Don Gaetz

TALLAHASSEE — Senate President Don Gaetz said Thursday he isn't sold on a campaign-finance reform rocketing through the Florida House that would raise contribution limits for candidates to $10,000 in exchange for quicker disclosure of those...

Florida Senate President Don Gaetz had bad news Monday for coastal homeowners wondering how much more windstorm insurance premiums can increase. "The hard truth is insurance rates in Florida are going to continue to go up," he said. "Florida is a very...

A year after the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, proposals to change the controversial Stand Your Ground law are dead in the state Legislature. “Repeal of Stand Your Ground or major modifications of Stand Your Ground I don’t think get past...

TALLAHASSEE — Senate President Don Gaetz said Wednesday that the Senate will not pursue legislation this spring to create a state-run health insurance exchange in the future. “I appreciate the Committee’s thorough consideration of this...

TALLAHASSEE — A sweeping ethics reform that cracks down on political slush funds, revolving-door lobbying, and Florida's weak ethics enforcement unanimously cleared its last Senate committee stop Tuesday. Senate President Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, has...

UPDATE: The post now includes Democratic lawmakers criticism of the bill. A bill filed today looks likely to revise last year's contentious “parent trigger” debate as it proposes to let parents at a struggling school help decide the future...

Since ushered in by a new law nearly two years ago, Florida's new teacher evaluations have prompted lots of complaints, worries and arguments. Recently, even Gov. Rick Scott and Republican lawmakers — who signed and voted for the law — have...

So Jim Greer pleaded guilty — and now the former chair of the Republican Party of Florida probably will slink quietly away to prison. This allows Republicans to publicly crow about what a bum he was while privately rejoicing that he didn't air...

The big topic in the Florida Legislature's upcoming session this year: ethics. Please, please! Stop the hysterical laughter! Quit rolling on the floor! It's unseemly for a grownup! Florida, once considered among the most accessible of states when it...

TALLAHASSEE – Gov. Rick Scott didn't become a titan in the health-care industry by staying on the wrong slope of the learning curve. And what a transformation two years has made to the one-time tea-partyer. The Scott of 2011 rode into...

TALLAHASSEE — A Florida Senate panel is fast-tracking a sweeping ethics proposal that would crack down on politicians' lavish lobbyist-funded living, their revolving-door jobs and even their paychecks in cases when they don't pay ethics fines. The...

TALLAHASSEE — Senate President Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, said last week he wanted to curb the “fillet Mignon lifestyle” some lawmakers are living courtesy of political funds called “committees of continuous existence” that ...