Full Nelson?
Though it was not an official announcement, Florida Democratic U.S. Senator Bill Nelson released a statement on Monday that, in passing, stated he would be running for reelection in 2018. Nelson, who would be 76 years old on Election Day 2018, is setting his sights on becoming just the fourth Floridian to win a fourth term to the nation’s upper legislative chamber. Only Democrats Duncan Fletcher (1908, 1914, 1920, 1926, 1932), Park Trammell (1916, 1922, 1928, 1934), and Spessard Holland (1946, 1952, 1958, 1964) have won more than three U.S. Senate elections in Florida history among the 34 men and women to serve in the chamber. In addition to Nelson, Democrats Wilkinson Call (1878, 1884, 1890), Claude Pepper (1936, 1938, 1944), George Smathers (1950, 1956, 1962), Lawton Chiles (1970, 1976, 1982), and Bob Graham (1986, 1992, 1998) have all won three such contests.
At least ONE person needs to represent a State, even one as populous as FL, at any given point in time. Moreover, Nelson, since rebounding from what turned out to be a necessary loss to the Chiles-MacKay duo in an intra-party gubernatorial tussle (way) back in 1990, has served as a competent technocrat, and steady counterweight against Tallahassee Rs (Bush, Rubio and Webster as state House leaders, and Scott) as well as national Ds (DWS, et.al.). So, 6, even 12 more for Nelson!