BREAKING: United Teachers of Dade will remain the union representing teachers in Miami Dade schools. They received 83% of the vote among teachers in the district. The election was called after a conservative group came in and tried to decertify the union. @CBSMiami The Miami Dade Education Coalition, the group financed by the conservative, anti-union Freedom Foundation, received just 14% of the vote. Three percent of teachers voted for no union at all.

Tonight’s @60Minutes report on the systemic fraud committed by insurance companies in Florida is infuriating for several reasons. Beyond the fraud itself - which is spectacular- you have to ask why isn’t @GovRonDeSantis and @AGAshleyMoody doing something - anything - about it?

https://twitter.com/60minutes/status/1840537632553480263

It’s also apparent the Legislature went too far in recent years protecting insurance companies from lawsuits by homeowners. The companies are using those laws to help them commit fraud.
The failure of @GovRonDeSantis and @AGAshleyMoody to protect Floridians is staggering.

On this Fourth of July, I have two books to recommend. “How Democracies Die” by @levitsky2 and @dziblatt and “Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present” by @ruthbenghiat. Americans can not assume that because we’ve been a democracy for 248 years we will always be one.
And in most cases the move from a democracy to an authoritarian regime is not through violent coup but with the gradual loss of liberty at the direction of a charismatic leader.

In November there will be two FL Supreme Court (@flcourts) justices on the ballot - Justice Renatha Francis and Justice Meredith Sasso.
They were both recently appointed to the court by Governor DeSantis, so voters will now decide if they should remain on the court. 1/x Interestingly, both Renatha Francis and Meredith Sasso voted against having abortion on the ballot at the same time voters will decide if they will be retained.
And they both voted against having recreational marijuana on the ballot as well.
Is that a coincidence? Perhaps. 2/x

A few observations about today’s FL Supreme Court abortion decisions.
Justices voted 4-3 to allowed the amendment on the ballot in November. The three voting against were the three women DeSantis appointed: Justices Jamie Grosshans, Meredith Sasso and Renatha Francis.
@CBSMiami Those three women are the newest and the youngest members of the court and reveals in stark terms the extreme rightward trajectory of the court by DeSantis for years to come.
BTW, they also voted to uphold the 15-week abortion ban and the 6-week abortion ban in 30 days.

Here is my interview this morning with Dr. Scott Rivkees.
In the past few weeks, more people have died from COVID in Florida than any other state in the country - including California, New York and Texas.
Florida also leads in hospitalizations with 3,500 being admitted weekly.

https://twitter.com/cbsmiami/status/1705966066533540049

Here are the numbers. About 800 people a week are dying of COVID and Florida accounts for more than 100 of those each week.
For the weeks of August 26 and Sept. 2 the total deaths were:
Florida (pop 22M) 248
California (pop 39M) 197
New York (pop 19.6M) 112
Texas (pop 30M) 87

This was the portion of my interview with Marco Rubio in August 2022 dealing with former Congressman David Rivera, who was indicted by federal authorities for allegedly representing the Venezuelan government without registering in a secret $50 million contract. @CBSMiami There are no allegations of wrongdoing by Rubio but his answers appear to be in conflict with the indictment particularly when he told me, "We've worked closely, but not on this."
And: "That has nothing to do with me."
The indictment shows otherwise. @CBSMiami

Breaking: @CBSMiami has learned Florida Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran will step down at the end of April. No plans on what he will do next.
No replacement has been announced but @SenMannyDiazJr is believed to be at the top of @GovRonDeSantis’s list The move by Corcoran has been anticipated. The likelihood that @SenMannyDiazJr will be in line to take over Department of Education has created a domino effect with Republicans getting ready to run for Diaz’s Hialeah seat. @CBSMiami

It is 3:10 pm and the Senate has been in session for five hours and State Senator Ileana Garcia is nowhere to be found.
Garcia was widely ridiculed over the last 24 hours for her speech yesterday on the Don’t Say Gay bill in which she said being gay is “not a permanent thing.” Last night on @BravoTV @Andy Cohen called out Ileana Garcia by name.

https://twitter.com/bravowwhl/status/1501407263621275655

STUNNING NEW DETAILS IN ROSENBERG RESIGNATION:
Rosenberg subjected the woman to unwanted sexual advances for months, starting in October 2021. Rosenberg repeatedly expressed his desire to have a romantic relationship with her, even promising to take care of her. @CBSMiami 1/X When the overtures were first made, according to a source briefed on the investigation, the woman told Rosenberg she was not interested in a physical or romantic relationship with him. He reportedly apologized and promised not to bring the matter up again. @CBSMiami 2/X

BREAKING: Mark Rosenberg, who abruptly resigned as the president of @FIU Friday, acknowledged he stepped down because “I caused discomfort for a valued employee.”

“I unintentionally created emotional (not physical) entanglement,” Rosendberg said in a statement. @CBSMiami 1/x Rosenberg’s resignation followed a complaint filed against him alleging sexual harassment, a source briefed on the matter told @CBSMiami, adding: “There is an internal massive investigation into this. At a minimum there are text messages and other forms of communication." 2/X

BREAKING: An emergency meeting for the FIU board of trustees is being called for 4 pm where @FIU President Mark Rosenberg is expected to announce his immediate resignation, according to sources. This move comes as a surprise. No reason for why Rosenberg is out. @CBSMiami The @FIU Board of Trustees will consider a recommendation to name the school’s Chief Financial Officer the interim President.
The question remains: What happened that caused President Rosenberg to resign? A source said this was a forced resignation. @CBSMiami

Good morning from I95 in Virginia @CBSMiami An update from I95

Two days ago I mentioned on Twitter how there were too many politicians - especially county commissioners - at the Surfside press conferences.
The next day I reported that the Commission Chairman @CommishDiaz was attempting to hold "sunshine" meetings at the site 1/x @CBSMiami Since then I have been receiving calls from county officials questioning - in more serious terms - what @CommishDiaz is doing.
The first thing to make clear is that Pepe Diaz has absolutely no role at the site. He is in charge of nothing. 2/x @CBSMiami

According to @MDCElections, as of 11 am 64K have voted today.
Elections is expecting a turnout today of around 200K, which would make the vote total in Miami-Dade 1.2 million (out of 1.5 Million registered voters)
That's an 80% turnout.
In 2016 turnout was 72%
@CBSMiami The record turnout in Miami-Dade was 73% in 2004.
We are on track to shatter that old record.
Here is a snapshot of who has voted so far today (taken just before 11 am - that's why it doesn't add up to 64K)

Dems 20,976
Rep 19,613
NPA/Other 19,877

@CBSMiami
@CBSNews

Did @ArianaGrande take down Florida's voter registration site Monday?

At 3 pm, Grande tweeted to her 77M followers this tweet urging her "fellow Floridians" to register, noting Florida "has the potential of swaying the election."

https://twitter.com/ArianaGrande/status/1313194940357246978?s=20

@CBSMiami @CBSNews The state then saw a spike of 1.1 million attempts an hour crashing the system.

While state was trying to determine if they were being attacked by Russia - reporters, politicians and others tried logging on see if the site was down, adding to the problem
@CBSMiami @CBSPolitics

ATTENTION SECRETARY OF STATE LAUREL LEE:
The deadline to register to vote in Florida is midnight, however the online site is not working. Apparently only certain browsers work. I have been getting error messages using Safari, Chrome and Internet Explorer. @CBSMiami Here is the screen shot with Safari

Just finished watching @GovRonDeSantis press conference and I don't know what embarrasses me more - the denial by DeSantis as to the problem we are facing or the acquiescence of the Tampa Bay press corp in the room. 1/5 Let's start with the first problem. As we've seen in these press conferences, the Gov speaks for an hour and tries to convince those watching what a great job the state is doing and how the problem really isn't that bad.
Okay, we expect politicians to spin and obfuscate. 2/5

UPDATE: Learning new heartbreaking details regarding the death of 9-year-old Alejandro Ripley.
The mother had been considering killing the autistic child for some time, according to a law enforcement source, saying Alejandro was physically becoming to hard to control @CBSMiami The arrest report notes the mother said her son was in a better place now, but a source tells me the mother also told detectives that a family member - who is now dead - used to tell her, “God didn’t make Alejandro.” @CBSMiami

As tens of thousands of people in Florida get laid off or lose their job entirely, we are going to have to examine just how bad this state is in terms of taking care of people. @CBSMiami

Looking at weekly unemployment compensation. Florida is among the worst as this chart shows For comparison sake here are the weekly benefits offered by the top five states. 👇

Is the state of Florida and @GovRonDeSantis ready for the economic catastrophe that is upon us with the entire hospitality industry in the state shutting down?

The signs are troubling.

Here is just one example. 1/ In a matter of days, tens of thousands of people who have lost their job will need to apply for unemployment benefits from the state.

Florida has the worst system in the nation to apply for benefits.

The online system routinely crashes - even before this onslaught 2/