Florida's attorney general Pam Bondi, up for reelection next year.Official photo
Florida attorney general Pam Bondi has been a lightning rod in a state that’s got quite a few of them. A tea party favorite and occasional Fox News commentator, Bondi played the lead role in Florida’s attack on the Affordable Care Act. Bondi’s office filed suit, later joined by other states, to challenge the law’s constitutionality. While the suit failed to derail the entire law, Bondi was wildly successful in helping prevent millions of poor people from getting health insurance through an expansion of Medicaid provided in the law. (The Supreme Court ruled that the Medicaid expansion could not be forced on the states and only expanded voluntarily. Florida and 12 other states then rejected it.)
On that stellar record, Bondi has been campaigning hard for reelection, even going so far as to postpone an execution so she could attend a fundraiser last month. Democrats would clearly love to kick her out of office along with Republican governor Rick Scott, who’s facing a tough race next year. Polls are scarce as Democrats have yet to identify a challenger for the AG job (though Bondi seems to come out ahead in a TMZ “Who’d You Rather?” poll matching her up against California AG Kamala Harris, dubbed the “best looking attorney general in the country” by President Obama.) But one person thought to be lining up against Bondi is George Sheldon, currently the Acting Assistant Secretary for Children and Families at the US Department of Health and Human Services.
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced last week that Sheldon would be stepping down and returning to Florida this month, and he has reportedly been feeling out donors and state politicos about the prospect of a Bondi challenge. TMZ is not likely to feature Sheldon in any “who’s hotter” polls, but he knows Florida politics. Sheldon began his career in the state legislature and later served as deputy attorney general and head of the state’s department of children and families. At HHS, he’s been involved in campaigns to combat human trafficking and pushed to limit the use of psychotropic drugs on juveniles in foster care. Unfortunately, none of this is particularly sexy, and Sheldon himself would make a very mild-mannered foil to Bondi’s firebrand.
His “hot” problem may extend to fundraising. Sheldon has made two previous efforts at winning statewide office, including a run for attorney general in 2002 in which he finished third in the Democratic primary. His tenure in the Obama administration may raise his profile a bit this time around, but given his own role in defending Obamacare, that may not be much of a credential with Florida’s conservative voters.
