It’s been expected, but now it’s all but official: Aides confirm that Florida Governor Charlie Crist will, indeed, announce tomorrow that he will run for the U.S. Senate as an independent. Crist has been a Republican his entire career, but a run from former state House speaker Marco Rubio on his right has pushed him both out of the party primary and into the center.
This, in effect, both blows up this race, as well as solidifying it earlier than the primary would have. Rubio now has a longer time to move center to try and court moderate Republicans and independents who might be scared off by his links to the tea party movement. His recent moves seem to have predicted that Crist would defect, e.g., his lack of support for the recent Arizona immigration bill. Meek’s campaign, which wasn’t too terribly great to begin with, got more complicated. While before he could paint Rubio as too conservative, now he has to change tactics and hope Rubio and Crist can split the right and open the center.
Can Crist win? Well, he has a better shot now than before (he was definitely going to lose the primary, but it’s arguable he had as good a shot in the general election), but his chances are still far from knowable. Nate Silver doesn’t think his chances are great. However, Crist does have a lot of time until November now, and if he can agilely move to the center without sending sell-out signals, he could come off as a slight-latter-day Scott Brown. Or, he could come off as a less-sleazy Joe Lieberman, but without the Democrats in this case to unofficially officially support his candidacy.
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