Florida's Latest News

Don’t know DeSantis’ campaign manager? Generra Peck would like to keep it that way

“Generra Peck had just finished a 5K spartan race at Nationals Park in Washington in September 2021 when the phone call came from Ron and Casey DeSantis.

Seeking to rebuild a political operation left dormant by internal dissension and the pandemic, Florida’s first couple were ringing to ask Peck to steer the governor’s re-election campaign.

Peck took all of a few moments to get to yes.

She drove back to her home in Richmond, packed her suitcase, scooped up her dog and began the 11-hour drive to Tallahassee the next day.

“The biggest reason why the First Family chose Generra is she’s very low key and doesn’t make it about herself. That’s probably the most important aspect,” said Nick Iarossi, a Tallahassee lobbyist, DeSantis supporter and fundraiser. “The fact that people don’t know her tells you how understated she is.”

Peck remains the lone “funnel” which every person who wants to reach Ron or Casey DeSantis goes through, according to a pro-DeSantis Republican outside the operation.

That unparalleled proximity to DeSantis means it is Peck who will ultimately receive credit for what would be the biggest upset since Barack Obama dislodged Hillary Clinton for the Democratic Party nomination in 2008, or the burden of defeat for a governor fending off a summer of political heat.”

Ron DeSantis to become first GOP candidate to file for South Carolina Primary during visit next week

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis plans to file his 2024 candidacy for South Carolina’s Republican Presidential Primary when he’s in the first-in-the-South voting state next week, becoming the first GOP hopeful to do so.

DeSantis will file his paperwork at the state GOP headquarters in Columbia on Tuesday, his campaign told The Associated Press on Friday.

DeSantis will make his candidacy official during his third campaign swing through South Carolina, where Republican hopefuls have been stumping for more than a year already. On Monday, he makes a stop in Tega Cay, an affluent community on Lake Wylie along the state line with North Carolina.

After he signs his candidacy paperwork, DeSantis plans to make a policy rollout in Columbia, the details of which the campaign did not immediately release. It will be DeSantis’ second policy announcement, following his immigration proposals — which call for ending birthright citizenship and finishing construction of the southern border wall — outlined during a June visit to a Texas border city.

USF researcher Joseph Dituri shares what he learned from his 100-day stay underwater

This week on Florida Matters, we talk with Joseph Dituri, a University of South Florida researcher who spent 100 days living underwater.

Dituri, 55, is a retired US Navy diver who has a PhD in biomedical engineering and goes by the nickname "Dr. Deep Sea."

He says the purpose of living underwater for 100 days was to gather data for medical research and to learn more about what it would be like to spend months in a confined environment, similar to what astronauts will experience on missions to deep space.

When he surfaced last month after a record-breaking stay underwater, he was a tiny bit shorter and couldn’t see too well.

The decrease in height and myopia were a couple of the side effects of more than three months living in the pressurized environment of Jules Undersea Lodge — more than 20 feet below the surface of the ocean — at the bottom of a lagoon in Key Largo.

7th case of locally contracted malaria reported in Florida

A southwest Florida county has document a seventh case of malaria, state authorities said.

The Florida Department of Health reported a new locally acquired case of malaria in Sarasota County during the week of July 9-15. That's in addition to five cases last month and one case in May.

Sarasota County and Manatee County directly to the north have been under a mosquito-borne illness alert for nearly a month. The area is located on the Gulf of Mexico, just south of Tampa Bay.

Sarasota County officials have been been using aircraft, trucks and ground crews to apply insecticide to the area where the malaria cases were reported. Mosquito control workers are trapping the insects and sending them to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for evaluation.

About 2,000 U.S. cases of malaria are diagnosed each year — the vast majority in travelers coming from countries where malaria commonly spreads.