Florida Governor and independent Senate candidate Charlie Crist appeared on CNN's The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer Wednesday afternoon. It was a relatively brief but also quite substantive interview, as the guv admitted he was in town to attend a fundraiser being held by "prominent Democrats" close to Bill and Hillary Clinton. Crist also admitted he has no stomach for the "tougher than Arizona" illegal immigration bill introduced yesterday by Bill McCollum.
But since the day he announced his independent candidacy, the press has wanted to know: who will you caucus with if you're elected to the chamber in November? Crist, adroitly trying to alienate no one as he takes the independent route (which has worked brilliantly for him so far) again refused to say who he'd caucus with, even if his refusal verges on parody:
BLITZER: There are two independent U.S. senators, as you know, Bernie Sanders and Joe Lieberman, but they both caucus with the democrats and the democrats are in the majority, they have chairmanships and committee rankings and all that.
If you are elected to the United States Senate will you caucus with the democrats or the republicans?
CRIST: I’ve always said that I’ll caucus with the people of Florida. And what I mean by that is, issue by issue, whatever is in the best interests of the people of my state, my fellow Floridians, I want to be able to be with those who are going to help Florida.
BLITZER: But you got to make a decision because if you’re not going to be caucusing with one party or the other party, you’re not going to have any committee ranking and you’re not going to have any influence in the United States Senate. You’re going to have to make a major decision.
CRIST: Well, if I have the honor of winning, I’ll have a vote in the United States Senate.
BLITZER: You’ll have one vote, but if you’re chairman of a committee, if you caucus with the democrats, chairman of a subcommittee, you could have some influence. So you’re going to have to decide whether to caucus with the democrats or republicans. You just can’t caucus with yourself, if you will, if you want to have some influence.
CRIST: Well, I got to keep my eye on the ball and the eye on the ball for me means for me means looking at November 2nd. I’m not going to be a chairman of anything if I don’t get elected to the Senate first.
Meanwhile, the Associated Press reported earlier this week that he continues to gather Democratic party financial support, as donors who gave to Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign make up almost 10% of his individual contributions in the second financial quarter this year, as opposed to only 2.5% of those Obama donors when he was still a Republican (which was until the end of April this year). And his percentage of donors who contributed to his Democratic gubernatorial opponent in 2006, former Tampa Congressman Jim Davis, nearly doubled in the second quarter when he turned indie, vs. when he was still with the GOP.
This article appears in Aug 12-18, 2010.