Another Sign of 2A Trouble in the Florida Senate

Just yesterday my colleague Tom Knighton wrote about the squishiness of some Republicans in the Florida Senate when it comes to Second Amendment issues. Though the Florida House has passed a number of pro-2A reforms by wide margins this year, the Senate isn’t likely to take up any of the bills that are the top priorities of Second Amendment advocates. Some have pointed to the shooting at Florida State University as their excuse for dodging a vote on repealing the post-Parkland law banning gun sales to adults under the age of 21, but even before that tragic incident Senate President Ben Albritton was noncommittal about bringing that bill forward. 

That was bad enough, but now there’s another troubling sign that some supposed Second Amendment supporters in the Senate are taking their gun owning constituents for granted. 

 An op-ed advocating for students and professors to carry guns on college campuses nearly cost Daniel Foganholi a seat on the state Board of Education. Foganholi, a former appointee of Gov. Ron DeSantis to the Broward County School Board, was confirmed by the Florida Senate to his newest education position by a narrow vote of 20 to 17. All 10 Democrats and seven of the 27 Republicans voted no. Sen. Jason Pizzo, who switched from Democrat to no party affiliation last week, did not cast a vote.

His confirmation appeared to be sailing along, having been recommended favorably by the Senate Education Pre-K-12 on March 31 and the Ethics and Elections Committee on April 22.

But on April 23, a day after the Ethics and Elections Commission meeting, the conservative publication Spectator World published an essay written by Foganholi titled, “Let students and professors carry guns to class. We owe them their God-given right to self-defense.” The opinion piece was in response to the April 17 shooting at Florida State University.

“It’s time to get real: gun-free zones do not protect our students — they turn them into defenseless, easy targets,” Foganholi wrote.

Sen. Tina Polsky, a Democrat from Boca Raton, serves on the Ethics and Elections Committee and had voted to recommend Foganholi to the full Senate. But after reading his op-ed, she changed her mind. On Tuesday, she asked her Senate colleagues to reject his nomination, saying his suggestion that students should be freely allowed to carry guns on college campuses was dangerous.

“Fortunately, the bill that we had that would have done so was voted down by this Legislature, demonstrating our widespread understanding of the additional dangers this policy would create,” Polsky said.

A bill this year that would have allowed students to bring guns onto college campuses died after being rejected by the Senate Criminal Justice Committee. A bill to lower the legal age to own a rifle from 21 to 18 never got a committee hearing, despite passing the House.

The ineffectiveness of Florida’s carry ban on college and university campuses was made painfully clear when a 20-year-old decided to open fire on the Florida State campus last month, and I wholeheartedly agree with Foganholi that lawful gun owners should be able to carry in self-defense and defense of others in those settings. It was bitterly disappointing to see the campus carry bill shot down by a Senate committee earlier this session, but the fact that Foganholi’s confirmation was nearly derailed over his support for the measure is downright alarming. 

No other senators joined in on the debate, creating uncertainty as to how much support Polsky had. But when it was time to cast votes, not only had the nine other Democrats voted no, seven Republicans had as well, making it two votes shy of defeat.

“If I’d known it would be this close, I would have worked it a little more to try to get it defeated,” Polsky told the Sun Sentinel after the vote. “I didn’t whip any votes. It was kind of organic.”

Among the no votes were three Republican senators from Miami-Dade County: Alexis Calatayud, Ana Maria Rodriguez and Ileana Garcia.

Foganholi was also opposed by Colleen Burton of Polk County, Nick DiCeglie of Pinellas County, Tom Wright of Volusia County and Clay Yarborough of Duval and Nassau counties.

“I am disappointed in the ‘Republicans’ who voted against my nomination simply because I defended our God-given right to self-defense and the Second Amendment,” Foganholi told the Sun Sentinel in a text.

It’s easy to pin the blame for the lack of movement on pro-2A bills on Albritton and Sen. Kathleen Passidomo, who chairs the committee that would have heard the bill repealing the under-21 gun sale ban, but Foganholi’s confirmation vote shows that the rot goes deeper than just those two senators. If advocating for the right to bear arms in self-defense nearly cost Foganholi his job (or at least his ability to serve out his full three-year term) then gun owners have a serious problem in the state Senate, and one that’s may require primary challenges to these Second Amendment squishes at the first given opportunity. 

In the meantime, gun owners and 2A advocates should reach out to these lawmakers and ask them to explain their vote, as well as their stance on campus carry, which is already the law in 14 states (thoughtthe particular details of the policy vary from state to state). Why do they believe that support for campus carry should disqualify someone from serving on the state’s Board of Education? And just as importantly, why do they want to keep a policy in place that clearly doesn’t stop committed killers from carrying out an attack, but does prevent lawful gun owners from being able to protect themselves and others?