Jennifer Carroll Vs Rick Scott

Steve Bousquet must have drawn the short straw and had to read the Jennifer Carroll book for the Tampa Bay Times/Miami Herald political news team. Carroll served as Rick Scott's Lt. Governor. Carroll's book "When You Get There" paints a picture of Rick Scott being emotionally disconnected.

"During my entire time in office, I never received a birthday card or an anniversary card or anything that showed a personal touch," she wrote. "No matter what I did to try to establish a relationship with the governor, nothing worked."

Clarence McKee told Bousquet that Carroll's account in the book of her minority voter outreach is correct. Susie Wiles, Scott's 2010 campaign manager supported Carroll's claim on how Carroll was placed on the ticket. Scott only conducted one interview with Carroll.

Wiles said that account was accurate. A long-time friend of Carroll’s, Wiles said she didn’t think the book would damage Scott’s re-election prospects. “I have a negative view -- as I think most people do -- of people who do these kiss-and-tell books after they have been trusted as part of the inner circle,” Wiles said.

According to Carroll, Scott showed no concern when Carroll fell and hit her head in a church. If true, this doesn't surprise me.

Rick Scott Fires Black People

It says a lot about Gov. Rick Scott when former Gov. Jeb Bush comes off as the voice of reason. There is a reason why the Scott campaign don't want the lost e-mails to be found. The emails will reveal how callous Scott and his transition team is.

Bush emailed Scott's campaign manager Susie Wiles during the transition. Bush asked why is the Scott Team firing black people.

"All three are African American, non-political and good workers," Bush wrote to Wiles.

Scott had a history of discriminatory hiring and firing practices. David Yarian worked for Scott's Solantic clinics. Yarian told Salon.com of Scott's refusal to hire brown-skinned people.


After the attacks on Sept. 11, Yarian says that Scott phoned him and stated that he should be careful not to hire anyone of Middle Eastern descent because they might scare off customers. At the time, Yarian was willing to excuse the directive as part of the collective shock the country was going through.

In November, though, Yarian interviewed a Hispanic man for a supervisory nurse position. "He was great. He had all the qualities and experience I was after," Yarian says. "But he had a slight accent. When Rick found out, he said, 'Nope. All our employees have to be mainstream.'"


One of the black people fired by Carolyn "Freda" King. She had lost her son, Army Pfc. Brandon King, in August of 2010. Another termination was Mavis Knight. Bush wrote to Wiles that Knight ""four governors well."

Scott did use of of the vacancies to add a tea party activist to the external affairs office. Shockingly, Scott's media relations handler Brian Burgess had no comment. Neither did Scott. That tells you how bad these firings stink.