The big news in Florida last night? Ben Smith's piece on Bill Clinton's efforts to get Rep. Kendrick Meek to drop out of the Florida Senate race and endorse professional windsock Charlie Crist in a last-ditch attempt to stop conservative favorite Marco Rubio from winning the state's open Senate seat. While Meek had hoped to capitalize on Crist's political shifts to garner the majority of the Democratic vote, he lacked the money and the message to overcome Crist's long history in the state. Meek's campaign said the article is not true and that he's pressing on with his campaign.
There are a lot of complex dynamics at play here, and I'd recommend Marc Ambinder's analysis as a good starting point to understand what's going on. It doesn't appear that this was White House-driven, although Crist says he spoke to White House staff about the conversations. Most likely, this impetus to act on the idea of Meek endorsing Crist -- an idea that has been floating around for months and months -- burbled up among the New York Democratic operatives who orbit Crist and Clinton. Ambinder is wise to tag consultant Josh Isay as a player in this mess.
Meek endorsing Crist seems outlandish after the Democrat has spent so long attacking him not just as untrustworthy but also extremely conservative, thanks to Crist's attempts to brand himself one during his erstwhile primary battle with Rubio. For Meek to endorse would be a much bigger shift than the typical post-primary "Sure, I said he wouldn't be ready for 3 a.m. calls, but I got him an alarm clock and you should vote for him because we're all in the same party." Meek has been making the argument that Crist and Rubio represent the same Republican ideas for months now; to publicly change his mind now might be devastating for his political career, which is not in good shape as it is.
Dems hope Meek's campaign can help boost turnout for Alex Sink in the governor's race, which is of vital importance to their party. Michael Steele has already suggested, as is his role, that Democrats are sending a "chilling signal" to African American voters with the episode. Relatedly, some Florida political insiders will say -- anonymously -- that Meek's race has played a role in his stagnant campaign. Florida hasn't elected a black politician statewide since Reconstruction.
Would a Meek decision to endorse Crist have been better for the Democrats? Even as pragmatic as I am, it seems impossible to trust the transparently ambitious politician with the Senate majority on the line. There's little to stop him, once elected, from caucusing with the Republicans as an independent, especially if the majority hangs in the balance.
Crist's camp leaking this story now is also a sign of desperation. Whatever they expected to accomplish -- tarnishing Meek in his last days of the campaign, maybe forcing him to endorse -- wouldn't have been enough to push Crist over the line. The governor is ending his campaign for Senate the way he began it: Not a Republican, not a Democrat, but a Cristocrat.
-- Tim Fernholz
