Thanks for the great article. I certainly did not understand this issue in near as much detail before, Geez, I am always just gobsmacked at what complete slimeballs Ron DeSantis and those close to him are. Florida has really gone to shit in the past decade or two.
Great piece. One point, though, about the argument that Mayfield is ineligible under the term limits section of the constitution.
The significance of the resignation clause is NOT that it directly applies to Mayfield. It clearly doesn't, since she didn't resign. The point is that it demonstrates that the authors of the term limit amendment wanted to prevent loopholes, which could support a strict interpretation of the whole section.
And a strict interpretation of term limits would support the argument that "eight consecutive years" -- the actual language in the Constitution -- is not synonymous with 2,920 days. (Another way to think about it: If someone tells you they've watched television for the past eight days, you wouldn't think that they had watched TV for the past 192 hours.)
But that's just about the legal argument over term limits. The question of whether a state agency run by a partisan political appointee has, or should have, the power to make these kind of legal determinations is a different issue entirely.
Thanks for the great article. I certainly did not understand this issue in near as much detail before, Geez, I am always just gobsmacked at what complete slimeballs Ron DeSantis and those close to him are. Florida has really gone to shit in the past decade or two.
Great piece. One point, though, about the argument that Mayfield is ineligible under the term limits section of the constitution.
The significance of the resignation clause is NOT that it directly applies to Mayfield. It clearly doesn't, since she didn't resign. The point is that it demonstrates that the authors of the term limit amendment wanted to prevent loopholes, which could support a strict interpretation of the whole section.
And a strict interpretation of term limits would support the argument that "eight consecutive years" -- the actual language in the Constitution -- is not synonymous with 2,920 days. (Another way to think about it: If someone tells you they've watched television for the past eight days, you wouldn't think that they had watched TV for the past 192 hours.)
But that's just about the legal argument over term limits. The question of whether a state agency run by a partisan political appointee has, or should have, the power to make these kind of legal determinations is a different issue entirely.
Thank you for laying this out in detail.