- This is a production of WEDU PBS, Tampa, St.

Petersburg, Sarasota.

[music] - The work of Florida lawmakers is far from over.

They are no closer to passing the state's budget.

Will Florida face a government shutdown this summer?

And how many more times might the legislature meet to get the job done?

Plus, the local military community, both active and veteran, closely watching the conflict with Iran.

Now more U.S.

troops are getting called up to the Middle East.

Our panel explores Tampa Bay's ties to the Strait of Hormuz deeper than many people realize.

And in Cuba, the breakdown of the energy grid and the public health infrastructure have reached historic lows under the weight of the U.S.

oil blockade.

Are the real negotiations with Cuba.

What's in the headlines?

Hear the perspective of a Tampa Bay native.

He's retired after decades in Washington DC, his career spanning work with diplomats, policymakers over Cuba, South Africa, and beyond.

Florida This Week is next.

[music] Welcome back, everybody.

I'm Lissette Campos.

Joining us on the panel this week is Dr.

Armon Mahmoudian.

He is a researcher at USF's Global and National Security Institute.

We have Mitch Perry, senior reporter for the Florida Phoenix and Albert Fox Jr.

He is a retired diplomat of Washington DC, a business owner, and also an expert on Cuba policy.

We begin with the Florida Legislature.

It wrapped up its regular session earlier this month without passing a state budget.

It is a constitutionally mandated duty, and the second year in a row that lawmakers left without the job done.

Now they'll head back potentially three times to deal with the budget, congressional redistricting, and property taxes.

We look at what's next and what's at stake for Floridians.

Physically, the Florida House and Senate are just a few hundred feet apart.

But when it comes to the budget, the two chambers ended session with a distance of $1.4 billion to navigate.

The House version outlined $113.6 billion in spending, while the Senate landed higher at $115 billion.

- There are the mistrust issues that I find to be extraordinarily difficult to understand, given the fact that we're all supposed to be Republicans.

- House Speaker Daniel Perez and Senate President Ben Albritton say that lawmakers will return for a budget special session, likely in mid-April.

The state faces a partial government shutdown if a budget is not signed by July 1st.

And that's not the only return trip.

A special session on voter redistricting is set for April the 20th through the 24th.

Lawmakers will be tasked with redrawing Florida's congressional maps, something that historically only takes place once a decade.

Florida's last redistricting was in 2022.

The move to redraw the voting lines is not exclusive to Florida and has been undertaken recently in several other states.

A third session is expected to take up Governor Ron DeSantis push to reduce property taxes.

The House put forward seven proposals, one passed, its plan would place a new non-school homestead exemption on this year's November ballot.

The Senate declined to take up property tax cuts during the regular session, insisting that more debate is needed.

Just 12% of bills passed this session and still no budget.

- It's really a shame that we've had 60 days and we have almost nothing to show the state for affordability issues.

- As lawmakers head back to Tallahassee, the pressure is on to finish the job with billions of dollars and a deadline at stake.

And Mitch, you are just back from Tallahassee having spent all spent all those weeks there.

Where are we on this?

When are we meeting?

About the budget.

You're saying.

- I'm saying that as of today, again, we don't know, but it's expected to be soon now.

They do have until the end of June.

This is different than last year in the respect that because the chambers met in January and February, they have a little more lag time to get it together again.

That is their only constitutionally mandated responsibility to do that.

So it does have some urgency and it's not good.

You know, Senator Don Gaetz, a Republican from Panhandle area, he called it an embarrassment.

He said, you know, not only on this, but also for not addressing certain other issues.

And again, this fissures that have developed between the two chambers, between the two leaders of the chambers in the last couple of years has been really pronounced a Republican and Republican violence, if you will.

- And there's plenty of fissures, as you said, when we talk about redistricting, congressional redistricting, um, what in this plan, Republicans think that they will be gaining how many seats?

- Well, we're now we're hearing them downplayed a little bit after the results maybe of the state elections this week.

We've heard between 1 to 3, up to five districts that they think they can take.

Right now Republicans have 20 of the 28 congressional districts they control right now.

Uh, now, this is technically illegal to do it just to get partisan advantage.

And Ron DeSantis has acknowledged that.

You know, I asked him a couple of months ago, or somebody did a press conference, like how many, how many seats do you think Republicans can get when you do this?

He said, well, that's not what we're doing it for.

We're going to be mandated to do it because the U.S.

Supreme Court is going to weigh in on this decision about the Voting Rights Act, because he's being very careful, because we do have the Fair Districts amendment, and the legislature over a decade ago got chided for that, got knocked down because they did it again.

So they're going to theoretically try to be doing this in a nonpartisan way.

We'll see how that plays out.

And again, there's a possibility, perhaps if they call a "W" mandering where you think you're going to actually gain more seats than actually redounds on you and the Democrats may, may do better.

I mean, it's really kind of a dangerous thing that they're doing.

And they're really only doing this, obviously, because Donald Trump a year ago said, I want states to do this in Texas and other states to do this because I'm a fearful of losing the congressional midterms.

- Florida is certainly not the only one that's.

- Doing it, and it's gone on both sides, obviously.

California is doing this as well.

- Property taxes.

We've been hearing about property taxes eliminating property taxes for a year.

Yeah.

- Well, you know, it's funny because as you mentioned, Ron DeSantis was his top issue going into the legislative session.

And then he didn't say a word about it for the whole nine weeks, basically that it was going on.

The House did pass something, as you mentioned again in the setup clip here.

And they can feel good about themselves in terms of like, we did something this year.

The Senate did not follow suit because they're basically taking listening to what DeSantis wants them to do.

And basically they never even filed a companion measure.

So that's not going to count.

Whatever the House did in the session, what it's going to be.

I don't know.

Ron DeSantis hasn't come up with anything himself.

And he said the other day, it's not ripe yet.

Will we wait till a certain time to bring it out?

Yeah, this could be later.

I'm thinking maybe may or so I somehow I think he wants to do this towards the August midterms because he thinks that some Republicans are kind of queasy about this.

I don't think so.

In the House they voted unanimously for this.

But but I don't know if he believes in this as much as he as he did before.

I think this is going to be his big legacy project to eliminate property taxes outright on homestead properties.

- Moving forward with the with their plans.

Right.

And the Senate is really watching do anything.

- And basically it's dead even with the House did it's dead because, you know, a constitutional amendment has to have 3/5 in both chambers.

And so that died.

Okay.

So that's so there's nothing at all existing right now.

And so it's just really interesting the way he's handled this because this I think, wants to be one of his legacy projects, maybe to outright eliminate property taxes.

And it's probably not going that's not going to happen.

There'll be some serious reduction, perhaps in the constitutional amendment, and then we'll see what the people vote for it.

- Thank you Mitch.

We're going to shift gears now.

The conflict with Iran is being felt by voters as well.

The Tampa Bay Times talked to voters in Hillsborough County this week and found mostly, mostly dislike and frustration over the war.

That sentiment is reflected nationally.

A new Associated Press poll finds that nearly 6 in 10 Americans believe the U.S.

military action has gone too far.

45% say they're worried about affording gas in the months ahead.

Oil prices have surged more than 40% since the war began, something that Tampa Bay families are likely already watching at the pump.

We are... Ahmad, I'd like to ask you.

So many are watching closely what the U.S.

and Iran are doing now.

They appear to be at an impasse.

Israel says that it's going to increase its targeting of areas in the next 48 hours.

Where do you see this from your perspective?

- Well, first, thank you for having me.

And second, regarding your question, to be frank, it's a very hard question to answer because as war goes on, the imagining the end game of this war is getting harder and much more frustrating.

And the reason behind of that, you can anticipate the pattern of the war as long as you know the goal for that war.

So the war is preceded by the military people, but it's always determined the fate of it, the start of it and the end of it by the politicians who come up with the goal.

When it comes to the goal of this war and what the United States is aiming at, we are receiving different signals from the White House itself.

So initially was that this was supposed to be there.

It happened to help the Iranian people who had a very bloody protest in January.

As you know, in January, thousands of Iranians being killed in the protests and President.

- Trump, 40,000.

Yes.

- Yes, exactly.

And President Trump promised a goal.

But as we got closer to war itself, the dialog changed from helping the Iranian people to dismantling Iran's nuclear project.

And then at the day of the war, February 28th, the war wasn't pursued in a way that the United States attacked the office of Supreme Leader, the Office of National Security Council, and the Office of President.

If you take these three together, you would see that the goal is regime change, because once you move to remove the highest echelon of the leadership, that's basically you are aiming at.

And now the recent reporting of the White House is that the United States has successfully under graded the Iranian ballistic missiles and nuclear project, and we are very close to achieve the goals.

And we've been hearing this.

We are very close to achieve the goals, but it doesn't really go as well with the military action because as we say, we are close to achieve the goals.

We send more troops.

We, we, we state that we are going to escalate our air campaign against Iran.

And so which makes it maybe, maybe not everyone in the page.

- And let's take let's talk about the neighbors of Iran in the region.

Pakistan is now stepping up in the negotiations to play a bigger role.

Is Pakistan a credible source for negotiations for diplomacy, or are they accepted by the people at the negotiation table?

- It is not the ideal, necessary mediator, because there is an issue of trust between the United States and Pakistan during the war on terror, and it is still, you know, staying from the war on terror.

And the fact that Osama bin Laden was living very close by the Pakistanis presidential guard.

But given the circumstances that region, it seems that Pakistan is the best available option.

Historically speaking, Omanis and to a lesser extent, Qatar is where the countries who were playing an intermediary role.

The problem right now is that right after the beginning of the war, Iran began to launch a bombing campaign against every single Arab states of the Persian Gulf.

So right now, there is an issue of trust and lack of extreme, extreme lack of good faith between Iran and these countries.

Pakistan was not has not been a target of Iranian and so forth.

And Pakistan has a direct interest.

They want peace.

They have a so-called defense pact with the Saudis that they are concerned to be activated.

They don't want Iran being stabilized because they can be stabilized, and they have a good relationship with the United States.

They still have a good large number of representatives to Centcom.

So they have both operational and political willingness and incentive to mediate.

So I think it's a good available option.

- You've mentioned Centcom.

Centcom has played a key role in Operation Epic Fury.

How could that role change in the operational management of the conflict as this continues?

- Well, that's a great question, especially now that we are hearing news that there is a chance that the United States might want to launch a limited at this ground operation, which makes them madder and the stakes much higher.

Centcom always will remain the executive arm of any military operation in the Middle East.

But as we move forward to the actions that have extreme political implications, such as sending the ground forces, because that's something that voters takes very differently.

They are already sensitive about the price of gas and oil.

But if the American troops are on the ground, this triggers a different level of political earthquake in the U.S.

As we get to these kind of politically insensitive, sensitive matters, the DC would take much more intervention, even to some extent that we will.

We can see the Department of War or the State Department or White House itself to try to.

I don't want to say micromanage, but to be more involved.

But Centcom will always remain the executive arm of the campaign.

- And we'll talk a little bit more about that later on in the show.

During our big stories of the week, now we're going to shift to Florida.

Democrats are celebrating a couple of special election wins this week.

Democrat Brian Nathan flipped a Hillsborough County state Senate seat.

He beat Republican State Representative Josie Tomko by just 408 votes.

- We have at least one special session coming up, like I said, covering redistricting.

There may be more so I need to get ready to go do that work to represent these folks that just elected me.

- Tomko vows to run for the seat again in November.

Perhaps the biggest surprise, though, was Democrat Emily Gregory.

She flipped a Palm Beach House seat in the district that includes President Trump's Mar a Lago estate.

She defeated a Trump endorsed Republican in a district the GOP had won by nearly 20 points just two years ago.

- My theory of the case was always that my neighbors wanted the same things that I do a fairer, kinder Florida that works for all of us.

- With November still months away, the question is whether this is a trend or just a blip on the political radar.

Mitch, what are you thinking?

- That's the big question, right?

And that's a question.

I talked to strategists from both political parties yesterday actually, about this.

And it's a political earthquake.

There's no question about it.

Especially this victory by Brian Nathan in Tampa.

This is a plus nine Republican district.

And we know Republicans, there's a certain amount who actually switched party lines and did vote for him.

And of course, all the NPAs went for Brian Nathan and also Josie Emkow outraised him roughly 10 to 1.

I mean, really shocking.

And we rarely see that these days in Florida politics.

Does this change the equation for November?

Well, I wrote back in January that when there was a shocking a similarly shocking victory in Texas in a legislative district that was a plus Trump 17 that went to like plus 13, the Democrats I wrote, will we see this in Florida?

Well, let's watch this race in Hillsborough County.

I didn't predict this was going to happen, so I thought it was going to be an indication, a very interesting barometer.

So I think I think it's what it does do for Democrats.

It gives them hope.

For one thing, any district that's within ten points they're going to take, whether it's congressional district or a legislative district, that they have a fighting chance now.

And will we see more money coming in from Washington and those PACs that usually traditionally in the past when we were a swing state, help out gubernatorial or especially U.S.

Senate and congressional candidates, that has not happened the last couple of election cycles.

Floirda has been considered a red state.

Democrats are going to save their money and put it in other places.

So that may change now.

So it's definitely, for the moment, a real big development here.

- One of the things that I love about this episode of Florida this week is that we are all over the map.

We're talking about the Middle East, Iran, Tehran, we're talking about Tallahassee.

And now we're going to shift our focus on Havana, Cuba and what's going on there.

The push for a free Cuba is growing in Florida.

Thousands of Cuban Americans packed the streets of the city of Hialeah this week for a free Cuba rally.

They were waving flags and chanting Libertad, which is the word in Spanish for freedom.

More than 8000 people turned out, according to CBS News in Miami.

The energy in South Florida comes as President Trump has signaled aggressive action toward the Cuban government.

Plus, the Florida legislature just passed a bill that would ease state restrictions on Cuba if there is a regime change.

Governor DeSantis, meanwhile, struck a cautious note this week.

Speaking in West Palm Beach on Wednesday, he welcomed the prospect of change on the island but does not want to see a mass migration into Florida if things become unstable.

Albert, I would like to start with you and ask you.

I mean, there's so much to this.

Is there really is there even a short answer to why the U.S.

has been in the embargo with Cuba, why we are at this point?

- Well, the short answer is that, uh, um, the United States embargo towards Cuba for some 67 years has absolutely nothing to do with human rights violations, political prisoners, freedom of the press, nothing.

It has everything to do with vengeance, hatred, pride and retribution.

Cuba was a colony of Spain for 400 years.

In the late 1800s, they decided they wanted their own independence.

They fought their independence.

They lost a fifth of their population in 1902.

They were an independent state.

But from 1902 to 1959, Cuba was nothing more than a colony of the United States.

Okay.

And we controlled everything on the island.

- The telephone was a sovereign nation.

But you're saying that the politicians in power were basically puppets of the American government?

- Uh, the short answer to that is absolutely okay.

That's what they were.

- Um, there was a really important interview that the Cuban deputy Foreign Minister, Carlos Fernandez de Cosio, did with Meet the Press.

- Our military is always prepared, and in fact, it is preparing, uh, these days for the possibility of military aggression.

We would be naive if, looking at what's happening around the world, we would not do that.

But we truly hope that it doesn't occur.

We don't see why it would have to occur, and we find no justification whatsoever.

Why would the government of the United States force its country to take military action against a neighboring country like Cuba?

- Some people might call his tone defiant, whereas others might say he's just doing his job.

What did you think of that?

- His answer was, you know, we're a sovereign country.

You don't like us.

We understand that.

So we have to be prepared for anything that might or might not happen.

So I wouldn't focus so much on that answer.

I would focus on more of all the other answers that they want to be friends with the United States.

There is not a scintilla of evidence that Cuba is an enemy of the United States.

Every American's go there.

They're welcomed.

They're treated with respect.

They're treated with dignity.

And the fact that people don't like that government.

So what?

I don't like the government of China.

I don't like the government of Saudi Arabia, but I want the right to travel there freely as an American.

- Tell us about the Obama initiatives that were started.

Where are we now on that?

And do any of them do we.

Are any of them being discussed as being brought back in the current negotiations with Cuba?

- No, and that's the classic example.

The initiative that Barack Obama did, who liked it.

The Cuban government liked it.

The Cuban people liked it.

99% of the American people liked it.

The Marriott Corporation liked it.

The Royal cruise line industry, all the cruise lines they liked.

Well, who didn't like it?

A thousand people in Miami, 25 people in Tampa and 500 people in Union City, new Jersey.

But they're the people that have the political muscle.

- Do you believe that the Castro regime is on its last leg?

What would it take for the diplomats to come to some sort of a result that would provide a change.

- Fidel Castro, I think, has been has passed away for at least I think it's ten years.

And he was out of power about five years before that.

But we keep referring to the Castro regime.

The people that run Cuba today is the president of Cuba, President Diaz-Canel, the foreign minister, Bruno Rodriguez, and the deputy foreign minister, Fernando Carlos Castillo Garcia.

They refer to him who was on the TV.

Um, Raul Castro, does he have influence in there?

Yes, he does, but he's, I don't know, 94, 95 years old.

Um, and one of the ironies is that President Trump and Marco Rubio, they all say that the Castro regime is still in power and Raul Castro still controls everything.

Well, if that's really true, why are they devoting all this time on President Diaz-Canel to get him to leave the country and desert the country and move on?

You know, they said if you just leave.

Well, which is it?

If he doesn't have any power.

I'd be focusing on the people that have the power.

And are there problems with the Cuban government?

Of course there is.

Are there problems with our government?

Of course there is.

But I always come back to why are we embargoing blockading?

Why are we denying them oil and food and medicine?

That is immoral.

- Well, in the time that we have left, there are so many different things that are that are happening.

This is one of those weeks where it's hard to pick topics for a half hour show.

So this is a time when I'd really love to hear from each of you, just briefly.

The other big stories that you're following.

So Mitch, what would you say is the big story.

- That you're following?

We've got this issue with the airports, right, with the TSA.

And I was at a congressional debate with Democrats who were trying to run against Anna Paulina Luna, and they don't like ICE.

Many of them want to deport or defund ICE, excuse me.

They're deporting people themselves.

But it just shows you that the Democrats position, which is controversial in some respects, like how they're holding out on this, not funding DHS, that some of their Democratic base, those people are were with them on that.

So I think that's kind of interesting.

- Quickly, what would you say is what are you looking at?

- I would like for your viewers to understand the so-called filibuster that everybody raves about okay.

Rule 22 of the Senate.

The United States Senate is never going to get rid of the filibuster.

Never.

Why?

Because you get rid of the filibuster.

Then you have a little mini house.

If everything is divided by George and you have senators that publicly say,"We've got to get rid of the filibuster," because they know that other senators are going to carry the water.

Not going to let them happen, you know.

And so it's very important we waste so much time.

This would only pass if you didn't have the filibuster.

The filibuster is actually a good thing.

- Arman, what would you say is when the Global and National Security Institute is looking at the scene in the Middle East and the and the local ties to Florida, what are you looking at?

- Well, you know, similar to all Floridians, we are concerned about the impact of the gas price on the Florida's livelihood.

Florida Floridians already were struggling in the pandemic era and the Great Migration with the housing problem, with the power purchase problem, they were just adjusting to it.

This is not going to help the.

The crisis in Cuba also might offload another level of immigration and refugee crisis.

So we are really concerned about what's the implication of this war, economically speaking, and also security wise for the people of Florida.

We are looking for it.

- Thank you so much for your perspectives and for your expertise.

It's always wonderful to hear the different voices and to have viewers hear those different perspectives.

So we thank you all for coming in.

Remember that our conversations don't end when the cameras are turned off.

You can find extended bonus content on our YouTube channel.

Just visit YouTube.com/WEDUPBS.

And if you'd like to watch this episode again, share it with someone.

You'll find our full archive of Florida This Week on our website at wedu.org.

That's all the time that we have for today.

Thank you to our panelists again.

Mitch Perry, Dr.

Arman Mahmoudian and Albert Fox Jr.

We know that you have plenty of options for your news and information, and we thank you for choosing us at Florida This Week and WEDU.

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