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The words “sexual predator” would be stamped on the driver’s licenses of sexual predators under bill language that was approved in the Florida House. The language was attached Friday to a bill that deals with a number of Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles issues. Democratic Rep. Gwyndolen Clarke-Reed pointed out that would mean department store clerks checking licenses for a credit card application would see that the person across the counter would be a sexual predator. Republican Rep.…

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For Dan Brown, seeing the globs of orange and brown oil that washed up along the Florida Panhandle’s 58 miles of protected national park beaches four years ago was like a punch in the stomach. But now, those beaches are clean and Brown, the superintendent of Gulf Islands National Seashore, is celebrating the park’s resiliency with a kayak trip from one end to the other. Community leaders and residents joined Brown for parts of his journey around the seashore that…

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Two Florida lawmakers motivated by Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder Yasiel Puig’s dangerous escape from Cuba are trying to change the way Major League Baseball treats Cuban players and are willing to tie state money for stadiums to the issue. Reps. Jose Felix Diaz and Matt Gaetz are filing an amendment to a stadium funding bill that would require the Miami Marlins and Tampa Bay Rays demand Major League Baseball change its Cuban player policy if they want state money for stadium construction or renovations. “We are enlisting the Marlins…

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John Paul Stevens says he thinks it’s appropriate for Supreme Court justices to factor in political considerations when weighing a decision to retire. “I think certainly it’s natural and an appropriate thing to think about your successor,” the retired justice told ABC’s “This Week” in an interview aired Sunday. Stevens was nominated by Republican President Gerald Ford. He joined the court in 1975 and retired in 2010, at 90. Stevens was asked about speculation that 81-year-old Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg…

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The House Republican campaign committee raised almost $10 million in March and has $31.2 million banked to defend the party’s majority, according to financial reports filed Sunday. The National Republican Congressional Committee’s $21.2 million fundraising haul in January, February and March gave the group its best first-quarter showing since 2003. It also puts the committee roughly $8 million ahead of its fundraising at this point in 2012. Still, the GOP committee faces a well-funded challenge from House Democrats, who amassed…

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A surge of eleventh-hour enrollments has improved the outlook for President Barack Obama’s health care law, with more people signing up overall and a much-needed spark of interest among young adults. Nonetheless, Obama’s announcement Thursday that 8 million have signed up for subsidized private insurance, and that 35 percent of them are younger than 35, is just a peek at what might be going on with the nation’s newest social program. Still to be announced is what share of those…

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Florida Gov. Rick Scott along with former governors Jeb Bush and Bob Martinez are calling on legislators to pass a tuition break to students who entered the country illegally. The three Republicans put out a joint statement Friday. The push from Scott comes a day after a key Republican state senator used a procedural move to block the legislation from being heard next week in a Senate committee. Sen. Joe Negron of Stuart said the break should only go to…

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