Allen West for Florida governor? Stranger things have happened
theGRIO REPORT - When Allen West lost his congressional seat to a 29-year-old newcomer, many Florida watchers wrote his political obituary....
This post has been updated.
When Allen West lost his congressional seat to a 29-year-old newcomer, many Florida watchers wrote his political obituary.
The Tea Party favorite, who developed a reputation for outrageous comments and far-right politics, was, at one point, one of just two black Republican members of Congress (the other, Tim Scott of South Carolina, has since been promoted to United States senator, thanks to the retirement of Jim DeMint and a tap from that state’s governor, Nikki Haley.) He ran for office in 2010 after a failed attempt to unseat the Democrat in the 22nd district, but succeeded his second time around thanks to a national Republican wave fueled by opposition to President Barack Obama’s push for universal health care.
“Obamacare,” as the Affordable Care Act was called by Republican opponents, has since become the law of the land, cemented by a Supreme Court decision, and growing in popularity, such that the term is now coined by Democrats as well. Some of its staunchest opponents, like Florida Gov. Rick Scott, who made a name for himself by creating a PAC to specifically oppose health care reform, have relented. Scott recently announced that he would accept the Affordable Care Act’s expansion of Medicaid in Florida, something the Supreme Court ruled was optional for states.
Scott’s reasoning, like that of other swing state governors, was that the 100 percent federal reimbursement for adding people earning up to 135 percent of the poverty rate for the first five years was worth it, especially for states like Florida, that have large uninsured and elderly populations. Scott’s decision infuriated Tea Partiers in the state, who had backed him in 2010. He has since been rebuffed by the state’s Republican-dominated legislature, which has signaled they won’t go along with Scott’s decision to accept Obamacare money for Medicaid expansion.
And now, West has weighed in, telling the Tampa Bay Times‘ senior political reporter Adam Smith that Scott’s reversal has made him “vulnerable,” as he faces re-election in 2014.
“I think when you say you’re gong to stand up to something then you kind of back off … but there are other Republican governors who did the same thing. It’s kind of making people question, ‘Really, where is your backbone?'” West told Smith last Friday. “Me, I would not have gone for that Medicaid expansion. And according to the Supreme Court decision, it was not something you were mandated to do.”
