The unfolding fall of the Florida GOP

Jim Greer, disgraced ex-Republican Part of Florida chairman, was arrested today, apparently on four counts of grand theft, one of money laundering and one of attempted fraud. The details are unfolding, but I suspect the political ramifications are enormous. I've linked to the Orlando Sentinel, as Greer lives in Oviedo and the paper seems to have the most up-to-date info.

Every race in the state could be tainted by this, but it is especially bad news for Charlie Crist and Bill McCollum.

In the Senate race: Crist hand-picked Greer for this job, and when the shady workings of the party led to Greer's ouster in January, it fed the dirty insider narrative that was hurting Crist in the Republican primary with Marco Rubio. Crist seemed to shake that taint effectively when he became an independent. I mean, how much more outsider is that, right? He doesn't even have a party. You can't be an insider without a party. But you can still be corrupt. But back that, only Republicans in Florida were paying attention to the particulars. The primary was just a circus act for most of Florida. Now, I expect Rubio will spin this to tell all Floridians this is why Crist was driven from the GOP, not some overly stringent litmus test. Kendrick Meek, meanwhile, will be casting blame on the Republican culture of corruption, including Crist. The governor can only spin and hope this falls out of memory by election day. Meek is the most isolated of the three candidates from this scandal, as both Crist and Rubio were among those with credit card charges in the GOP records. Still, I think Rubio will get the immediate bump here as the "clean" Republican in the race, especially since Greer was such a strong Crist supporter.

In the Governor race: McCollum has been hammered for months by the Florida Democratic Party for stalling on a criminal investigation into the party. He, like Crist, was one of the officials who had expenditures released when credit card records went public, but that wasn't so excessive to cause much political woe. However, the fact he ignored calls for some time to start a criminal probe becomes a very big deal now that the probe has found cause for criminal charges. Alex Sink will jump on this news, and the FDP will jump harder. This is a dream for the Democrats. I predict that in a week or so, we will see the first poll come out where Sink leads McCollum in the governor's race.

The Republicans were wise to toss Greer earlier this year or this would be a much more damaging issue for the party. Nevertheless, this is a problem that will keep on growing through election day. The story today is Greer's arrest. Tomorrow it will be a list of formal charges. Then we get plea negotiations, or worse, a trial. Either way, this tale will be months in the telling, and every bit of news that comes out will hurt the GOP.

It is amazing to believe that four years ago, the Florida Democratic Party was in shambles, and the GOP boasted every Cabinet post and mega-majorities in both houses of the Legislature. The FDP since then has brought on Karen Thurman, the most successful party chair in a decade, and the RPOF has gone into crisis and chaos mode. At the start of these credit card scandals, I thought this would mostly be an intra-party conflict that mostly served to embarrass Republicans. Now, I think it could be a watershed moment that finally swings momentum in favor of Democrats for the first time in more than a decade.