Rick Scott became Governor of Florida with a promise to create jobs. Yet his record since being sworn into office has been the exact opposite. Rick Scott and the legislature have responded to the budget shortfall by targeting state workers and the unemployed while paying off his political supporters with a special bailout, paid for by our public schools, teachers, police and fire fighters.
Even worse, Scott is systematically eliminating jobs instead of creating new ones by:
- Eliminating approximately 6,700 jobs, many essential to our state workforce.
- Giving tax breaks to big corporations and the wealthy while adding a new tax on police officers, firefighters and teachers.
- Rejecting $2.4 billion in stimulus money from the federal government to construct a high-speed rail link between Tampa and Orlando which would have resulted in 50,000 jobs in Central Florida.
- Making the deepest cuts to Florida schools in modern history. These devastating cuts could lead to more than 20,000 layoffs of teachers and other essential support personnel in every county.
- Eliminating 1,690 jobs from the state prison system.
- Refusing federal matching funds for Medicaid which will eliminate 135,000 jobs while taking $14.7 billion dollars out of Florida’s economy next year alone.
- Radically changing unemployment insurance to give corporations a tax giveaway, while the unemployed are left to suffer without relief or access to jobs.
- Giving a massive tax giveaway to bail out major corporations, many who are major donors to Scott and Tallahassee politicians.
Rick Scott and legislative leaders have turned their backs on the Florida families who elected them to create jobs. Instead, the Tallahassee politicians are back in the pockets of the special interests and big donors.