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David Jolly Makes It Official: He’s Running for Governor as Newly-Minted Centrist Democrat

June 5, 2025 | FlaglerLive | 10 Comments

David Jolly in Palm Coast last month. (© FlaglerLive)
David Jolly at a town hall in Palm Coast last month, when he told a large audience: “I believe we are in a constitutional crisis right now. We don’t have to wait to be told we are in a constitutional crisis when the President of the United States looks at the Congress and says, I don’t care about the laws you wrote or the budget that you enacted, I’m not going to abide by it and I’m going to ignore it. That is a constitutional crisis. That is the ignoring of the legislative authority that appears in Article One of the Constitution, when he says to the courts, I don’t care about your judgment or your orders. I’m going to do what I want to do. That’s a constitutional crisis. When he says to individuals in this room and outside, I don’t care about your due process, that is a constitutional crisis. The crisis, though, is not just because of the malfeasance of a president, it is because of the collapse of the Republican-led Congress. We have seen malfeasance of a president before, but it has been met with accountability from the courts or from the Congress. Malfeasance of a president alone is not a constitutional crisis, but the inability or unwillingness of the Congress or the courts to respond to that crisis by holding a President accountable, that creates a constitutional crisis. (© FlaglerLive)

Former Republican Congressman David Jolly on Thursday became the first prominent Democrat to enter the 2026 gubernatorial race, saying he can attract middle-ground voters who want leaders to address issues such as rising housing and property-insurance costs.

Jolly, 52, represented a Pinellas County district in Congress for nearly three years and more recently has been a cable-news political commentator. He hopes to become the first Democrat elected governor since Lawton Chiles won in 1994. Gov. Ron DeSantis cannot run again next year because of term limits.

Republicans control every statewide office in Florida, have supermajorities in the state House and Senate and continue expanding their voter-registration lead.

“If you’re a Republican, Democrat or independent, you’re facing an affordability crisis in the state of Florida that has you wondering if you can continue to live here, retire here, raise your kids here,” Jolly told the News Service of Florida. “Personally, I think Republican politicians in Tallahassee have contributed to this crisis, ignored it, won’t do anything about it, and I think there’s a coalition that’s demanding change.”

The Republican Party of Florida described Jolly’s announcement as “breaking News from Fantasyland.” It pointed to the GOP’s voter-registration lead and said Jolly had changed his views on issues such as health care and the Second Amendment.

“No matter the issue, David Jolly has been on all sides of it,” state Republican Chairman Evan Power said in a statement

Jolly entered a race that includes Congressman Byron Donalds, a Naples Republican who has drawn support from President Donald Trump. Speculation also continues to swirl around whether Florida First Lady Casey DeSantis and Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson also will run for the GOP nomination.
Also, state Sen. Jason Pizzo of Sunny Isles Beach has indicated he plans to run without party affiliation, and big-name attorney John Morgan has floated the idea of running as a third-party candidate. Pizzo served as Senate Democratic leader before leaving the party this spring.

Jolly said he expects overreach, instability and damaging policies by Trump will help lead to a political environment for candidates to prioritize state concerns. And he anticipates Republicans will attack him for his positions on issues such as climate science and gun control.

“What would be inauthentic and a lie is to suggest I’ve never changed. That’s a failing candidate,” Jolly said. “It is a strength of our candidacy that I admit to changing and that I engage in conversations about why.”

Jolly, a former Washington, D.C. lobbyist who also worked as general counsel for Republican Congressman Bill Young, won a special congressional election in March 2014 after Young’s death. Jolly was re-elected that fall to a full term.

Initially he was among several Republicans, including then-Congressman Ron DeSantis who flirted with running for the U.S. Senate when then-Sen. Marco Rubio embarked on a failed run for president in 2016. When Rubio decided to seek re-election to the Senate, Jolly ran again for Congress and was defeated by Democrat Charlie Crist, another former Republican.

Before officially leaving the GOP in 2018, Jolly teamed with Democrat Patrick Murphy, another former Florida congressman, on a tour pushing for political common ground.

Jolly was the second prominent Democrat to announce plans this week to run for statewide office, after former state Sen. Jose Javier Rodriguez of Miami filed to run for attorney general.

–Jim Turner, Mike Exline, News Service of Florida

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Judith G. Michaud says

    June 5, 2025 at 12:36 pm

    I am so thrilled to hear this! He has our whole family’s vote! Awesome person, awesome candidate !

    11
  2. Me says

    June 5, 2025 at 12:50 pm

    So, happy to read this, you have my vote.

    8
  3. JC says

    June 5, 2025 at 2:09 pm

    Yep, going to lose hard next year. People don’t like flip floppers like pancakes.

    4
  4. Samuel L. Bronkowitz says

    June 5, 2025 at 6:33 pm

    Oh great, a Republican

  5. Deborah Coffey says

    June 5, 2025 at 6:50 pm

    @ JC

    On the contrary, we love people that have actually seen the light and act accordingly.

    You’ve got my vote, David. It will be such a treat to have a fine, decent, ethical person that actually loves democracy in the governor’s seat.

    6
  6. Mike P says

    June 5, 2025 at 7:40 pm

    Jolly joke…good luck!

  7. David Schaefer says

    June 5, 2025 at 10:03 pm

    We need to get these Trumpers out of this state they are useless I would vote for Jolly any day of the week…

  8. Laurel says

    June 6, 2025 at 8:37 am

    JC: “People don’t like flip floppers…” so that means you don’t like Trump, who changed his party affiliation five times, and flip flops on tariffs daily, correct?

    Then there is “”breaking News from Fantasyland.”” Isn’t it sad that partisans must make up false branding to influence us? Civil behavior simply doesn’t work, unless we reject it.

    Jolly is the front runner for those who are no longer interested in the made up dramas, and prefer our governor works on things that really matter to us.

  9. Just say'n says

    June 6, 2025 at 8:41 am

    Pretty bad when dems are pulling for a former republican that really wasn’t a republican ans rejected by republicans.You folks are really deep in the wilderness and I couldn’t be happier.Cant wait till a strong black republican and all MAGA is the next governor ,your gona loose your minds.Choke on that for a while.

  10. Pierre Tristam says

    June 6, 2025 at 12:27 pm

    So says the Republican who probably twice voted for Reagan–the former New Dealer Democrat who campaigned for Truman before GE zapped him into a reactionary. At least Jolly is going in the more decent direction.

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