Escambia County Supervisor of Elections Robert Bender is still waiting for Gov. Ron DeSantis to decide the date for the special election to fill Congressman Matt Gaetz’s seat. He expects the primaries to be held in February and the general in April, but that is only speculation.
- “My new statement is the new congressman may be able to see the cherry blossoms in D.C.,” he said. “I’m not necessarily putting a date behind it, but people who understand when the blossoms bloom know when the election might be.”
A challenge is the vote-by-mail process. Since the 2024 election cycle is over, all VBM requests must be renewed. Bender said he and his fellow D1 election supervisors have discussed when to start accepting those requests, but they have yet to receive any direction from the state.
- “We have set up the primary and the general for 2026 in our system. We believe that we can go ahead and start accepting vote-by-mail requests for those elections, which give us a jumpstart on the special.”
The election supervisor shared that the actual qualifying period (when candidates finalize their paperwork—see Bruce Childers) may last only 24 hours. For example, it could begin on Monday at noon and end on Tuesday at noon. Bender added, “Candidates will still have two weeks prior to the qualifying period to pre-file to run.”
He added that Rep. Michelle Salzman doesn’t have to resign from the Florida House until 10 days before the start of the qualifying period. If the Cantonment Republican resigns sooner, that would give the Supervisor of Elections office time to include the Florida House D1 seat on the ballot.
NEW CANDIDATE
Former Pensacola mayoral candidate Jonathan Garrett Green has announced his intention to seek U.S. Congress Representative of Florida, District One as a NPA (No Party Affiliation) candidate.
According to his press release, Green is the Chief Strategy Officer and Lead Mediator at the American Humanity Mediation Service. He is also a part-time faculty member in Criminal Justice at Columbia Southern University. He earned his Juris Doctorate from Southern University Law Center in 2016, complementing it with a Master of Science in Criminal Justice from Troy University in 2012 and a Bachelor of Arts in Criminal Justice from the University of South Alabama in 2009.