A Florida State Consultant has grow to be the most recent disaffected Democrat to hitch the Republican Social gathering.
Susan Valdes, a Cuban-American who lately gained re-election in her constituency in West Tampa, wrote in a submit on the X platform that she felt ignored by the Democratic caucus and that solely by becoming a member of the Republican Social gathering may she get her concepts throughout.
She defined:
I’ve spent my grownup life combating to present a voice to the individuals of my West Tampa house. I’ve finished in order a Democrat partly out of behavior – I come from a household of Democrats – and partly as a result of I believed the Democrats had been the occasion most involved with the working households I symbolize.
Within the Home, I’ve lengthy recognized that nobody has a monopoly on good concepts. I cannot waste my closing two years within the Florida Legislature being ignored in a caucus whose management expects me to disregard the wants of my neighborhood.
Efficient instantly, I’ll change my registration from a Democrat to Republican and can be part of the Republican Convention within the Florida Home of Representatives. Our Speaker, Rep. Daniel Perez, has laid out a imaginative and prescient for the Home that focuses on empowering Home members to work on actual issues going through our communities.
That’s what I need to be part of. I need to roll up my sleeves and work. I need to be part of fixing issues for West Tampa. I’m bored with being the occasion of protesting once I obtained into politics to be a part of the occasion of progress. I do know that I gained’t agree with my fellow Republican Home members on each situation, however I do know that of their caucus, I can be welcomed and handled with respect.
I like my neighborhood, and I’ll proceed to battle every single day to profit the individuals of West Tampa, Hillsborough County, and the state of Florida. And in my coronary heart, I do know the easiest way to try this is to face with Speaker Perez and be part of the Republican supermajority within the Florida Home of Representatives.
See assertion beneath… pic.twitter.com/JUVhsziSL7
— Susan L. Valdés (@SusanLValdesFL) December 9, 2024
Based on the Tampa Bay Times, Valdes’s defection is all of the extra stunning on condition that she lately ran for a place inside the native occasion:
Democrats have bother at occasions maintaining their members from voting with the Republican majority in Tallahassee. As a result of Republican leaders management the price range, there’s a powerful incentive for particular person members to toe the Republican line to convey a reimbursement to their districts.
However there was little indication Valdés was considering such a transfer till Monday. She ran to be the Hillsborough County Democratic Government Committee chairperson earlier this month. She attended a Kamala Harris debate watch occasion in September at a gathering of Hillsborough County Democrats, and he or she’s posted quite a few occasions to X concerning the risks of Donald Trump’s coverage platform — notably with regards to immigration.
In addition to holding the governorship and each Senate seats, Valdes’s swap expands the GOP supermajority that already exists throughout each legislative chambers.
Her defections implies that Republicans now 86 of the 120 avaliable seats inside the Florida Home of Representatives. They maintain 28 out of the 40 avaliable seats within the State Senate, which additionally surpasses the supermajority threshold.