Elections Headlines Opinion Nassau County

Who to Vote for on Nassau Nov. 5 Election Ballot?

October 12, 2024

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Opinion/Election

By George Miller, 10-1-24

Many people have asked me who I’m voting for, to help them make up their own minds. This is just my opinion as an informed voter and local media person, flavored with some input from people who know even more.

President- Donald Trump. It’s not even close. The threat to our nation, way of life, safety and financial health is directly threatened by what Harris and her handlers/associates pose. None of the 3rd party candidates on the ballot have a chance, nor would they be good choices. Lots of people disklike Trump’s personality and style. But, the bottom line is that things were pretty good while Trump was President, except that he caved to the Fauci approach of COVID lockdowns and signed off on hyper spending to deal with it. His policy positions are the best I’ve seen in a long time and I’ve been watching for a long time. See our article on candidate policy positions. The real reason that the establishment hates Trump so intensely is that he is a clear and present danger to their Globalist/Socialist/totalitarian ambitions.

Senator- Rick Scott is definitely the lesser of evils. Not a hard decision.

4th District U.S. House of Reps- Aaron Bean has done a much better job than expected and expectations were good to start with. Easiest choice of all for me.

District 15 State Rep- Dean Black votes Conservative, so he’s our choice against a Liberal opponent, even with his questionable campaigning practices in 2022.

Judges

Judges are always hard to decide upon because there is very little information easily available about them. They use the excuse of “judicial canons” to tell us practically nothing.

This year we are given the choice whether or not to retain two Supreme Court Justices and seven 5th District Court of Appeal judges. Just for the record, only one judge has been turned out in over 40 years and that was only after a very strong campaign was mounted. No such campaign exists this year, so all of these people will almost certainly be kept in office. They do not even have opponents. So, I wasn’t particularly motivated to spend lots of time and effort on this.

We don’t elect state judges. They are appointed by the Governor, selecting from a list developed by a nominating commission, which the Governor also appoints. Judges must be confirmed by the electorate within 1 year of appointment, which almost always happens. Since there is no organized campaign to pick of any of the judges, I predict that all will be retained this year. All sitting Supreme Court Justices were appointed by Governor Ron DeSantis or Charlie Crist.

Fifth District Court of Appeals- I got two strong recommendations, one from an anonymous sitting judge, who wrote me: “To answer your question succinctly, the last guy on the list of justices and judges – Adrian Soud – is a dream appellate judge, in my opinion. Judge Soud is a constitutionalist and constitutional law expert. He was assigned to Nassau a few years ago for a short-term assignment, then returned to Duval before rising to the Appellate Court and was not only a really good judge, but a powerful voice for the U.S. Constitution and Amendments, and for the Federalist Papers.”

Still researching the others. Will let you know what I come up with, if anything. Keep watching this space.

Fernandina Beach City Commission

This has turned into a real slugfest. Eight candidates are competing in 2-candidate races. I’ll admit that I’m not really jazzed about any of them. Not too impressed with how the commission handled changing City Managers, dealing with resident views, development, waterfront and more. Even though the city is only 13,000 people, it is the cultural and financial center of the county at this time, so how it is run deserves some attention.

See: https://www.fbfl.us/175/Elections

Seat 1 (currently held by Commissioner/Mayor Bradley M. Bean)

Candidates: Bradley Bean and Joyce Tuten

Bean is the son of former FB Mayor and current Congressman Aaron Bean. He has voted mostly but not all well, but seems biased toward development. Of course there is good development and bad development- not everyone agrees which is which. He has not recused himself from voting on the proposed RYAM bioethanol plant where he is employed as an engineer. Joyce Tuten is a retired school teacher. Her very left wing views and activities rule her out immediately for many of us. Read recent Citizens Journal articles about that by Steve Nicklas (1), Dave Scott (2) and Jack Knocke (3), (4). So, it’s Bean.

Seat 2 (currently held by Commissioner/Vice Mayor David Sturges)

Candidates: David Sturges and Genece Minshew
Sturges has been a so-so Commissioner. Again, he is vastly preferable to his extreme left-wing and PRIDE opponent Genece Minshew. He is accused of being a developer with vested interests, but he is a small time guy who mostly does home improvements. I refer you again to the above-referenced articles.

Seat 3 (currently held by Commissioner Chip Ross)

Candidates: Christy Kelly and Timothy Poyntner
I will pass on opining here at this time.

Mayor (currently held By Commissioner/Mayor Bradley M. Bean)

Candidates: James Antun and Darron Asycue

Asycue has done better than I expected, although not great, while Antun did not live up to his Conservative sounding rhetoric espoused when we met him. A local left wing publication ran an article by a former left wing Mayor claiming that Asycue was excessively harsh in his treatment of people on social media and that disqualified him for Mayor. I didn’t see or hear evidence of bad conduct at meetings. A few mean tweets or posts are outweighed by doing what needs doing, so I’m for Asycue, but he should work on that. I refer you again to the above-referenced articles, which include Antun.

Ballot Measures

These six are all proposed constitutional amendments, some having the potential to make major changes in Florida law, some rather undesirable, especially Proposition 4, which would usher in “blue state” abortion law. A 60% majority is required to pass these. My default for ballot measures is NO, unless they make a real good case.

#1- Partisan Election of Members of School Boards. This would introduce party labels and probably more party activity in what were previously technically “nonpartisan” races. We are finding locally that many Democrat candidates and office holders have registered Republican or no party affiliation when they act like Liberal Democrats. This is very true of Fernandina Commission and Nassau County School Board offices. Some have only recently changed their registration. I don’t know if this will help differentiate candidates. I don’t see a significant improvement resulting from this.

#2- Right to Fish and Hunt. I thought we already had that but what do I know? Well, it turns out that there are lots of different opinions/consideration s. Many of us thought this was a basic right. It is somewhat, but there are already lots of restrictions, including licensing, species, zones, seasons, even who can do it and how they can do it. It looks like Measure 2 is mainly a defense against the “greens” who would practically eliminate rights, given the opportunity and have attempted to do so in the past in multiple states. Since the measure does not preclude reasonable conditions on hunting and fishing, I believe the objections to be invalid and therefore will vote YES on Measure 2. 23 states have similar provisions.

#3- Adult Personal Use of Marijuana. I learned the hard way that marijuana really isn’t that good for you- at least it wasn’t for me. It made me lethargic, but more mellow. I got sick more. So I stopped many years ago because it interfered with my work and my running competition program. But I also believe that the government power to regulate what you ingest is invalid. Some people who are sick and in pain claim great relief using it. Most of my Conservative friends I have talked to have said they are voting against legalization. Younger/more Libertarian folks are for it.

#4- *** By far the most controversial and far-reaching: Amendment to Limit Government Interference With Abortion. This would legalize abortion for pre-viability (how to define that?) fetuses and those pregnancies where the patient’s (mother’s?) health is jeopardized, but here’s the catch: “as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.” What if the provider is Planned Parenthood, or someone of that ilk? Prior parental notification would still be required, but says nothing abut parental approval. The ballot description also pointed out that that parental consent may be eliminated. There are issues whether destruction of frozen embryos is illegal per newer existing Florida laws and what would happen if this passed. There are questions about whether abortions would still have to be performed by licensed physicians and even whether passage would require the state to subsidize abortions. Current law says that the ban includes exceptions in cases of rape, incest and human trafficking up to 15 weeks of pregnancy. It also allows physicians to terminate a pregnancy if necessary to save the life of the mother or prevent “a serious risk of substantial and irreversible physical impairment.”

Libertarians and Liberal Democrats mostly espouse the “my body, my choice”/right to choose (pro-abortion with few or no restrictions) position. Many also believe that a fetus is not a person, but merely a “clump of cells.” Science has proven that sadly mistaken, via brain waves, sonagrams and other diagnostic/observation tools, independent of religious beliefs.

Conservatives tend to believe that “life begins at conception”, that abortion is murder, also that there is more than one body involved and one doesn’t have a choice. Some of both sides believe in limiting abortions to earlier term pregnancies only (pre-viability) and/or making exceptions for rape, incest, human trafficking, mothers heath and major birth defects, unhealthy pregnancies. The overturning of Roe v Wade did not outlaw or rule on legality of abortion. It merely concluded that it is a state and not federal issue, leaving states to choose how to handle it. Yet the courts are still involved. This measure would eliminate nearly all government control. I prefer to stick with what we have now and will vote NO on Measure 4.

#5- Annual Adjustments to the Value of Certain Homestead Exemptions- These exemptions are designed to reduce the bite of property taxes. They benefit lower cost homeowners disproportionally but the fixed amount is now far lower percentage-wise, with the huge home price/assessment growth/inflation that has taken place since the amounts were set. I’m for it and will vote YES on Measure 5.

#6- Repeal of Public Campaign Financing Requirement- Eliminates public campaign financing, which hardly anyone utilizes anyway. YES on 6.