An American Son: A Memoir (30 page)

I
STOPPED WAITING FOR CHARLIE CRIST TO MAKE UP HIS mind. I gave an interview to the local Univision station on May 4, announcing my candidacy. I released a Web video the next day formally launching my campaign, and I told the
Miami Herald
I didn’t think my “odds were that long. Races of this magnitude are decided by who presents a clearer picture of the future, and I intend to do that.” When asked why I was running, I replied, “I don’t agree with the notion that to grow our party we need to become more like Democrats.”

I had the field all to myself for the next seven days. No one really thought I could defeat Crist, but I was surprised by how interested the press was in my candidacy. On Mother’s Day, May 10, Jeanette and I hosted a lunch for all the mothers in our family. I excused myself from the party several times that afternoon to check the Internet for any news that might have leaked about Crist’s plans. That evening, several media outlets reported that Crist would announce his Senate bid on Tuesday.

We released another Web video before Crist announced, framing the race as a choice between more of the same and a leader who will stand up to the establishment.

I loved it. When I first saw it, I was excited to do battle, and sent my consultants the following message, not entirely in jest.

I flew to Washington on Monday, where I would have access to the national media when Crist announced. I wanted to appear confident in my long-shot bid. I understood the challenges I faced, but I was, in fact, increasingly confident about my chances. The year 2010 was beginning to feel like a national wave election, in which conservatives frustrated with the party establishment’s support for moderate candidates had all the energy and momentum. If I could just plug away, I thought by late summer I could ride the conservative wave to a come-from-behind victory in the Republican primary. I knew Crist would have an enormous financial advantage and the support of Florida’s biggest Republican donors. But the contested primary would prevent the state party from weighing in on Crist’s behalf, and the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) would have to remain neutral as well. Or so I thought.

I went to the Capitol with one of my finance consultants, Ann Herberger, for a meeting with John Boehner’s chief of staff, Paula Nowakowski, a friend of Ann’s for many years. She told us that in a meeting of House and Senate Republican leaders, Senate leaders announced plans to try and invoke Rule 11 in the Florida Senate primary. When a state party chairman and two national committee members signed a Rule 11 letter, the state party and the NRSC could intervene in a contested primary. It was an obscure provision intended to prevent the David Dukes of the world from
hijacking Republican nominations. Now it seemed it would be used against me. It was an obvious abuse of the rule, and just as obviously, it would potentially devastate my campaign. If invoked, Rule 11 would allow the Republican Party of Florida and the NRSC to raise and spend vast sums of money for Crist, and the state party and NRSC staff would be at his disposal.

That night I sat in the lobby of the Marriott in downtown D.C. with Ann and another of my consultants, Carmen Spence. Ann received a call on her cell phone, and I could tell by the expression on her face that someone was giving her more bad news. It was Jeb Bush. He had just gotten off the phone with the NRSC chairman, Senator John Cornyn, who informed him that the NRSC would not remain neutral, and would endorse Crist the next day.

Crist declared his candidacy the next day, and within minutes of his announcement, a steady stream of prominent Florida Republicans announced their support for him. For most of that day, it seemed like barely a minute would pass before I received another e mail, text message or phone call informing me of another Crist endorsement. It was a carefully crafted plan to demoralize me. And it worked.

Publicly, I tried to appear unimpressed and undeterred. But privately, I was shaken. I had had a previously scheduled meeting with Senator Cornyn that day. I didn’t see any point in keeping it and told Ann to cancel it. She insisted we go anyway, arguing that they should have to tell me personally why the committee was violating its customary neutrality. We attended the meeting where both Senator Cornyn and his staff explained that the party needed to win the Florida seat without spending a lot of money that was badly needed in other Senate races. They felt Charlie Crist gave them their best chance for an easy victory. The message was pretty clear: they weren’t asking me to get out of the race, but they would do everything they could for Charlie. Not only would I be running against a popular sitting governor, but he would now have the full financial and political support of the Republican Party.

As we were leaving the meeting, I got a phone call from another of my consultants, Heath Thompson, who told me Senator Jim DeMint from South Carolina had asked to meet with me. Given the onslaught of state
and national Republican endorsement announcements for Crist, the fact that any Republican senator wanted to talk to me was shocking. I went to Senator DeMint’s office and was greeted by young staffers who had seen some of my speeches on YouTube and seemed genuinely excited to meet me. I was escorted to the senator’s office, where I gave him my standard pitch about how I could win the nomination. Only Republicans could vote in Florida primaries, and they were typically dominated by the most conservative Republicans in the state. Florida conservatives had never been very fond of Crist, and once they realized they had another choice, they would abandon him and vote for me. I didn’t need to raise as much money as Charlie. I just needed enough to let Florida Republicans know they had a choice in the primary.

Jim was encouraging but noncommittal. He had started a political action committee, the Senate Conservatives Fund, to support conservatives in contested primaries. My campaign fit the bill. I didn’t leave the meeting with his endorsement, but I was a little encouraged by his willingness to discuss the race and consider endorsing me on a day when I felt the entire Republican universe had lined up in opposition to me.

The NRSC endorsement of Charlie Crist would turn out to be a blessing in disguise. It would galvanize conservative support for me, and fury with the Republican establishment for backing Crist. That night, though, I retreated to my hotel room physically and emotionally exhausted. Alone on the road, away from my family, rejected by my party, I was discouraged and depressed. I called Jeanette and we talked for two hours—or, more accurately, I talked while Jeanette listened to me share my disappointment and feel sorry for myself. I wanted to go home.

Had I done so, I think I might have decided to quit the race. Fortunately, I couldn’t. I was scheduled to speak to the South Sarasota Republican Club the next morning. A local supporter, Raul Fernandez, met me at the Ft. Myers airport and drove me to the event. I spent most of the drive on my cell phone trying to prevent the state party from invoking Rule 11. I had no doubt the state party chairman, Jim Greer, would sign the letter. He was Crist’s close friend and supporter. I called our state national committeeman, Paul Senft, and tried to convince him not to sign. But I could tell from the tone of his voice he already had.

Our national committeewoman, Sharon Day, was my last hope. If she signed the letter, the rule would be invoked and my campaign almost certainly would collapse. Seconds after she took my call, Sharon made it abundantly clear she would refuse to sign the letter, and found the whole effort to force me from the race offensive. I had finally caught a break. I didn’t know Sharon all that well at the time and was worried she would eventually cave under pressure from the governor and the party establishment. But she is a formidable person, and she never wavered. Had she signed it, I doubt I would have ever made it to the Senate.

I had dodged a bullet, but the forces arrayed against me were still much on my mind, and demoralizing. As if I needed any further reminders of the odds against me, the steady stream of Crist endorsements continued to dominate the news. I felt besieged by the avalanche of support for Crist—I felt as low as I had ever been in my political career. But I got a bit of a boost at a speech in Venice, Florida. A group of homeschooled kids and their parents met me when I arrived, holding handmade signs supporting me. They had seen a video of my farewell speech to the Florida House and had come to encourage me on their own initiative. They were evidence that there were people out there who were looking for something different in this election. Time would tell if there were enough of them and if I could reach them in time.

After the speech I drove a rental car across the state in time for another event with conservative activists in Ft. Lauderdale. I got home after the kids had gone to bed. It was only Wednesday night, and it had already been a long week. I started early again the next day, leaving home before sunrise to catch a flight to Jacksonville. My brother, Mario, picked me up at the airport and drove me to my lunch with the Republican Women’s Club of Duval Federated. Like at other events I had attended that week, my speech was well received, and the crowd enthusiastic. It finally occurred to me how unaffected regular Republicans were by the Crist steamroller. My audiences seemed excited about my message and genuinely pleased to have a conservative candidate to support.

I didn’t make it home that night until after ten. The next morning I attended an event at my son Anthony’s school. The school year ended before Father’s Day, so the school always organized a father’s breakfast in May. Before breakfast was served, Anthony and his classmates sang several
songs for their fathers. The lyrics of their last song seemed squarely directed at me.

I felt as if God were sending me a message in the sweet voices of three-year-olds. The last five days had been a trial. I had felt forsaken by my party and destined for failure. I had forgotten that I had not been forsaken by the people who mattered—by the family who loved me and the people who believed in me. And I had not been forsaken by my God. I looked down and saw on the table in front of me a laminated paper key chain with a Bible verse.

I carried it with me for the rest of the campaign.

I flew to Tampa after the breakfast for meetings with grassroots activists, an interview with Neil Cavuto on Fox News and a keynote address to the Tampa Republican Hispanic Club. I made the five-hour drive home alone. I had a long time to reflect on everything that had happened that week. I had always been on the political inside looking out—as majority whip, majority leader and speaker of the house. People came to me to ask for my support. Now I was on the outside looking in, and I was the one who needed help. How many times had I been told I had a bright political future? Now the same people who had flattered me had endorsed Charlie Crist and were telling me it was not my time. By every conventional standard, I didn’t stand a chance of winning. I was comparatively unknown. I didn’t have much of a fund-raising network and I was running against a prolific fund-raiser. I had never run a statewide campaign. Crist had won statewide four times in the last ten years. If I lost, I probably wouldn’t have a political future of any kind.

Why would God put me in this position? Why had He given Jeanette such peace of mind when she had always been bothered by the time politics took from our family? None of it made sense to me. But I would not be afraid. On that long drive home, I started to believe that something special was about to happen if I had the courage for it.

I devoted the rest of May and all of June to making the case that my candidacy was viable. I didn’t spend as much time raising money as I should have. We had a growing Internet fund-raising operation, but I wasn’t raising nearly enough money to finance the kind of campaign I needed to run. I didn’t have a broad base of longtime financial supporters like Crist did. I did spend a good amount of time with potential donors, which would pay dividends down the road. But at the time, they barely knew me and just wanted to see if I was a serious candidate.