At a press conference in Ocala on Wednesday, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis took several digs at Randy Fine, the Republican who won a special election for U.S. House seat vacated by National Security Advisor Mike "the reporter's number must have gotten sucked onto my phone" Waltz of Signalgate fame.
DeSantis and Fine have been archenemies ever since the latter read the tea leaves, withdrew his presidential endorsement of the governor, and gave it to Trump. Fine underperformed in the race, winning a district that DeSantis and Trump won with 30-plus-point victories in 2022 and 2024, respectively, by less than half of their margins.
DeSantis had held the same congressional seat before leaving Congress to run for governor in 2018, and Fine played down the margin by noting it was roughly the same DeSantis had won by when he ran for the seat for the first time in 2012.
To be fair to both parties, the district has become much more red in that time period, but while Fine is indeed a slimy character who has said many repulsive things over the years, his lackluster win probably had more to do with voters' rejection of the chaos caused by Trump and Musk (see Wisconsin special election results from the same evening).
When a reporter asked about Fine's race, DeSantis took the opportunity to issue several digs, but one in particular stood out to me.
"Just the way he conducts himself is somebody—he repels people," DeSantis said. "He’s repelled people in the legislature. They wanted to get him out of the legislature, so they asked me to put him up for Florida Atlantic president, and I did, and the whole board would have resigned rather than making him president, and now he’s going to be in Congress, so there you go."
To summarize, our governor just told us that he tried to appoint this guy he considers a lowlife to be president of a major state university—a million-dollar-a-year gig, by the way—as a favor to legislators who found him repulsive. What's more, Fine had spent pretty much his entire professional life in the casino industry and had no experience whatsoever in higher education.
So, if you're wondering how people like New College president Dick Corcoran get installed as exhorbitantly paid university bosses despite being totally unqualified to run an institution of higher learning, your governor just told you. Every once in a while, and usually in a petulant fit of juvenile anger, politicians take the mask off and show you who they really are and how things really get done.
Dennis "Mitch" Maley is an editor and columnist for The Bradenton Times and the host of our weekly podcast. With over two decades of experience as a journalist, he has covered Manatee County government since 2010. He is a graduate of Shippensburg University and later served as a Captain in the U.S. Army. Click here for his bio. Mitch is also the author of three novels and a short story collection available here.
3 comments on this item
Only paid subscribers can comment
Please log in to comment by clicking here.
rjckeuka4
DeSantis' mask has been off for years!! As a former university executive, I can tell you what Corcoran is doing to New College is an abomination in terms of academic quality/prestige! In terms of academics, it's a joke to build an athletic program around baseball. In college athletics, in comparison to all other sports, baseball players are last by a wide margin in their persistence rate, i.e., likely to graduate. That's only one measure of what DeSantis is doing to higher education in our State!
Friday, April 4, 2025 Report this
Cat L
Florida is still a "good old boys club" and they talk a lot of smack about the constitution, while only following the parts convenient to their interests. I get super mad when I listen to folks around me espousing virtues our unconscious Gov doesn't have. Choices are made to further special interests, they don't care if the person is qualified. The only thing that matters is that they are "on board" with the shenanigan's.
Friday, April 4, 2025 Report this
rickcoyne507
I figure the long range plan was to give your buddy a a million dollar a year job .
SO when you term out you could be head baseball coach for say 10 million a year at a college of less than 800 students. PREFECT!
Sunday, April 6, 2025 Report this