{"id":184860,"date":"2026-03-09T23:05:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-09T23:05:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/184860\/"},"modified":"2026-03-09T23:05:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-09T23:05:11","slug":"last-call-for-3-9-26-a-prime-time-read-of-whats-going-down-in-florida","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/184860\/","title":{"rendered":"Last Call for 3.9.26 \u2013 A prime-time read of what\u2019s going down in Florida"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last Call \u2013 A prime-time read of what\u2019s going down in Florida politics.<\/p>\n

First Shot<\/p>\n

House Speaker Daniel Perez is acknowledging what most of Tallahassee already assumed: the budget isn\u2019t getting done this week.<\/p>\n

Opening the final week of Session, Perez told members the Legislature will keep grinding through its remaining business even as the 2026-27 spending plan slips past the scheduled Friday finish.<\/p>\n

\u201cDespite wild rumors to the contrary, I intend for us to continue working until both the House and Senate agree that we have disposed of all pending matters before the Legislature,\u201d Perez said.<\/p>\n

Perez said Monday through Wednesday will be devoted to Senate bills that either have a House counterpart on the calendar or are substantially similar to a House bill that has already passed. Those measures will either be approved outright or amended and kicked back to the Senate.<\/p>\n

So far this Session, the House has passed 253 bills and the Senate 149, with 53 clearing both chambers.<\/p>\n

Thursday and Friday will bring the familiar late-Session ritual of \u201creturning messages\u201d \u2014 bills that passed both chambers but in different forms and now need one more round of votes to iron out the differences.<\/p>\n

That process tends to produce floor sessions full of stops, starts and procedural detours as leadership works through the message lists.<\/p>\n

Evening Reads<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201cA wartime presidency defined by Donald Trump\u2019s unique political style<\/a>\u201d via Michael Birnbaum of The Washington Post<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201dU.S. and Israeli military campaign tests limits of air power<\/a>\u201d via Michael R. Gordon and Jared Malsin of The Wall Street Journal<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201cNine days in, the most basic question about the Iran War remains unanswered<\/a>\u201d via Judd Legum of Popular Information<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201cGas prices are set to go vertical<\/a>\u201d via Nate Silver of the Silver Bulletin<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201cHow ICE plans to put 8,500 immigrants in this warehouse<\/a>\u201c via Allison McCann, Helmuth Rosales and Eric Rabinowitz of The New York Times<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201dThe Pete Hegseth exception<\/a>\u201d via Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201dAmerica\u2019s vaccine skepticism is starting to show up in health data<\/a>\u201d via Pratick Pawar of Vox<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201dHouse Democrats blast James Uthmeier\u2019s pay at UF Law \u2014 but overlook half his workload<\/a>\u201d via Jacob Ogles of Florida Politics<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201dTough challenges confront electric air taxi firms as they maneuver to take flight in South Florida<\/a>\u201d via David Lyons of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel<\/p>\n

\u2014\u201dCan AI kill the venture capitalist?<\/a>\u201d via Arielle Pardes of WIRED<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Quote of the Day<\/p>\n

\u201cAs it is abundantly clear to all of you, we will not complete the 2026-2027 state budget by the end of the week.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014 House Speaker Daniel Perez, confirming an overtime Session.<\/p>\n

Put it on the Tab<\/p>\n

Look to your left, then look to your right. If you see one of these people at your happy hour haunt, flag down the bartender and put one of these on your tab. Recipes included, just in case the Cocktail Codex fell into the well.<\/p>\n

Grab a Fibonacci cocktail<\/a>, because Senate budget writers are taking a creative new approach<\/a> to the way Exceptional Student Education funding is calculated.<\/p>\n

House Democrats get A Swing and A Miss<\/a> for failing to parse the spreadsheet before taking a shot<\/a> at Attorney General James Uthmeier.<\/p>\n

Send a Shark Attack<\/a> to U.S. Sen. Ashley Moody, who\u2019s backing a bill<\/a> that addresses a \u2018reel problem\u2019 in the fishing industry.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Breakthrough Insights<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Tune In<\/p>\n

JU Dolphins try for rare NCAA women\u2019s hoops spot<\/p>\n

Jacksonville University aims for the program\u2019s first berth in the NCAA women\u2019s basketball tournament when they face Austin Peay in the ASUN tournament finals this evening (5 p.m., ESPNU).<\/p>\n

The tournament is being played in Jacksonville, but the game will tip off at the VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena, not on JU\u2019s home court, Swisher Gymnasium. The Dolphins were the second-seeded team in the tournament and have avoided the upset bug, beating West Georgia and Central Arkansas to advance to the finals.<\/p>\n

Austin Peay had a tougher road. As the eighth seed, the Governors beat ninth-seeded Lipscomb, top-seeded Eastern Kentucky, and fourth-seeded Stetson to reach the finals.\u00a0<\/p>\n

JU has one NCAA appearance in program history. That came in 2016, when the Dolphins won the conference tournament after finishing second in the regular season, just as they did this season. JU is led by Priscilla Wiliams, who averages 15. 4 points per game, with Tatum Brown adding 10.1 points per game. They are the only Dolphins scoring in double figures.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Austin Peay has three double-digit scorers: Anovia Sheals (14.2 points per game, Jim\u2019Miyah Branton (10.6), and Veronaye Charton (10.5). During the regular season, Austin Peay beat JU in Jacksonville on New Year\u2019s Day, 71-65, and lost to the Dolphins in Clarksville, Tennessee, on Jan. 31, 70-68.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Last Call is published by Peter Schorsch, assembled and edited by Phil Ammann and Drew Wilson, with contributions from the staff of Florida Politics.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Last Call \u2013 A prime-time read of what\u2019s going down in Florida politics. First Shot House Speaker Daniel…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":85141,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[19740,72317,4832,28,30,29,19741,4833,19742],"class_list":["post-184860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-breakthrough","tag-breakthrough-insights","tag-featured-post","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-florida-political-news","tag-florida-politics","tag-last-call"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184860","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=184860"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184860\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/85141"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=184860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=184860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=184860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}