David Jolly, Carlos Lopez-Cantera and Ron DeSantis all mentioned they are fed up with how Republicans in Washington have been doing — or not doing — their jobs while appearing at the Republican Party of Florida’s summer quarterly meeting this past weekend in Tampa.
“There are millions of Republican voters throughout the country who are demoralized, depressed and dejected about what’s happened since we took over the Senate in November,” DeSantis told FP in an interview.
“I’ve been here getting things done here in Florida, ” Lopez-Cantera said in a speech on Saturday, referring to how he helped cut taxes and deregulate the government. “Whereas in Washington, we only hear complaints about it.”
And in his speech before hundreds of state Republicans, Jolly boasted that he was a Florida Republican, not a Washington Republican, and blasted “Washington math” in referring to how he was in a minority of House Republicans to oppose their own budget because it added hundreds of millions of dollars to the deficit.
Kathy Castor says she gets it.
The Tampa Bay area U.S. representative often bashes the John Boehner led-House of Representatives, and she says dissatisfaction with Congress is universal, though she’s not talking about her fellow Democrats, now in the minority in the House and Senate.
“The Republican Congress is stuck in a rut,” she said on Monday. “They’ve got the country stuck in a rut. We can’t raise wages, they stopped the mininum wage increase. They stopped progress on comprehensive immigration reform that’s common sense. It looks like we’re going to have another budget battle and possible government shutdown over what? Because of women’s health issues and Planned Parenhood? So I agree with folks who say what the heck are Repubilcans doing in Washington?”
On other issues, Castor said that she was somewhat sympathetic to the complaints by Martin O’Malley and Bernie Sanders that there may be as few as just four debates between the Democratic candidates in the next few months.
When told that the Democrats had 27 such debates in 2007-2008, Castor admitted that the Obama-Clinton battle was exciting and did generate huge interest. “So yeah, it would be healthy to have additional debates.”
Castor says that Vice President Joe Biden and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have worked as close allies over the years, so she doubts that the VP will enter the Democratic race.
“I have such great respect for both,” she says when asked who she’s supporting in the race. But she appears to be leaning toward Clinton. “I’m inspired by her service to the country, what she’s talking about when it comes to student loans, helping students, helping famiiles, when it comes to family leave she’s an expert. I’m hopeful, I look foward to the debate, because the Republicans are so wrong on those issues,” she said, referring to interest rates on student loans, workplace leave issues and the minimum wage.
Castor has yet to weigh in on the nuclear deal between the P5 +1 countries and Iran that Congress will weigh in on next month, and says she will announce her decision by the end of this week.
However, if you were a betting man, consider that Castor was among the 150 House Democrats who signed a letter back in May supporting President Obama’s framework for a nuclear deal with Iran. To this point, none of those Democrats have come out against the deal.
