Three state senators say that the decades-long Democratic dominance of Broward Public Defender and State Attorney campaigns should end.
That’s not their goal. But that is what will happen if they pass their bill to make state attorney and public defender elections nonpartisan.
In Broward, where snow is more likely than a non-Democrat winning either courthouse job, the bill’s passage would mean Republicans and independents would finally be guaranteed a real say in who should be the Public Defender and State Attorney. Since the mid-1970s when Democratic retirees first grabbed control of the county’s politics, those races have been decided in the Democratic primary usually disenfranchising Republicans and independents.
The bill stems from last year’s bitter Jacksonville campaigns for state attorney and public defender, races that were decided in the Republican primary. Most of Jacksonville’s blacks – only roughly 4 percent are Republican — could not vote for the winner.
