Jason Pizzo, the Florida Senate minority leader, announced Thursday that he will leave the Democrats and will soon step down from his position.
Pizzo has been a member of the Florida Senate since 2018. I said During his speech on the Senate floor,The Democrats in Florida are dead. ” He added that he mailed the voter registration form to switch his party affiliation to “no party affiliation.”
Miami area lawmakers argued that Florida’s political system resembles the “declination of civil war, power struggle, corruption and the decline of citizen virtues that permeated and ultimately arrived in the collapse of Rome.”
“So we’re our players, or props, amidst the partisan chaos at the bottom,” Pizzo added between him. speech. “Our constituents crave practical leaders, not political hacking.”
“The party my father volunteered for JFK in 1960 when he was 18 years old is not the party he is today,” the senator continued, referring to the Democrats. “It longs for disorder, screams, then demands pardon. It’s not okay.”
Florida state Sen. Lori Berman was elected as the new minority leader of the Florida Senate shortly after Pizzo’s announcement, Florida politics It has been reported.
Florida Democratic Party Chairman Nikki Fried said statement On Thursday, in response to Pizzo’s announcement that the party “becomes more united without him.”
“Jason Pizzo is one of the most effective and unpopular Democratic leaders in recent memory, and his resignation is one of the best things to happen to the party over the years,” Fried wrote in a statement. (Related: DNC Discord – Chairperson relies on David Hogg’s major incumbent home plans)
Pizzo’s decision to leave the Democrats continues for several months Speculation He may continue to succeed after Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has been in office since he is seeking re-election, starting his governor’s bid in 2026.
“Senator Pizzo didn’t leave Democrats. The party left him,” said Evan Power, chairman of the Republican Party in Florida. statement Thursday. “Senator Pizzo is Florida’s third Democrat to leave the party in the past few months.”
In December, two representatives from Florida, Hilary Cassel and Susan Valdez, They announced they had switched party affiliations to GOP, increasing the majority of Republicans on the Capitol.
Florida was in a hotly contested swing state Inside Over the past decade, President Donald Trump has won the state in the past three presidential elections. In the 2016 presidential election, Trump won Sunshine State with less than two points protection 48.6% of Florida’s votes compared to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s 47.4%.
Trump in 2020 notch 51.2% of votes in Florida, while former President Joe Biden secured 47.9%.
Trump has particularly expanded his margins in Florida in the 2024 presidential election. Receive 56.1% of former Vice President Kamala Harris voted for 43%. president It will be carried After losing seven people in 2020 in 2024, Pizzo’s hometown in Miami-Dade scored 11% points in 2024. He scored an 18-point swing and made him his first Republican since 1988.
Pizzo did not respond to a request for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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