Bill Clinton will be in East Tampa late Sunday afternoon to promote early voting in Hillsborough County, the third and final campaign event of the day in the Sunshine State for the 42nd president of these United States.
Although the polls will be closed by the time the Clinton event ends on Sunday (it begins at 5 p.m.), the former president will be at two "souls to the polls" events earlier in the day, an important day for Democrats to bring minority voters to the the election booth. Clinton will hit attend a rally at Florida A&M University for Panhandle-area candidate Gwen Graham and a Palm Beach Gardens fundraiser for incumbent Patrick Murphy.
No doubt you'll see all sorts of local Democrats at the Tampa event, because, hey, who doesn't love Bill Clinton these days? But I wonder if you'd see so many of them around if it were Barack Obama in town.
The current president was in town last month, you might recall, to get a briefing from the commanders at U.S. Central Command at MacDill Air Force Base. Kathy Castor joined him at one point, but no other Democrats were present that we know of. It was not a campaign event, because the president has been off the trail this fall, finally going out last Sunday to events in Maryland and Illinois.
But with his poll numbers at their nadir, some Democrats on the ballot around the country have been making it quite explicit how much they disagree with Obama, and no one is asking him to stump with them.
An exception might be Charlie Crist, who literally embraced Obama in 2009, and figuratively has done so in this campaign. Call it overcompensation for the fact that he wasn't a Democrat until two years ago, but whatever you want to say about his candidacy, I'm sure you know by now (after thousands of airings of Rick Scott ads) that Charlie thinks Obamacare is great. Crist has had the First Lady do events for him in Florida, and has embraced the president's policies wherever he goes.
But The Big Dog? Everyone loves him now. Hell, even Republicans do — until he goes on the campaign trail and trashes their policies. Folks can get tickets to the Clinton event at www.charliecrist.com/tampa for tickets.
In other news...
Agenda 20/20, the ambitious plan to reduce poverty in St. Petersburg's Midtown region, held an event yesterday to try to get 200 at-risk youth jobs next year.
GOP Congressman Paul Ryan was in Florida yesterday, raising campaign contributions for Florida GOP candidates like David Jolly and Vern Buchanan. DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz denounced Ryan and the congressmen who were with him for supporting the famed Ryan budget, which includes serious changes to Medicare. No biggie, except that Jolly didn't vote for the Ryan budget.
The Cal Ripken Foundation is investing in Tampa's Sulphur Springs neighborhood, to the tune of half a million dollars.
And Annette Taddeo, Charlie Crist's running mate, made an appearance in Temple Terrace yesterday to kick off early voting in Hillsborough County.