Politics

In Tallahassee, a series of proposals to repair the state election system is finding broad support in the Legislature that many say broke the voting process two years ago.

A Senate bill instituting one of the reforms proposed by Secretary of State  Ken Detzner has already been filed and there are clear signals from a House elections subcommittee that it will prepare a bill to launch the rest of them.

TALLAHASSEE -- Federal health officials have approved a key part of Florida's effort to transform its Medicaid program, clearing the way for tens of thousands of seniors across the state to move into managed-care plans.

Number crunching by a Florida university professor has led to an odd conspiracy theory about the Florida House of Representatives.

Not that Prof. Mark Soskin actually subscribes to the theory himself. As you hear on TV a lot, he's just sayin'.

On the Florida Roundup: New immigration reform proposals are put on the table in Washington. How could a path to citizenship be traveled in immigrant-rich South Florida?   Plus we get the latest update on the FBI raid of a West Palm Beach eye doctor with connections with U.S. Senator Bob Menendez, a sponsor of a bipartisan immigration reform plan.

TALLAHASSEE -- Gov. Rick Scott unveiled a record-breaking $74.2 billion budget Thursday, pouring hundreds of millions of additional dollars into public schools, colleges and universities in a proposal that Democrats knocked as a public-relations gimmick.

U. S. Sen. Marco Rubio's leadership in the movement to reform American immigration policy has complicated his once-cozy relationship with the conservative organization formerly known as the Tea Party.

The state Legislature, perhaps more than Congress, passes laws that have a direct impact on the day-to-day life of a Floridian: how much you pay in sales tax, how much time you have to vote, how you obtain a gun.

Tallahassee is in our lives every day. It's only 480 miles away. And yet, for many in South Florida, it might as well be on another continent. 

Florida is one of only 11 states that does not prohibit texting while driving.  Though state legislators have already introduced 3 texting ban bills for the upcoming session, similar bills have failed in the past several years. 

American medical students who get their diplomas in Cuba could forget about practicing in Florida if legislative bills filed by two Hialeah Republicans are passed this session.

State Rep. Manny Diaz Jr. said Americans who overlook human and civil rights abuses just to get a cheap medical degree lack the "moral clarity to serve patients in Florida."

The Senate bill, SB 456, was filed by State Sen. Rene Garcia.

A determined Palm Beach County teenager is gaining ground on a big goal -- stopping people from smoking at Florida's beaches and public parks.

Caitlyn Johnston's campaign caught the eye of State. Rep. Bill Hager, R-Boca Raton, who filed a bill (HB 439) giving cities and counties the power to ban smoking on their own public lands.

Politics can be quite the poetic muse - especially statehouse politics, it turns out.

We recently challenged members of the Public Insight Network to write about politics in the Sunshine State - in a limerick.*