FL senator warns of 'train wreck'
Posted: Thursday, March 06, 2008 4:19 PM by Domenico Montanaro
From NBC’s Ken Strickland
Florida Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson today wrote a letter asking DNC Chairman Howard Dean to either seat their delegates in accordance with our primary results, or pay for the state to hold a new primary. Without a resolution, Nelson said, "We're coming on the biggest train wreck you've ever seen."
"If they go to the Democratic convention and stiff arm the Florida delegation,” Nelson said, “how in the world do you think Floridians are going to support the Democratic nominee ... only two months after the Democratic convention?”
Nelson also told reporters outside the Senate Chamber, "The DNC has a responsibility because they took it out on Florida, not what Florida Democrats did, but what the Republican legislature -- signed into law by the Republican Governor -- did in changing the date."
He says the measure that authorized moving the primary to January, in violation of DNC rules, was part of a broader election machine reform bill. Nelson, a Clinton supporter, adds that the Florida state legislature's Democratic leader offered an amendment to move back to Feb. 5th, but was defeated.
"So the Florida Democrats come into this with clean hands," he pleaded. "But I couldn't get Howard Dean and the DNC last summer to understand this."
This is something the state party argued in August of 2007 before the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee. The committee, though, rejected the argument, saying there was not a “good faith effort” made by Florida Democrats to defeat the measure.
Nelson says Florida Republican Gov. Charlie Crist agreed to cooperate to set up the elections if someone else picked up the tab. The last primary cost about $18 million, according to Nelson, with 1.75 million Democrats voting.
"The principle here is one person, one vote," he said calling up the ghost of the 2000 Bush-Gore election. "And by the way, we're a little sensitive about that principle in the state of Florida. Do I need to remind you about that in 2000?"