"Carpetbagger" describes people who move somewhere to run for office. In Southwest Florida, six former congressional hopefuls from other states are taking their shot in this conservative stronghold. Tomorrow is primary day in Florida.
Voters in southwest Florida will decide who should replace Congressman Byron Donalds. He is running for governor. It's considered a safe Republican seat, but the GOP primary has garnered a fair amount of attention.
That is in part because of the 10 Republicans in the primary and only a few of them have local ties. NPR political reporter Maham Javaid joins us to discuss this race. This seems really unusual to me.
Of the 10 candidates in this Republican primary, only a few have local ties. It's a really diverse cast of characters, and most of them aren't actually from Florida. They say they moved to Florida for the weather because they had a family home there or for its conservative values.
But there's a lot of tension between local candidates and those from out of state, and the transplants are being accused of carpetbagging, which is when someone moves to another state for power or influence. SUMMERS: Have the candidates responded to that accusation? I was just in the district and posed that question to several.
Here's how some of them responded when I asked them what they thought of the term. JOHN STRAND: Carpetbagger? I think a lot of people very clearly moved here, it seems like five minutes ago, to run for Byron's seat knowing it was going to be open.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
