Warning: This is a column about pearl clutching. I’m the one doing it.
Like so many others, I hold Sept. 11 as a sacred day. My family is from the City. I lived in New York. I remember Sept. 12, when this was briefly one country, and that America is unrecognizable from the one we live in now. This year, on the 25th anniversary, it mattered more than ever.
I’ve also come around, reluctantly, to an ugly argument: al-Qaida won. The 9/11 Commission put the plot’s cost at $400,000 to $500,000. Box cutters and plane tickets. The last quarter century of American political history has been a disaster, and it began when two jets slammed into the Twin Towers. The New Arab’s Hesham Gaafar made the case again Friday. I increasingly think he’s right.
So I hold the line. Florida Politics did its best to keep campaign coverage off the site until Saturday. Fabrizio Gowdy compiled how cities and counties marked the day. My X feed was 9/11 and nothing else.
Not everyone has to do this. The world moves on. I get it.
What I’ve spent a couple of years shaming campaigns for is the campaign logo on a somber image. Memorial Day, D-Day, Veterans Day, 9/11. Not because of me, but campaigns have adjusted. Most officials now post a name and an office, without the “for.” Friday, nobody put a campaign logo over the Twin Towers.
One of the exceptions was state Rep. Angie Nixon, the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, who framed her statement as “U.S. Senate Candidate Angie Nixon Reflects on the 25th Anniversary of 9/11” and ran her campaign logo under it. It wasn’t as bad as what I’ve seen in past years, but she didn’t need to do it. “State Rep. Angie Nixon” would have worked.
Then there was the AI slop I was dreading. Rep. Chip LaMarca‘s post for a first responder event in Fort Lauderdale made LaMarca, smiling, the dominant image, with the Twin Towers and the city skyline arranged around him. LaMarca says the organizers provided the graphic. Fair enough. Maybe that one is me being too vigilant.
But there is no such excuse for Gov. Ron DeSantis.
At 3:11 p.m. Friday, the Governor endorsed Rep. Alex Rizo for Senate District 39. A state Senate endorsement, on 9/11, for a Special Election DeSantis himself hasn’t called.
There was no deadline. Monday was right there.
DeSantis is a Navy veteran who deployed to Iraq. He has bona fides on service that I don’t. That is what makes it inexplicable. As one person put it to me, this is the worst of DeSantis. The guy who walks into an event, eats with his hands, throws down the napkin, and leaves.
Senate President-designate Jim Boyd and Sen. Jay Trumbull endorsed Rizo the same day. I don’t blame them, or Rizo. Clearly a political move was made here, and it was the Governor’s. But, gentlemen, a word. For the last five years, Florida politics has had to operate around the selfishness of Ron DeSantis. This is probably his last state Senate endorsement as Governor. You all can reset it. The next time someone says it has to go out today, and today feels wrong, say no.
It’s one day a year. Everything else can wait until the 12th.
