Chiles Announces Losing Campaign

Now the question is how many candidates will lose because of this.

"Bud" Chiles, son of the late Gov. Lawton Chiles, announced today he will run for governor as an independent. This is very bad news for the Alex Sink campaign, as the Democrat has the potential to spoil her rising campaign. I am personally disappointed in Chiles and feel this is a dangerous stunt with no chance at success.

But didn't this very blog predict Charlie Crist would win the Senate race despite a candidacy with no party affiliation? Yes, but there are enormous differences between Chiles and Crist. Chiles holds no elected office, and no standing statewide political operation in place. Crist makes headlines every day he signs or vetoes a bill, but Chiles has little chance of making the news on his own beyond today. He will be relegated to a paragraph at the bottom of certain news stories, if that. Chiles also is no Rick Scott and isn't ready to drop millions in personal wealth on a likely-losing campaign. He carries his father's legal name and broad business connections from his activism from his work on Worst to First and the Lawton Chiles Foundation, but neither of those carry much weight with the typical Florida voter, and running as an independent means the benefits those connections do bring mean a great deal less.

I would like to have seen Chiles run as a Democrat, not because I prefer him over Sink, but because it would have raised the profile of the party primary. A healthy primary contest would produce a better candidate for the general election regardless of who came out victorious. In the meantime, it would grab headlines to duel with the McCollum-Scott circus act playing out in Florida media right now. What I worry about is that Chiles will act as Ralph Nader in this campaign. Without Nader's Green party candidacy, Al Gore almost certainly would have won Florida in 2000, likely by a recount-free margin, and we would have been spared the W. years.
Especially with the Crist campaign in full swing, Chiles is going to pick up some left-leaning independents in the general election this year and may deliver victory to McCollum.

While Sink has been trailing in the polls, I always felt confident she would win this race. But I don't kid myself into believing it will be easy. Sink is the only person holding statewide office in Florida right now to have won her first statewide election, but McCollum did win one the same year, and he has run two other statewide campaigns in the past. Most agree this will be a tough year for Democrats, though I personally think that matters less with open seats. I also believe Sink realizes this is a tougher race than CFO. She knows too well what happened when her husband Bill McBride ran for governor in 2002 and got trounced. I still recall him telling me at a Daily Commercial editorial board meeting how he believed beating Jeb Bush would be easy once he knocked Janet Reno out in the primary and carried the aura of a winner. I knew then he would be in trouble come November. Sink will not make the same mistake and underestimate the Republican machine.

But Chiles clearly has if he believes he has a shot to win. As an indy, Chiles will either be an also-ran who takes less than 3 percent of the vote or a serious spoiler who ends up in the teens come Election Day. Either way, those votes may be enough to sink Sink.

Chiles has until June 18 to change his mind and run as a Democrat or get out. Let's cross our fingers.