Carter leaned against the counter. “Example?”
“State Rep Mitchell Dominguez, three years ago. Democrat incumbent. Lost a state House seat in a deep blue district that should have been his for the taking down in Miami-Dade. He started worrying about what they were doing in DC instead of what they were doing in Miami-Dade. Went national with his platform, when the key issue the citizens in his district were worried about was FDOT wanting to enact eminent domain proceedings on some properties to create new Florida Turnpike on and off ramps, and all the traffic that would bring their region. The GOP guy, new guy, Paul Sanchez, ran unopposed in the primary because no one thought they’d ever unseat Dominguez, and there was a state Senate seat up for grabs, thanks to term limits, that everyone wanted to try for.
“Sanchez was a newbie to the GOP, ran without any local party support. Guy’s aliteralfreaking racist. There were first-hand reports of him being buddy-buddy with white nationalists who are, again,literalKlansmen. He belongs to this small radical evangelical church who, yet again,literallypreaches gays are an abomination and should be killed. Massive anti-abortion guy, anti-gay rights. All of that. Fuckernevershould have made it past primaries.
“But few people heard any of that because he kept the focus on thatonekey district issue and hammered Dominguez on his national politics every time the guy turned around. Sanchez controlled the message because Dominguez was sloppy and had a shit-for-brains guy running his comms. Instead of Dominguez looking local and meeting Sanchez there in that battle pit, and saying, oh, by the way, this guy is a flippingracist, Dominguez was chasing his own tail at every debate.
“But Sanchez looked good to the locals who were showing up at town hall meetings and saying, ‘Hey, I don’t want to lose my house or have all that extra traffic in our area.’ Sanchez found out who all the FDOT people were behind this, by name, was doing the homework, and calling them out at all these local rallies. He wore out more shoes, knocked on more doors, and made more phone calls.
“So who are these hard-working, middle-class people going to vote for? The guy who’s kvetching about what the assholes in Washington are doing, or the guy who shows up and says, ‘Hey, you elect me, I’m going to be knocking on Joe Smith’s office door in Tallahassee and fighting for you to save your homes.’”
She looks at me, then back to Carter. “You tell me.”
Carter had been slowly nodding through all of this as he listened.
“Now, fortunately, someone with half a fucking brain got through to Dominguez,” she continues. “He unseated Sanchez two years later, before the asshole could do any real damage to state politics. Didn’t hurt Dominguez could leverage the fact that massively pro-life, fifty-year-old Sanchez got hissixteen-year-old mistress pregnant and paid for her abortion five years earlier.”
“Ouch,” I say.
She snorted. “Yeah. Daddy had a personal hand in that ratfuck. I might have asked him how he’d feel ifI’dbeen the mistress. He didn’t have the info the first time around or he would have used it.Again, the GOP couldn’t find someone qualified to run in the district to unseat Sanchez in the primary, so Daddy dropped that bomb about four weeks before the general, when it was too late for Sanchez to mount an effective counter-attack ahead of when early voting opened.”
The way Carter tips his head tells me that news interests him. “Really?”
“Yeah. Daddy might be staunchly red, but even he couldn’t stomach the thought of that guy being tagged GOP for another two years.”
“Wait.” Carter tips his head back and stares at the ceiling for a moment. “That means you were fifteen when all this happened?”
Holy. Shit.
When I was fifteen, I was focused on passing my high school classes and when Imagine Dragons were dropping their next album.
She smiles. “It’s amazing what rich old white guys will talk about when there’s a girl in the room who they completely underestimate. Daddy frequently takes me to events instead of Momma, because I’m better at getting him information. Which works out for both of us, because Momma hates going to those things, and she was usually busy with her own work.”
“What does she do?” Carter asks.
“Until three years ago, she was a professor of anthropology at FSU. She retired.”
“Can I ask a stupid question?” Carter poses.
She smirks, the dimple returning. “Sure.”
She’s fucking adorable, and I’msofucking screwed.
“When are you running for office?” Carter asks.
She shrugs. “Well, I’m personally not going to screw around with local-level offices. I am going to leverage Daddy’s name and contacts, in that respect. I’m independent, not stupid. I know how to play the game. Need to be at least twenty-one to run for state House or Senate. Then, I’m going for the big G. But you have to be at least thirty to run for that, and have to be a registered voter in the state for seven years. That means I have time. Now, all I have to do is get my law degree, make my own rep within the state party, and bring it home. Depending on who’s looking strongest when I hit that point, I might run as a lieutenant first. Make deeper connections. I know any GOP candidate will break his own neck trying to kiss Daddy’s ass for political brownie points and name me their lieutenant governor.”
“Why don’t you want to try for smaller local offices first?”
She snorts. “You know how much I can make being a lawyer between now and then? I mean, sure, if it wasn’t for Daddy, I’d go that route. Build name recognition and connections. Practice in a populated county where I can run for county commission or school board or something, bring in the poll numbers.” She smiles. “And learn the dirt, where the bodies are buried, so I can leverage that when I run.”
Wow. She’s really thought this out.
I had trouble planning my class schedule last year.
In addition to all of this, she admitted earlier in the evening that she already has a year and a half of college credits completed via dual-enrollment classes she took in high school. So she’s actually academically ahead of me and Carter.
I feel like not just a slacker, but like a total loser compared to Susa and her work ethic. She possesses a drive I damn sure don’t have at my age, a determination I don’t think I’ll ever have in my life. I’m not hard-wired that way.
