A week after announcing that he was planning to run for governor, independent candidate Bud Chiles, son of Florida political icon and long-time U.S. senator and governor Lawton Chiles, kicks off his campaign Saturday morning in Lakeland -- with his fathers legacy front and center.
In many ways Bud Chiles is walking in his fathers footsteps -- literally.
When he first ran for the U.S. Senate in 1970, Lawton Chiles --at the time an unknown state senator from Lakeland --walked around the state to garner attention for his campaign.
Walking more than 1,000 miles in a three-month period, Lawton Chiles traversed the state from Pensacola to Key West and, despite initially placing second in the primary, crushed former Gov. C. Farris Bryant in the runoff to win the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate. Chiles went on to beat U.S. Rep. Bill Cramer, the first Republican in Florida to win a congressional seat in decades, in the general election.
Bud Chiles has certainly embraced his fathers campaigning style. While Bud Chiles had held walks to bring attention to his concerns on education issues, his gubernatorial campaign has taken "walking" to the next level. The campaign Web site is www.walkwithbud.com. The campaign staged a walk Friday led by the candidate in Ybor City.
The event Saturday opens in Lakeland with a walk from Lawton Chiles Middle School to Munn Park, where a campaign kickoff walk will begin. The campaign will conduct a workshop in the afternoon.
The workshop will be to train campaign workers, said Chiles' spokesman Jim McClellan on Friday. "This is a grass-roots campaign," said McClellan. "It's being driven by the people."
Even when commenting on polls, Bud Chiles brings up his father.
When Quinnipiac University released a poll earlier in the week, the first one to include Chiles fledgling campaign, it showed that the independent was drawing support ranging from 13 percent to 19 percent, depending on who the Republican nominee was. The new candidate then invoked his father.
Im proud that the Chiles name still resonates among Floridians, he said in a statement on the poll results.My father taught me to keep faith with the people and put their interests ahead of the special interests. I believe Floridians are ready for that brand of leadership once again.
The Chiles campaign team is trumpeting the solid poll results as an indicator of how strong a Chiles candidacy could be.
The response has been phenomenal, said McClellan. Weve got real people who have not been engaged in politics in years.
But Lawton Chiles is not the only political figure the Bud Chiles campaign is invoking. The Chiles campaign logo, a sun rising over blue lines, is a visible reminder of Barack Obamas presidential campaign logo. The Chiles campaign even repeats words associated with Obamas efforts in 2008. It takes one step to inspire a movement of hope reads a Chiles campaign flyer.
Lawton Chiles never lost a statewide election in Florida, winning three terms in the U.S. Senate and beating Gov. Bob Martinez and future Gov. Jeb Bush in gubernatorial elections. Obama beat Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain in 2008. Bud Chiles is invoking some successful candidates as he attempts to win an election on his own.
Reach Kevin Derby at kderby@sunshinestatenews.com or at (850) 727-0859.
