![\"Former](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/tfl-z-2298711565_267546925.jpg\")
Former Chicago mayor and ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel, left, campaigns with Florida Democratic gubernatorial candidate David Jolly at the Wynmoor Democratic Club on Monday, Oct. 5, 2026 in Coconut Creek.(Joe Raedle\/Getty Images)<\/p>\nDemocrats got a blunt warning and a promise of something better Monday from their party\u2019s candidate for Florida governor.<\/p>\n
Speaking about his Republican opponent, Democrat David Jolly was direct, leaving no doubt about his assessment: \u201cI want to be very clear about something, and I want you to hear me and I want you to understand it,\u201d he said. \u201cFolks, Byron Donalds is a liar. Byron Donalds is a liar. He is a liar.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was an in-person delivery of Jolly\u2019s latest television ad, in which he used the same term to describe Donalds, though it doesn\u2019t use the l-word as often and emphatically as Jolly did before 250 or so people at the Wynmoor Village condominium community in Coconut Creek.<\/p>\n
Like the TV spot, Jolly sought to reassure voters that the way he\u2019s being described by the opposition in its TV campaign isn\u2019t true. \u201cI don\u2019t support a hurricane tax. I don\u2019t support a tax on Social Security. I don\u2019t support oil drilling and I don\u2019t support socialism.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jolly\u2019s campaign themes are housing affordability, healthcare and education.<\/p>\n
Opponent Donalds, he said, has suddenly \u201cwoken up to the fact that we have an affordability crisis right now. He didn\u2019t recognize it while he was hanging out at Mar-a-Lago, in Naples as long as he was, but now he realizes he\u2019s got to win an election. And so we\u2019re seeing a whole new Byron Donalds.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jolly was joined in Coconut Creek on Monday by Rahm Emanuel, a potential 2028 candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.<\/p>\n
Emanuel is a former member of Congress, former mayor of Chicago, was chief of staff to former President Barack Obama and was U.S. ambassador to Japan under former President Joe Biden. He said Tallahassee, like Washington, D.C., needs to be cleaned out.<\/p>\n
\u201cI came here because I have seen the level of corruption out of Tallahassee and periodically you gotta turn it upside down, shake it out, and power wash the whole place. The legislative branch, executive branch, clean it up.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gates McGavick, a Donalds spokesperson, dismissed the Democrats\u2019 assertions.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo one takes David Jolly\u2019s claims seriously \u2014 he\u2019s now a radical Democrat who abandoned every political position he\u2019d ever held the second it became convenient. Jolly and Emanuel have two things in common: bad Democrat policies that would make life more expensive, and the fact that they both peaked years ago. Byron Donalds will win on November 3rd,\u201d he said via text.<\/p>\n
Insurance<\/p>\n
One of the biggest factors making housing unaffordable is \u201ca homeowner\u2019s insurance market that has collapsed,\u201d Jolly said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe CEOs make $20 million. When a big storm happens, they deny 50% of the claims. They close up shop, and they leave because one thing we allow them to do is ship all their profits out of the state while keeping their losses here. That\u2019s today\u2019s hurricane insurance market in Florida, and if you like it and support it, you\u2019re paying two or three times what you used to for 50% of the coverage. That\u2019s the Byron Donalds plan for insurance,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Jolly wants to establish a state windstorm insurance program that he said would provide cheaper coverage and avoid the problems he outlined. \u201cMy friends on the other side of the aisle call it socialism. I just call it cheaper insurance.\u201d<\/p>\n
Donalds said that\u2019s what would lead to a hurricane tax that could hit $1,000 a year for Florida families. That\u2019s what Jolly said is a lie.<\/p>\n
Former Chicago mayor and ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel, left, campaigns with Florida Democratic gubernatorial candidate David Jolly at the Wynmoor Democratic Club on Monday, Oct. 5, 2026 in Coconut Creek.(Joe Raedle\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Emanuel<\/p>\n
Like all the other Democrats traveling the country in advance of the midterm elections, Emanuel said he\u2019s not focused on his own political future, but on boosting Democratic candidates in 2026.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s plenty of time to think about that,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ll deal with the future, but the first and most important thing is sending a message of change that begins right here in Florida.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still, he devoted some of his remarks to themes that are sure to make up parts of his presidential pitch, if he runs. He said public education needs to be transformed, and he said he\u2019s recently been to Republican states in the South to see what they\u2019ve done that has been successful.<\/p>\n
Emanuel also said he wants to change Washington, D.C., in several ways: banning stock market trading and participation in prediction markets by officials and \u2014 something he said the older Wynmoor audience \u201cmay not like but I do\u201d \u2014 mandatory retirement at age 75 for the president, members of Congress and federal judges. (Emanuel is 66.)<\/p>\n
Emanuel poked some fun at his city\u2019s reputation \u2014 and used it to deliver a jab at Republicans in Florida and Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m from Chicago. We think we wrote the book on corruption. I was reading up on Florida. We got nothing on you,\u201d Emanuel said, describing what he said is a culture in Tallahassee that mirrors what he said is emanating from Washington, D.C., where he said moneyed interests get what they want.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Oval office right now looks like eBay,\u201d he said. \u201cThe president wakes up every morning thinking of his arch. You can\u2019t afford a meal at the golden arches.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"People](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/tfl-z-2298711358_267546933.jpg\")
People listen as Florida Democratic gubernatorial candidate David Jolly speaks during a campaign event at the Wynmoor Democratic Club on Monday, Oct. 5, 2026 in Coconut Creek. (Joe Raedle\/Getty Images)
\nWynmoor<\/p>\n
The audience, most of whom were older voters, frequently applauded Jolly and Emanuel and gave Jolly a standing ovation.<\/p>\n
The appearance came two weeks before early voting starts in the big South Florida counties\u00a0and a month before the final day of voting, on Election Day, Nov. 3. Jolly and Donalds are devoting much of their time to South Florida, home to a quarter of the state\u2019s voters.<\/p>\n
Attendance of more than 250 may have been juiced a bit by a frequent feature of political gatherings at big condominium communities: a spread of Danish, rugelach, bagels and cream cheese and coffee. Turnout appeared to have somewhat exceeded expectations; by the time the event started, the offerings were picked over, with only cream cheese and coffee remaining.<\/p>\n
Coconut Creek Commissioner Jackie Railey, president of the Wynmoor Community Council, the master association for dozens of associations in the community, said she was impressed. \u201cI was watching the crowd. Everybody was engaged and hopeful.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alan Weiner, president of the Democratic Club at Wynmoor, said he is optimistic about the election but \u201cvery nervous. That\u2019s being a realist. but I\u2019m also being a realist that we can pull this off if we keep working hard.\u201d<\/p>\n
He was at the front of the room, looking out at the audience while Emanuel and Jolly spoke and said he saw something telling. \u201cNobody left. Everybody was engaged the whole time, 100% of the time, that door didn\u2019t open in back with people walking out. Usually, you know, people get tired, they want to go home.\u201d<\/p>\n
Political writer Anthony Man can be reached at aman@sunsentinel.com and can be found @browardpolitics on Bluesky, Threads, Facebook and Mastodon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Democrats got a blunt warning and a promise of something better Monday from their party\u2019s candidate for Florida…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":419888,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[506,11864,2715,28,30,29,114,266,5741,5742,115,99,109],"class_list":["post-419887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-broward-county","tag-coconut-creek","tag-elections","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-national-news","tag-national-politics","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-social"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/419887","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=419887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/419887\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/419888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=419887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=419887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=419887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}