Everything about Jeb Bush totally explained
John Ellis "Jeb" Bush (born
February 11,
1953) is an
American politician, and was the 43rd
Governor of Florida. He is a prominent member of the
Bush family: the younger brother of current
President George W. Bush; the older brother of
Neil Bush,
Marvin Bush and
Dorothy Bush Koch; and the second son of former President
George H. W. Bush and
Barbara Bush.
Early years
He enrolled at
Phillips Andover, a private
boarding school in
Massachusetts, already attended by his brother, George. Bush made the honor roll in his first semester.
When Bush was 17, he went to
León, Guanajuato, in
Mexico, as part of his school's
student exchange program. He spent his time there teaching
English, and it was there that he met his future wife
Columba Garnica Gallo.
Bush attended the
University of Texas at Austin, where he graduated
Phi Beta Kappa with a
Bachelor's degree in
Latin American Studies in 1973, taking only two and a half years to complete his work, and obtaining generally excellent grades. He registered for the
draft, but the
Vietnam War ended before his number came up.
Family
After his early graduation, Bush married Columba Garnica Gallo, on
February 23,
1974. Their three children are
George P. Bush,
Noelle Bush and Jeb Bush, Jr. Their eldest son, George Prescott Bush (born
April 24,
1976 in
Texas), went to
Gulliver Preparatory School, studied at
Rice University, and earned a
Juris Doctor degree from the
University of Texas. Noelle Lucila Bush (born
July 26 1977 in Texas), their daughter and second child, studied at
Tallahassee Community College, graduating in 2000. John Ellis "Jebby" Bush, Jr. (born
December 13,
1983 in
Miami, Florida), their youngest child and second son, attended
The Bolles School, a private boarding and day school in
Jacksonville, and then the
University of Texas.
John Ellis Bush, Jr. works for a
Miami commercial real estate firm. He has received media attention on two occasions: in 2000, he was caught having sex in a
Tallahassee, Florida, mall
parking lot with a 17-year-old girl. On
September 16,
2005, he was arrested and charged with public intoxication and resisting arrest on the street corner near
Sixth Street in
Austin, Texas. His father responded that this was a "personal family matter" which was being handled privately. In
October 2007, John Ellis Bush endorsed
Rudy Giuliani for the 2008 Republican Presidential nomination, and will support the effort as chair of "Florida Young Professionals for Rudy".
Noelle Lucila Bush graduated from
Tallahassee Community College in 2000. On
January 29,
2002, according to a police report made public via
The Smoking Gun, she attempted to “fraudulently obtain a prescription” at a
Walgreens Drug Store located in
Tallahassee, Florida. The attending officer, Mark E. Dent of the
Tallahassee Police Department, ascertained that Bush had telephoned the pharmacy using the name “Noelle Scidmore” in an attempt to obtain
Xanax, a prescription drug used to treat
anxiety disorders. As a result of her arrest, Bush was ordered by a judge to attend a rehabilitation program at the Center for Drug-Free Living in
Orlando,
Florida. During her time at the facility, Bush was found in
contempt of court after being found in possession of two grams of
cocaine, and was sentenced to 10 days in jail. Upon completion of her rehabilitation program, the governor's press office released a statement on his behalf. “Columba and I are pleased that our daughter Noelle has completed this step, and grateful for the treatment she's received…. She has worked hard to get here. We are proud of her efforts and love her very much.” Recarey, who ran International Medical Centres (IMC), employed Bush as a real estate consultant and paid him a $75,000 fee for finding the company a new location, although the move never took place. Bush did, however,
lobby the Reagan/Bush administration vigorously and successfully on behalf of Recarey and IMC. "I want to be very wealthy," Jeb Bush told the
Miami News when questioned during that period.
Civic and charitable activities
After narrowly losing a 1994 election for Governor of Florida against
Lawton Chiles, Bush pursued policy and charitable interests. He started a
non-profit organization called The Foundation For Florida’s Future, a
think tank that stated as its mission influencing
public policy at the
grassroots level. He also "volunteered time to assist the Miami Children's Hospital, the
United Way of Dade County and the Dade County Homeless Trust".
Jeb Bush has also worked with The
James Madison Institute, a
free market public policy
think tank based in
Tallahassee, FL. He helped the institute in numerous ways and still has his think tanks working in conjunction with it. In June 2008, Jeb's institute, the
Foundation for Excellence in Education, will partner with JMI to hold a summit called
"Excellence in Action: A National Summit on Education Reform"
.
In 1996, The Foundation For Florida’s Future published a book that Bush had co-written,
Profiles in Character (ISBN 0-9650912-0-1), a clear parallel to
John F. Kennedy's 1955 book
Profiles in Courage. The foundation also published and distributed policy papers, such as "A New Lease on Learning: Florida's First Charter School", which Bush co-wrote. Bush subsequently wrote the foreword to another book, published by the
conservative Heritage Foundation and written by Nina Shokraii Rees,
School Choice 2000: What’s Happening in the States (ISBN 0-89195-089-3).
Bush co-founded the first
charter school in the State of Florida:
Liberty City Charter School, a grades K-6 elementary school. The school is situated in Liberty City, a Miami neighborhood that was the site, in 1980, of the first major
race riot since the
Civil Rights era. The school's co-founder, working alongside Bush, was
T. Williard Fair, a well-known local black activist and head of the Greater Miami Urban League. The Liberty City Charter School still operates today as a charter school.
Religious affiliation
In addition to his business, civic and charitable activities, Bush underwent a religious conversion during the early years of his career. At the urging of his wife, a devout
Roman Catholic, the
Protestant Bush converted to her religion. He and his wife belonged to the Epiphany Catholic Church in Miami for many years. Bush is also a Third Degree
Knight of Columbus according to an
August 3,
2004 speech his brother, George W. Bush, made at the 122nd Knights of Columbus Convention in Dallas. The following is an excerpt from the speech:
» "I'm proud to say that my family has contributed to your ranks. A few years ago, Governor Jeb became a Knight. And he — yes — and he recently took his Third Degree. I'll see him this weekend. His son is getting married. I'll pass on the word, aim for the Fourth."
Political career
Early campaigns
Bush got his start in Florida politics as the Chairman of the Dade County Republican Party. Dade County played an important role in the 1986 election of
Bob Martinez to the Governor's office. In return, Martinez appointed Bush as Florida's Secretary of Commerce. He served in that role in 1987 and 1988, before resigning once again to work on his father's presidential campaign. In 1989 he served as the campaign manager of
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the first Cuban-American to serve in Congress. He launched an unsuccessful bid for the Governor's office in 1994 against incumbent
Democratic Governor
Lawton Chiles. Bush lost the election by only 63,940 votes out of 4,206,076 that were cast for the major party candidates (2,135,008; 50.8% to 2,071,068; 49.2%).
Governor of Florida
In 1998, Bush defeated the Democratic opponent Lt. Governor
Buddy MacKay by over 418,000 votes (2,191,105; 55.3% to 1,773,054; 44.7%) to become
Governor of Florida, after courting the state's
moderate voters and
Hispanics. Simultaneously, his brother, George W. Bush won a landslide re-election victory for a second term as
Governor of Texas, and the Bush brothers became the first siblings to govern two states at the same time since
Nelson and
Winthrop Rockefeller governed
New York and
Arkansas from 1967 to 1971. Bush is the first Republican governor of Florida to have served two full four year terms.
Ironically, Buddy MacKay would become Governor before Bush, as his predecessor, Lawton Chiles, died of a heart attack on
December 12,
1998, only three weeks before his term ended.
Education
Bush's administration has been marked by a focus on public education reform. His "A+ Plan" mandated standardized testing in Florida's public schools, eliminated social promotion and established a system of funding public schools based on a statewide grading system using the
FCAT test. Bush has been a proponent of
school vouchers and
charter schools, especially in areas of the state with failing public schools, although to date very few schools have received failing grades from the state. One program that has seen fruition is the
Florida Virtual High School, a
distance-learning program that allows students in rural areas of the state to take
Advanced Placement classes for college credit. However, his policies have also been driven by a firm refusal to raise taxes for education, which led Bush to oppose a ballot initiative to amend the Florida Constitution to cap growing school class sizes. Bush said he'd "a couple of devious plans if this thing passes". Despite his opposition, the amendment passed; Bush's subsequent suggestions that the amendment be repealed have contributed to criticisms that he's failed to implement it in good faith. A similar concern about new expenditures has led to controversy over whether Florida has provided adequate resources to implement a subsequent voter-approved state constitutional amendment that requires a universal state-financed pre-Kindergarten program.
In higher education, Bush approved three new medical schools during his tenure and also put forth the "One Florida" proposal, an initiative that effectively ended
affirmative action admissions programs at state universities. These moves were among the influencing concerns that led to the faculty of the
University of Florida to deny Bush an
honorary degree, whilst the University of Florida Alumni Association made him an
honorary alumnus.
Libraries
On May 2006, as part of an unprecedented $448.7-million line-item veto of state funding, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush slashed a total of $5.8 million in grants to public libraries, pilot projects for library homework help and web-based high-school texts, and funding for a joint-use library in Tampa.
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Jeb Bush minimized history education but the state's librarians stood up to Jeb Bush and won.
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After months of controversy that included thousands of e-mails, petition signatures and hundreds of picketers at the State Capitol,the Florida House voted to ditch Gov. Jeb Bush's plan to give the biggest collection at the century-old State Library to Nova Southeastern University.
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Environment
Bush signed legislation to protect the
Everglades and opposed federal plans to drill for
oil off the coast of Florida. In early October 2005, Bush attempted to strike a compromise with fellow Republicans that would allow offshore drilling in an area that stretches 125 miles off Florida's coastline and give the state legislature the power to permit drilling closer to the state's coastlines. The compromise was warmly received by some Florida Republicans and U.S. Congressmen, such as bill sponsor
Richard Pombo, but has yet to be agreed upon; others including Republican U.S. Senator
Mel Martinez, objected to any backtracking on the drilling moratorium. Jeb Bush is skeptical about man-made global warming.
LGBT Issues
Bush opposes
gay marriage and
hate crimes status for
gays and
lesbians. He also promoted a friend-of-the-court brief supporting the state's ban on
gay adoption.
Culture of life positions
Bush is both
pro-life and a supporter of the
death penalty.
Bush was involved in the case of
Terri Schiavo, a woman with massive and irreversible
brain damage, who was on a feeding tube for over 15 years, and whose husband and legal guardian,
Michael Schiavo, wished to remove the tube. This move was opposed by Terry Schiavo's parents in the courts. Bush signed "
Terri's Law," a law passed by the Florida legislature that permitted the Governor to keep Schiavo on
life support. The law was ruled unconstitutional by the
Florida Supreme Court on
September 23,
2004. That decision was
appealed to the federal courts. On
January 24,
2005, however, the
U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case, thus allowing the Florida court's ruling to stand. Bush took heated criticism from
conservatives who were disappointed that he didn't take further action to prevent Schiavo from having her feeding tube removed.
Bush
oversaw 21 executions as Governor (more than
Graham, Martinez and Chiles while they were in office). Bush never agreed to commute any sentence
Bush also presided over switching from
electric chair (the only method of executions until
2000, now optional) to
lethal injection, after a botched electrocution of
Allen Lee Davis (first inmate executed under his administration and last, to date, electrocuted in Florida). After two previous botched executions (
Jesse Tafero in
1990 and
Pedro Medina in
1997) Governors Martinez and Chiles along with legislature declined to change methods.
While he's a firm supporter of capital punishment, Bush suspended all executions in Florida on
December 15,
2006, after the execution of
Ángel Nieves Díaz was seemingly botched. The execution took 37 minutes to complete, and required a second injection of the lethal chemicals.
Popularity
Bush has consistently remained popular overall in Florida — a state with more registered Democratic than Republican voters, and an influential and diverse number of independent
swing voters.
International trade
Bush said one of the most important goals of his final two years as Governor was to secure the
FTAA Secretariat for Miami.
Lieutenant Governors
Lt. Gov.
Frank Brogan, a former fifth-grade teacher, principal, and superintendent, served only one term with Bush. After Brogan remarried, he opted not to serve a second term. Brogan was reelected to a second term in 2002 with Bush and then resigned in March 2003. He and his new wife moved to
Boca Raton, where he serves as president of
Florida Atlantic University. In Tallahassee, a museum was named in honor of Brogan's late wife, Mary, who died on
June 27,
1999 of
breast cancer and, like her husband, was a Florida school teacher.
Following Brogan's resignation, Bush appointed former
Florida Senate President
Toni Jennings, with whom he'd occasionally disagreed in regards to public policy, as Lieutenant Governor.
Florida Cabinet
As Governor, Bush served as the chairman of the
Florida Cabinet, which provides collective governance over part of state government.
Other organizations
Bush was a member of the
National Governors Association and the
Republican Governors Association.
2002 gubernatorial election
Before Bush's re-election, no Republican in Florida had ever been re-elected to serve a second term as the state's Governor. In addition, there was likely no precedent for any Governor to be branded by the opposition as its "Number One Target" for removal from office, as Bush was ranked in 2002. This wasn't merely a statewide effort to oust the Republican Governor, but a much-publicized goal of the
DNC and its highest leadership during the 2002 election cycle.
The Democratic primary race
Bush almost faced
Janet Reno in the 2002 Florida Governor's race. However, a number of other Democratic candidates also wanted to become Florida's next Governor, including
Bill McBride. A prominent litigator with
Holland & Knight and a novice candidate, McBride was favored by national Democratic Party leaders in part because of his military background and perceived ability to attract Florida's more conservative voters.
In the ensuing Democratic primary contest (where only Democratic voters could vote, pursuant to state primary laws), circumstances surrounding McBride's victory outraged many voters in South Florida. Some voting venues – located in Reno's urban strongholds of Broward County and Dade County, and operated by Democrats elected as county election officials – reportedly opened hours late, and then
ignored Bush's Executive Order, issued at Reno's request, to stay open later to accommodate all voters.
The 2002 election results
In the closely watched Florida Governor's race that attracted national attention, Bush was re-elected in
November 2002, becoming the first Republican in the state's history to be re-elected as Governor. Bush defeated Democratic challenger Bill McBride with 56% to 43%, a greater margin of victory than in Bush's 1998 campaign for the Governor's office. Bush also increased the number of counties in his victory column, winning several Florida counties for the very first time.
In January 2007, Bush became only the second Florida Governor to complete two full four-year terms in office, the first being Democrat
Reubin O'Donovan Askew. (Bush was prevented from seeking a third term in the 2006 election, due to term limits under state law.)
Bush made political history not only by becoming the first Republican Governor to ever win re-election in Florida, but also by being the first Florida Governor to select a woman,
Toni Jennings, to serve as Florida's Lieutenant Governor. No woman had ever been appointed or elected to that high office in Florida's executive branch.
Bush is also the first Governor to hold office while having a brother simultaneously serve as President.
Political future
Bush was unable, due to
term limits under state law, to seek a third term as Governor.
Some speculated that Bush would run against Florida's current Democratic senator,
Bill Nelson, in the
2006 U.S. Senate election, but he did not; the Republican candidate was
Katherine Harris, who lost to Nelson.
Notwithstanding rumors, he didn't run for president in the
2008 election.
Political bases
Bush is popular among
Cubans in Florida (winning 80% of the Cuban vote in 2002), and popular among non-Cuban
Hispanics (56% in 2002, equaling the 56% he won statewide). As a longtime supporter of
Israel, Bush also maintains a significant connection to Florida's
Jewish voters. He was endorsed in his two winning Governor races by a national Jewish publication, and won 44 percent of the state's Jewish vote in the 2002 Governor's race. Many black voters support his focus on public education and parental choice in education, and a number of
Black Republican clubs have risen in Florida. In his re-election in 2002, Bush surprised critics by winning the white female vote in the swing-voting battleground of Central Florida's I-4 corridor. Most recently, he's reached out extensively to Florida's
Haitian community.
Bush's impact on his political party
Bush's appeal to Florida's highly diverse group of voters, along with his success in expanding the so-called "big tent" of the Florida Republican Party, appear to have propelled him into a commanding political position. Nationwide, American
conservatives appear to be positive about Bush, seeing him as committed to upholding core conservative principles. Bush often personally keeps in touch with his base, such as when he emailed his thanks to his most devoted supporters on a conservative web site within 24 hours after winning the 2002 Governor's race. Throughout his two administrations, Bush's office has touted his record of non–discrimination and rewarding merit, claiming he employs highly qualified women, blacks and other minorities more often in top-level government positions than any previous Florida Governor.
Outside of Florida, fellow Republican leaders throughout the country have sought Bush's aid both on and off the campaign trail. Bush's out-of-state campaign visits include
Kentucky, where Republican challenger
Ernie Fletcher appeared with Bush and won that state's governorship in 2003, ending a 32-year streak of Democratic governors. In
California, after Democratic Governor
Gray Davis was ousted in a
recall vote, Bush dispatched Florida's budget director to that state to lead an independent
audit of California's budget, at the request of the state's newly elected Republican Governor,
Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Governor Jeb Bush was also instrumental in overturning the presidential popular vote in Florida in 2000 over Al Gore to favor his brother, George W. Bush.
Bush's on-going interests
Bush has also been active in the
neoconservative think tank
Project for the New American Century, whose stated goal is to promote
American global leadership.
Since 2004, he's been serving a four-year term as a Board Member for the National Assessment Governing Board (NAGB). Created by Congress, this board’s purpose is to establish policy on reports examining K-12 students’ academic progress in America’s public and private schools. In 2008, Bush will be serving on the NAGB educational committee focused on Standards, Design and Methodology.
Bush as NFL commissioner
In
May 2006,
AP reported that Bush was privately approached to become the next commissioner of the
National Football League. This is said to be an interest of his, but it was unknown whether or not he'd take the position. The former commissioner,
Paul Tagliabue, announced that his tenure would soon be over and he's searching for replacements. "I'm flattered," Jeb Bush said May 24, 2006 of the NFL's interest, "but I'm Governor of the state of Florida and I intend to be Governor until I leave -- which is January 2007. And I'm not going to consider any other options other than being Governor until I finish".
Roger Goodell eventually became the new NFL commissioner.
Speech at D.C. Summit
On January 27, 2007 Bush spoke as the keynote speaker at the
National Review Institute's Conservative Summit in Washington, D.C. speaking about the Democratic take over in Congress. He told
political conservatives "we lost, and there are significant reasons that happened, but it isn't because conservatives were rejected. It's because we rejected the conservative philosophy in this country." He told them “don't…abandon conservative principles…we don't need to be the end all and be all for every
special interest group, for every constituent that you like, for every person that's given a fundraising check to your campaign, for everything that's just wrong about public policy and politics”. In attendance at the summit was former chairman of the
Republican National Committee Ed Gillespie who said if he, like Bush, “left office with approval ratings above 60 percent…he might be in
Des Moines today [preparingfor the presidential primary]”.
Electoral history
- 2002 Race for Governor
- 1998 Race for Governor
- 1994 Race for Governor
Further Information
Get more info on 'Jeb Bush'.
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