For a spell, it had looked as though Florida Governor Rick Scott was an obvious choice for presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump's running mate.
After all, he's a successful (if one is willing to overlook all the fraud that occurred on his watch) businessman-turned-politician from the Great State of Florida, a state many deem crucial in clenching the presidency.
He's hinted at not being interested before, but he said definitively-ish Friday that he is not going to be the one, reports the News Service of Florida—despite a planned visit with Trump scheduled for New York on Monday.
"I'm going to pass on that," Scott told CNN's Wolf Blitzer.
One might surmise that polling suggesting a Trump-Scott ticket would go over like a Lake-O sludge-filled ballon in Florida may have influenced the above quote.
Asked why, then, he was going to New York, the governor said he and Trump plan on gabbing about how to, despite being being a profoundly unlikable gazillionaire with a name synonymous with questionable business practices, one could win an election, something about which Scott knows a thing or two.
"We're going to talk about my race in 2010 and 2014, how I won, and how we can help him make sure he wins Florida," Scott said.
The above-mentioned poll has Hillary Clinton (assuming she's the Democratic nominee) up three points statewide, and among minority groups she is miles ahead of Trump. The one group that seems to like Trump over Clinton? Duh. White dudes, according to the poll.
But Scott, according to NSF, thinks Trump's message of "job creation, defend the country and build up the military" will resonate in Florida more than his promotion of isolationism and violence will revile them.
This article appears in Jun 2-8, 2016.