Sunshine State News
- After the Shirley Sherrod debacle, President Barack Obama doesn’t need to pick another fight with his African-American base. But Florida’s Democratic Senate primary poses a new no-win situation.
Black lawmakers are urging — even threatening — the White House to elevate its support of Kendrick Meek, an African-American congressman locked in a tight fight with multimillionaire Jeff Greene.
But Obama, who supported Meek before Greene entered the race and before Gov. Charlie Crist took his own Senate bid independent, has been sending mixed signals.
“As the president has said, Kendrick Meek is his candidate and he fully expects that he will be the next senator from the state of Florida,” White House Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton declared last week.
At the same time, however, Obama’s director of Latino outreach, Alfredo Balsera, is organizing a fund-raiser for Crist in Meek’s hometown of Miami. The invitation list is said to be loaded with Obama supporters.
