Last time Rick Scott picked Jennifer Carroll, the attractive-black-PR specialist-state representative-Navy vet-Aunt Tom, as his running mate. Maybe it fooled enough folks in an electorate that ultimately stuck us with Scott.
Now what’s a lieutenant governor-less governor to do as next year’s re-election approaches? Will he perceive the need for another blatant, pandering act of ticket-balancing? If so, Scott has undoubtedly noticed who’s already filed fundraising papers to seek the Republican Party nomination in 2014. Among them: Sarasota businesswoman Elizabeth Cuevas-Neunder. She is also president of the Puerto Rican Chamber of Commerce of Florida.
It’s a given that the GOP needs to make inroads into the Hispanic vote, and Florida’s fastest growing Hispanic community is Puerto Rican. Scott was willing to make Carroll the first black elected to statewide office since Reconstruction. Might there be a Latina sequel for a governor still trying to combat a less-than-inclusive image?