2010 General Election Update

The 2010 election results are in, and winners in key Florida cabinet races include: Rick Scott (R) for Governor; Pam Bondi (R) for Attorney General; Jeff Atwater (R) for Chief Financial Officer; and Adam Putnam (R) for Commissioner of Agriculture.
At the federal level, Marco Rubio (R) handily won the race for Florida's U.S. Senate seat. Florida Republicans picked up four seats in Congress, helping to shift the balance of power to a GOP-controlled U.S. House. Long term care providers lost a strong advocate, Cong. Ron Klein (D), in Fort Lauderdale. However, Cong. Kathy Castor (D), a strong supporter of our issues, was re-elected, and David Rivera (R), another supporter at the statewide level, will head to Washington to represent a Miami district in Congress.

In the Florida Legislature, FHCA Associate Member Shawn Harrison (R) was elected to represent House District 60, which is good news. Overall, the Republicans picked up two additional Senate seats, changing the current Senate makeup from 26 Republicans and 14 Democrats to 28 Republicans and 12 Democrats. On the House side, the current makeup of 76 Republicans and 44 Democrats will change to 81 Republicans and 39 Democrats. As a result, on both the House and Senate side, Democrats will not be able to procedurally block any efforts by the Republican leadership. In addition, Republicans will have a veto override majority if they stick together.

For the constitutional amendments, Amendment 4, Hometown Democracy, was defeated. This is good news for long term care providers as it would have led to an undue burden for nursing homes and other businesses seeking to expand their facilities. Voters decided to keep the class size requirement the same and rejected Amendment 8, as well as Amendment 1, while Amendments 2, 5 and 6 passed.

For a complete list of all the election results, click here.