Donalds won't say if he stands by his record in Legislature
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U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.) speaks during a Leadership Forum on Sept. 1 in Tampa. Photo: Joe Raedle/Getty Images
U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds is the only candidate in the governor's race with a record in state government. But if you're looking to it for a preview of how he'd govern Florida today, you'll come up short.
Why it matters: Donalds hasn't changed his political affiliation like his opponent, Democratic nominee David Jolly, but that doesn't mean he hasn't changed positions.
- The portrait his campaign paints is sometimes at odds with the Donalds who left Tallahassee for Washington, D.C.
Zoom in: In 2017, long before Donalds vowed to make Florida the "most transparent" government in America, he filed a bill that critics said would have rendered the state's Sunshine Law "meaningless."
- The then-freshman state lawmaker sought to allow two members of a local board or commission to meet privately to discuss official business without public notice or a record of the meeting.
- Donalds argued that local officials should operate under the same rules as state lawmakers. The First Amendment Foundation, however, panned the bill, and it died in the state House.
He also championed legislation in 2019 to raise the state's felony theft threshold from $300 to $1,000, a proposal his Republican rivals later seized on to paint him as soft on crime, calling it "pro-shoplifting."
- Donalds' bill went nowhere, but his idea did. Florida later raised the threshold to $750 through legislation he co-introduced.
- He also twice unsuccessfully sought to let judges impose sentences below mandatory minimums for drug trafficking defendants with no serious criminal history who cooperated with prosecutors.
Friction point: Asked whether he still stands by his public records legislation or the criminal justice reforms he championed in the Legislature, Donalds did not answer.
- Gates McGavick, communications director for Donalds' campaign, instead told Axios that he "will put affordability, accountability, and public safety front and center in his administration."
- "That's why he's endorsed by 58 Florida sheriffs and the Florida Police Chiefs' Association," McGavick added.