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Meet Florida’s New Senate Education Committee

ByAccountabaloney

Committee Weeks for Florida’s 2023 Legislative Session start this week and Florida’s new Senate Education Pre-K-12 Committee is meeting for the first time on Wednesday (1/4/23).

Senate President, Kathleen Passidomo has re-organized her Education policy committees and has made some “interesting” choices regarding membership. What had traditionally been a single Education policy committee has now been split into two free-standing policy committees: the Education Pre-K-12 Committee and the Education Postsecondary Committee.

Here is the make-up of the Pre-K-12 Education Committee:

Chair:
Senator Corey Simon (R)
Vice Chair:
Senator Danny Burgess (R)

Senators Berman, Hutson and Jones are returning members, having served on the 2022 Senate Ed Committee.

Senator Perry served on multiple House Education committees prior to being elected to the Senate in 2016. He served on the Senate Education committee from 2018-20. He will serve as Chair of the Senate Ed Appropriations Committee this session.

The rest of the committee is new to Senate Ed.

Some members, like Senators Avila, Grall, and Yarborough (all elected to the Senate in 2022), had some previous experience serving on House Education subcommittees. When serving in the House, Senator Grall carried both the 2021 Parents Bill of Rights (HB241) and the 2022 Parental Rights in Education Bill (HB1567, called “Don’t Say Gay” by its opponents). Grall will serve as this session’s Chair of the Senate Education Postsecondary Committee.

The Pre-K-12 Education committee’s Vice-Chair, Danny Burgess, was first elected to the Senate in 2020, after serving in the House from 2014-2019. He has never served on education policy committees or subcommittees in either the House or Senate, but he did carry the 2022 Charter School Bill (SB892) last session.

Newcomer, Rosalind Osgood, was elected to the Senate in March 2022, after serving for 10 years on the  Broward County School Board. She was re-elected in November 2022.

The final three members, Chair Corey Simon and Senators Alexis Calatayud and Jay Collins are new to the Senate, new to Education Committees and new to public office. These three, on election night, were celebrated by Senator Passidomo as “historic victories”:

With the first Black Republican since Reconstruction, the first Green Beret and one of the youngest members ever elected, we will return to Tallahassee with a super majority and a renewed commitment to fighting for access to the American Dream for all Floridians.”  https://floridapolitics.com/archives/569822-jay-collins-unseats-janet-cruz-flips-sd-14-red/

All three ran in newly drawn Senate districts with massive support from the Governor and the Florida Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee. Their elections secured the Republic supermajority in the Senate. All three have been named by Passidomo, as freshman, to chair committees. Here is a closer look:

Senator Alexis Calatayud

Of the three newbies, Alexis Calatayud has the most experience in Education. Prior to her Senate election in November, she worked in Legislative Affairs at the Florida Department of Education for two years. Prior to that, Calatayud was Representative Vance Aloupis’ campaign manager in the 2018 and 2020 election cycles and served as his Legislative Aide from 2018 – 2020. Aloupis  served on multiple House Education committees from 2018-2022 and is the C.E.O. of The Children’s Movement, David Lawrence’s nonprofit advocating for early childhood education.

Calatayud originally filed to run for the House seat Aloupis was vacating but was convinced to switch and run for the newly drawn Senate district 38 instead. Within days of switching to the Senate race, Calatayud received endorsements from outgoing Senate President Wilton Simpson, incoming Senate President Kathleen Passidomo, Senators Ben Albritton and Ana Maria Rodriguez.

Calatayud ran on a campaign focused on School Choice (“enhancing school choice options) as well as increasing teacher salaries and public education funding.

Calatayud raised $680K, with numerous contributions from Charter School organizations and over $200K from the Florida Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee (FRSCC). She raised an additional $500K in her PAC: Vision & Integrity For Florida. Her PAC’s largest donors were Senator Bryan Avila’s PAC, Fighting for Florida’s Families (110K), and Senator Ana Maria Rodriguez’s PAC, Ethics and Honesty in Government PAC (70K).

Although she is a freshman senator and first year legislator, Passidomo appointed Calatayud as Chair of the Senate Community Affairs Committee.

Senator Jay Collins

Jay Collins is a retired U.S. Army Green Beret and Purple Heart Amputee. A native of Montana, he moved to the Tampa area in 2019. Collins originally filed to run for Congress, first in HD14 against Democratic Congresswoman Kathy Castor. He later switched to run for the open seat in HD15. In June, Collins was, apparently convinced by Gov. DeSantis to run, instead, against Democratic State Senator Janet Cruz. He announced his State Senate run by re-tweeting an endorsement from DeSantis. Cruz’s Senate District 14 had been redistricted to make it more “purple.”

Collins’ campaign website is short on policy (there is none mentioned) but, rather, focuses on Collins’ illustrious military career. Collins promises to be a “conservative champion for the people of Tampa and Hillsborough County” saying, “At this pivotal moment for our state, battle-tested fighters need to stand with the Governor to Keep Florida Free.”

Collins’ campaign website also sells merchandise using the slogans “Deeds Not Word” and “Giving America A Leg to Stand On’ and calling himself “G.I. Jay.”

Campaign reports show Collins raised $858K, of which over $750K came from the Florida Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee (FRSCC). Collins’ American Warriors PAC raised an additional nearly $1 million for his Congressional campaign. Some of that funding was transferred to Collins’ Senate campaign PAC, Quiet Professionals FL, which also received $70 from Senator Avila’s PAC, Fighting for Florida’s Families.

On October 28, 2022, Collins’ Quiet Professionals FL PAC recieved a 45K donation from Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), laundered through the Florida Right Solutions PAC. PhRMA is a trade group which lobbies on behalf of America’s pharmaceutical giants. The organization has lobbied fiercely against allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices for Medicare recipients.[4] At the state level, the organization has lobbied to prevent price limits and greater price transparency for drugs.[5] PhRMA has given substantial dark money donations to right-wing advocacy groups such as the American Action Network (which lobbied heavily against the Affordable Care Act) and the Koch brothers’ Americans for Prosperity (Which, among other things, supports vouchers and the privatization of public education).

Collins’ biography shows he earned a B.S. in Health Sciences from American Military University in 2010 and a graduate degree from Norwich University in 2012. Both universities are online schools. His current employment is listed as “Chief Programs Officer of a national 501(c)(3) with a focus on food needs in and out of disaster zones.”

Although Collins is a first time legislator and new to Tallahassee, Passidomo appointed him as Chair of the Senate Agriculture Committee.

Senator Corey Simon, Chair Pre-K-12 Education

Corey Simon is a former FSU and professional football star, who moved back to Tallahassee where he created a local non-profit, “Corey’s Kids,” and serves as the president of Big Bend Pop Warner.

His political career seems to have been groomed by Governor DeSantis.  In December 2020, DeSantis appointed Simon as CEO of Volunteer Florida, 501(c)(3) organization which promotes community service and volunteerism throughout Florida. In 2021, DeSantis appointed Simon to Florida’s Children and Youth Cabinet.

James Call, writing for the Tallahasse Democrat, described how DeSantis “engineered” Simon’s win:

Gov. Ron DeSantis made painting the Panhandle red as part of a plan he told Fox News earlier this year to produce “a really big red wave” in November.

The Legislature redrew the Senate map as part of redistricting this spring. That moved the district’s boundaries to the east and reduced the Democratic advantage to three points – putting it within the GOP’s reach.

Then DeSantis recruited Simon, a Black former Florida State University football star to challenge Ausley at her base – in football-centric Tallahassee and Gadsden County, Florida’s only Black majority county.

Simon’s website is short on policy but it does say “My mother worked hard every day of her life to give me a bright future. I’m ready to pay it forward and protect my community, my country, and the commonsense values we all share.” Those “common sense values” are later defined as

  • Standing Firm To Protect Individual Freedoms And Constitutional Rights
  • Finding Real Solutions For Rising Housing Prices
  • Unlocking Our Kids’ Potential Through Quality Education

Simon refused to give detailed policy positions during his campaign and canceled a debate with the Tallahassee Democrat and the League of Women Voters, because, according to him, it was a “liberal farce designed to fool voters”.

Simon did agree to debate at a Capital (sic) Tiger Bay forum in October, where he verbalized his support for Universal Vouchers and school choice. In a candidate interview with WFSU, Simon explained that his motivation for joining the Republican Party was the issue of school choice:

“I saw that as something that the party really got behind and really stood behind,” he said. “I saw that as a way to propel our families forward. That’s why I stand where I stand.”Simon said his mother had to use her work address to get him in a better school when he was growing up. “That was never lost on me,” he said. “ I could never understand why a kid was relegated to a school because of his zip code or her zip code. Our families should have the opportunity to pick the best school for their children.” https://news.wfsu.org/wfsu-local-news/2022-06-30/senate-district-3-candidate-profile-corey-simon

Of course, Simon was endorsed by Florida Federation for Children (FFC), a Betsy DeVos PAC, chaired by John Kirtley, the founder and chairman of Step Up For Students (SUFS). SUFS is the politically connected non-profit which administers Florida’s billion dollar voucher programs. Kirtley also chairs DeVos’ American Federation for Children (AFC). Both FFC and AFC advocate for candidates supporting the privatization of public education via school choice and Universal Vouchers.

Interestingly, Simon’s son attended Maclay School, a private school in Tallahassee, where Simon coached the football team. Maclay’s high school tuition is almost $16,000/year, about twice the value of a Florida Empowerment Scholarship voucher. Maclay does NOT accept state scholarships.

Simon also campaigned heavily against LBGTQ issues, going after votes Ausley made during her time in the Florida Legislature such as voting against the Fairness in Women’s Sports Act (2021’s SB 1028) which banned transgender minors from competing in sports that align with their gender identity. Simon also repeatedly went after her vote against the Parental Rights in Education Act (“Don’t Say Gay”). Simon released a campaign attack ad which alleged Ausley supported taxpayer funded sex change operations for minors and transgender men competing in women’s sports. Ausley’s response was “We’re at the state of the campaign where truth doesn’t seem to matter.”

Another interesting fact: Simon’s bachelor’s degree from FSU was in Library and Information Science, which might be interesting when bills further restricting public school library collections come before his Education committee.

Simon’s campaign raised $354K, of which $328.5 came from the Florida Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee. The Friends of Corey Simon PAC raised an additional $340K, with $40k coming from Senator Avila’s PAC.

Simon will chair his first committee meeting on Wednesday, January 4, 20230 at 10:30 AM. It will be his second committee meeting ever and his first as a chair. The topic is “Overview of Pre-K – 12 Education and Committee Jurisdiction.” As always, you can watch the proceedings at thefloridachannel.org.

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