate court to revisit a decision that Florida officials argue injected “confusion and uncertainty” into the state’s medical marijuana industry.

DeSantis and health officials on Wednesday asked the 1st District Court of Appeal for a hearing by the full court, known as an “en banc” hearing, after a July 9 ruling that Florida’s “vertical integration” system requiring licensed operators to grow, process and distribute cannabis and by-products runs afoul of a constitutional amendment that broadly legalized medical marijuana.

Gov. Ron DeSantis announced Wednesday his administration is ready to embrace Florida's transportation future and will add new electric vehicle (EV) charging stations to Florida's Turnpike service plazas statewide. 

Joined by Florida Department of Transportation Kevin J. Thibault at Florida’s Turnpike headquarters at Turkey Lake Plaza, DeSantis explained the state will add seven new EV charging stations from Miami to Daytona Beach along the busy north-to-south-running turnpike corridor. He spoke with reporters about how the new EV stations will benefit residents and visitors.

U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., is pairing up with a South Florida Democrat on a proposal to help the Coast Guard clear its infrastructure backlog.

Rubio and U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, brought out the “Coast Guard Shore Infrastructure Improvement Act” this week. 

U.S. Rep. Gus Bilirakis, R-Fla., who sits on the  U.S. House Veterans Affairs Committee, got his bill expanding U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) housing grants to the most severely disabled veterans through the U.S. House this week. 

At the end of last month, Bilirakis, who had been the vice-chairman of the committee when the GOP controlled the U.S. House, brought out the “Ryan Kules Specially Adaptive Housing Improvement Act.”  

State Sen. Lauren Book, a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, wants the state to investigate how the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office handled sex offender Jeffrey Epstein while he was in its custody more than a decade ago.

The Plantation Democrat asked Gov. Ron DeSantis on Monday to direct the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to check an allegation that Epstein, a politically connected wealthy financier, had sex with at least one woman while on work release supervised by sheriff’s deputies.