Early voting continues through Sunday, Aug. 18, at 28 locations in Broward County and 26 sites in Palm Beach. Locations are listed on supervisors’ websites. Early voting sites are open from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. in Broward and 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. in Palm Beach.

Polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. next Tuesday.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board endorses the following candidates in the Aug. 20 primary in Broward and Palm Beach counties:

BROWARD

U.S. House, District 23, Republican: Joe Thelusca

U.S. House, District 25, Republican: Chris Eddy

U.S. House, District 25, Democrat: Debbie Wasserman Schultz

Florida Senate, District 35: Chad Klitzman

Florida House, District 98, Democrat: Mitch Rosenwald

Florida House, District 99, Democrat: Daryl Campbell

Clerk of Courts, Democrat: Charles F. Hall

Sheriff, Democrat: Steven “Steve” Geller

Tax Collector, Democrat: Dwight Forrest

Supervisor of Elections, Democrat: Joe Scott

Circuit Judge, Group 1: Carol-Lisa Phillips

Circuit Judge, Group 38: Stefanie C. Moon

County Judge, Group 6: Kathleen Mary “Katie” McHugh

County Judge, Group 10: Samuel Ford Stark

County Judge, Group 16: Kathleen “Kathie” Elaine Angione

County Judge, Group 25: Corey Brian Friedman

County Judge, Group 32: Emilio “Emi” Benitez

School Board, District 1: Maura McCarthy Bulman

School Board, District 2: Rebecca Thompson

School Board, District 3: Sarah Leonardi

School Board, District 5: Jeff Holness

School Board, District 9: Debra Hixon

PALM BEACH

U.S. House, District 22, Republican: Deborah Adeimy

U.S. House, District 23, Republican: Joe Thelusca

Florida House, District 94, Republican: Anthony Aguirre

State Attorney, Republican: Sam Stern

State Attorney, Democrat: Gregg Lerman

Public Defender, Democrat: Daniel Eisinger

Sheriff, Democrat: Ric Bradshaw

Sheriff, Republican: Michael Gauger

County Judge, Group 2: Lourdes Casanova

School Board, District 1: Matthew Jay Lane

School Board, District 5: Charman Postel

All voters who are eligible by residency may vote in contests for judge and School Board, regardless of their party affiliation. All eligible voters may vote in Broward primaries for clerk of the courts, tax collector and supervisor of elections because only one party fielded candidates.

This contest is marked by the impact of outside money and negative advertising, much of it paid for by one interest group: trial lawyers.

The best-known candidate is Barbara Sharief, 52, of Miramar, a home health care executive and former mayor and commissioner for Broward County and a Miramar commissioner. So far, Sharief has spent nearly $292,000 of her own money in pursuit of an office that pays about $30,000 a year.

Sharief lost to Book two years ago in this same district, which includes Miramar, Pembroke Pines, Weston, Davie, Cooper City, Southwest Ranches and part of Sunrise.

If Sharief is to win this time, she will have to defeat two energetic and younger rivals: Chad Klitzman, 30, of Sunrise, a lawyer, and Rodney Jacobs, 34, of Miramar, a captain in the U.S. Army Reserve and director of Miami’s civilian investigative panel, a police oversight board.

Klitzman is best choice

All three Democrats have distinct strengths. On balance, the best choice is Klitzman, who came within 607 votes of winning a countywide race for supervisor of elections four years ago.

A politically astute Columbia Law School graduate who worked briefly as an intern in the Obama White House, Klitzman has deeper roots in the district than either of his rivals and offers the most detailed policy ideas.

If elected, he would be the Senate’s youngest member.

Sharief is a former Republican who donated to GOP candidates before switching parties in 2005. She is pursuing a defamation lawsuit against Book and a pro-Book political committee as a product of their highly combative 2022 race in which Book highlighted Sharief’s company being fined by the state for overbilling the Medicaid program by more than $500,000.

“We need someone who’s focused on legislating the future, not litigating the past,” Klitzman said of Sharief.

A threatened lawsuit

Sharief has threatened to sue Jacobs in this race for his campaign’s use of a manufactured, photo-shopped image of Sharief with Trump. Her campaign announced on July 17 that she sent Jacobs a cease-and-desist warning letter.

Jacobs, a first-time candidate and a District 35 voter for two years, is the intended beneficiary of a massive negative ad campaign against Klitzman based entirely on innuendoes.

It’s a case study of how special interest money seeks to dictate the outcome of legislative races.

Trial lawyers are targeting Klitzman’s brief former employment at White & Case, a global corporate white-shoe law firm whose clients include major corporations, some of whose partners have contributed generously to Republican candidates all over the country.

Grainy flyers show a photo-shopped image of Klitzman alongside Donald Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis and the line “Chad Klitzman and his Republican connections,” portraying Klitzman as an ally of right-wing extremists who ban books in schools.

Klitzman, a lifelong Democrat, never personally contributed to those candidates. But records show he has donated to numerous Democrats at the state and federal level.

Voters should reject this blatant case of guilt by association, which also raises questions about what Jacobs might owe Florida trial lawyers if he wins this election. By relying so heavily on one group, Jacobs risks being marginalized as a tool of special interests.

Tracking trial bar money

The disclaimer on the mailers is Progressive Youth PC, a Tampa-based political committee and the vessel for pass-through donations from other trial bar-aligned committees.

Another committee registered under Jacobs’ name, A New Hope for Tomorrow, is funded almost exclusively by lawyers, including the Florida Justice PAC.

Jacobs’ consultant, Dan Newman, says tying Klitzman to the firm’s Republican partners is fair game. “He chose that type of law over any other type of law,” Newman said.

Klitzman worked at White & Case as a young associate for less than two years. Before that, he worked at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, a firm closely tied to Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign.

Klitzman is endorsed by the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund. He also has endorsements from two major doctors’ lobby groups, the Florida Medical Association and Broward County Medical Association, despite Sharief’s extensive health care background.

Sharief appears in campaign literature in a white lab coat and a stethoscope. She is not a medical doctor, but has a 2017 doctorate in nursing practice (DNP) from Wilkes (Pa). University.

A diverse district

This is a diverse district where, as of last week, nearly half of the requested mail ballots were from white voters, with the other half divided between Black and Hispanic voters.

The district needs a strong voice in Tallahassee who can work in a highly partisan collegial body with other Democrats and Republicans.

Klitzman’s knowledge of voting and elections is another plus in a Capitol where Republicans regularly look for new ways to make it harder to vote.

Republicans hold a 28-12 advantage in the Senate, so every seat is critically important. In November, the primary winner in this solidly Democratic district will face Republican, Vincent Parlatore, who previously ran for state House in 2022 and 2020.

For Florida Senate, the Sun Sentinel recommends Chad Klitzman.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writers Pat Beall and Martin Dyckman and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Editorials are the opinion of the Board and written by one of its members or a designee. To contact us, email at letters@sun-sentinel.com.

The district stretches from Palm Beach Gardens’ western communities to Lake Okeechobee, taking in Jupiter Farms, The Acreage, Royal Palm Beach, and a trio of small towns near the lake. Most of it is rural land supporting the area’s $1.8 billion agriculture industry, one of the 10 largest in the U.S.

Adjunct college professor Christian F. Acosta, health care consultant Anthony Aguirre and small business owner Gabrielle M. Fox are vying for the Republican nomination and a chance to represent the sprawling district for the next two years.

A fourth candidate, Meg Weinberger, did not respond to an editorial board questionnaire or participate in interviews. Weinberger, who goes by “MAGA Meg,” has endorsements of Donald Trump and other marquee right-wing politicians such as U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz.

She has raised $281,394 in addition to $230,650 from her political action committee.

‘MAGA Meg’ liked Democrats

Despite her current embrace of the hard right, Weinberger and her husband Eric were both contributors to Andrew Gillum, the Democratic nominee for governor in 2018, who narrowly lost to Gov. Ron DeSantis.

Aguirre has support from Donald Trump Jr., the former president’s son, who contributed $1,000 to the candidate’s $262,965 campaign war chest.

More compelling than the endorsement is Aguirre’s understanding of the complexities and political makeup of the district as well as Medicaid, the budget-busting health insurance program for the poor.

The Sun Sentinel recommends Aguirre.

Solution-oriented

Aguirre, 40, graduated Florida State with a bachelor’s degree in economics. The Palm Beach Gardens resident is a consultant to the medical device company Medtronic and is operations manager for a medical practice group.

Health care eats up 43% of state spending, but Aguirre said the state isn’t getting its money’s worth. Patient outcomes are mediocre, he said, and resolving underlying problems will take expertise, not cash.

“You can’t just throw a bunch of money at it,” he said.

Undocumented workers are both a staple of the agricultural industry and a frequent conservative talking point. However, Aguirre’s response to a state law making it harder for farmers to find laborers and more expensive to verify their status is less political theater and more solution-oriented.

He acknowledges that the law is a financial burden on a low profit-margin industry where a single storm can level a year’s crop. But he distinguishes between immigrants who he says are crossing the border to reap government benefits and undocumented workers here for a job.

Productive workers contributing to the agriculture industry should be offered a legal immigration track to become verified and documented, Aguirre said.

Aguirre could bring needed pragmatism to the state Capitol. He supports Trump and one of his goals is to continue Gov. Ron DeSantis’s policies, but he says the district has roughly equal numbers of Republicans, Democrats and independents.

Whoever wins, he said, should not write off two-thirds of the electorate.

It’s a four-way primary

Christian F. Acosta, 41, holds masters’ degrees in nuclear engineering and management from the University of Florida. The adjunct professor at Palm Beach State College said he has worked with Roth for two years to better understand the district.

That includes relocating to Palm Beach Gardens to be inside district boundaries. The new home was slightly outside it, however, and he is living in Delray Beach with family while house-hunting.

He is the only candidate with political experience, having lost a 2020 Republican primary bid for the congressional seat held by Democrat Lois Frankel.

While it’s not as high profile as Congress, Acosta points out, state lawmakers are in a unique position to work on state issues in Tallahassee, then help mediate local issues with state resources in their districts.

Gabrielle Fox, 41, graduated from Keiser University with a degree in psychology and owns a bookkeeping firm. The Palm Beach Gardens political newcomer spent seven years as a conservative activist before deciding to run for Roth’s seat.

A small-government advocate, she said she jumped into this state race in part because of legislative bloat, citing more than 180 laws passed in the last session. “I can take a look at where we are overstepping and perhaps reel things in,” she said.

State representatives serve two-year terms and are paid $29,697.

Only registered Republicans can vote in this primary in House District 94.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writer Martin Dyckman and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Editorials are the opinion of the Board and written by one of its members or a designee. To contact us, email at letters@sun-sentinel.com.

Campbell, 38, had to run again a few months later, and because voters in District 99 had spoken, we agreed that Campbell deserved a full two-year term.

A former legislative aide to the departed DuBose, Campbell lacked experience, but we liked the idea of a mental health professional being in the Legislature in a state with an abysmal track record of funding mental health, a record just now starting to turn around.

According to Mental Health America, Florida improved from No. 46 to No. 40 among states in access to mental health care between 2023 and 2024.

Now, two years later, we endorse Campbell again, with no reservations. He’s learning the ropes and has proven to be a quiet but dependable representative. District 99 needs an experienced voice in Tallahassee, and Campbell is the better choice.

He voted against the most abhorrent bills to pass this year’s session, such as the gutting of state ethics laws (SB 7014) and a ban on sleeping in public that targets the homeless (HB 1365).

But even as he has resisted an increasingly radical agenda in Tallahassee, he has managed to do right by his district.

“It can be quite divisive up there, but as a freshman legislator, I was able to bring home $10.4 million to our community,” Campbell noted in a video call that also featured his opponent, Joshauwa Brown.

Campbell also co-sponsored two bills that became law in 2023 and 2024, an uncommon accomplishment for a junior-level Democrat.

One bill requires the state to maintain a sickle cell registry to better track that disease, and the other creates a pathway for people who have been homeless to qualify for a less stringent background check to be employed by certain homeless service providers.

Brown, 41, who runs a youth sports program, is earnest, but we don’t believe he has the knowledge of legislative issues that Campbell has. In his questionnaire, he cited rent increases as a top problem in the district, but his remedy of caps on rent increases is unworkable.

Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a law in 2023 banning any local laws on rent control.

We also asked about DeSantis’ vetoes on next year’s arts funding and a loosening of state ethics laws that Campbell voted against. Brown was unfamiliar with either issue.

Campbell’s questionnaire includes detailed answers to all of our questions.

He cited as the district’s top issue access to health care and housing — not merely due to the skyrocketing expense of both sectors, but simply because good health care can be difficult to find for residents who rely on Medicaid. Increasing access to both health care and housing would be a top priority for Campbell should he be re-elected.

Campbell has an incumbent’s usual advantages such as name recognition and fundraising. (He has raised about $50,000 to Brown’s $2,000, and Brown appears to owe more than he has raised, which is not allowed.)

This race is an open or universal primary because only Campbell and Brown are running. All Republicans, unaffiliated and minor-party voters can vote in the Democratic primary. The district had 60,274 registered Democrats and 14,485 Republicans as of March.

Campbell has proven himself to voters, and Brown offers no compelling reason to oust an incumbent. In House District 99, the Sun Sentinel recommends Daryl Nevroy Campbell.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writer Martin Dyckman and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Editorials are the opinion of the Board and written by one of its members or a designee. To contact us, email at letters@sun-sentinel.com.

That effectively makes the primary the general election in District 98. The time to vote is now — by mail, early (starting Aug. 10) or on Election Day, Aug. 20.

Three of four candidates returned questionnaires and took part in a joint interview that can be accessed online. They are Keith Abel, 54; Emily Rodrigues, 26; and Mitch Rosenwald, 53. All three live in Oakland Park.

The fourth candidate, Shelton Pooler of Pompano Beach, has been a frequent, unsuccessful candidate for public office. He did not return our questionnaire or take part in a joint interview.

It’s a close call between Rodrigues and Rosenwald. Both are well-informed and have good ideas for tackling a critical lack of affordable housing in this diverse, working-class district.

Rosenwald is best pick

Rosenwald is our recommended candidate on the basis of his experience as a professor of social work at Barry University since 2009 and his four years as a mayor and commissioner in Oakland Park.

Rosenwald, who earned degrees in his field from Salisbury (Md.) University, Syracuse and University of Maryland, is a licensed clinical social worker. That’s a perspective not often seen at Florida’s Capitol, and his local government experience is needed to fight the incessant Republican attacks on the home rule power of cities and counties.

Rodrigues, a digital strategist for nonprofits and Democratic campaigns, graduated from the University of Central Florida with a political science degree and is working on a master’s degree in mass communication at UF.

She was an aide to state Sen. Shevin Jones, D-Miami Gardens, during the 2021-22 term of the Legislature and worked for the Central Florida Urban League for a year.

She has much to offer, and we encourage her to run again is she is not victorious. As her top issues, she emphasizes housing and property affordability, attacks on the public schools and on reproductive rights.

Abel, a retired Sgt. First Class after a 30-year career in the Army’s Quartermaster Corps and a logistics specialist, says he’s running to continue in public service. The most critical issues he cited are the need for more affordable housing, climate change and more money for schools.

He appears less familiar with how the Legislature works. We also found him to be soft in his criticism of widespread private school vouchers that are harmful to public education.

Similar views

There was no daylight among Abel, Rodrigues and Rosenwald on abortion rights, gun control, homelessness, public ethics or most other major issues that the Legislature has handled poorly.

All three also strongly disapproved of Gov. Ron DeSantis having vetoed some $32 million in appropriations to arts and cultural programs.

“We’re all strong candidates who want to take on the DeSantis machine,” Rosenwald said.

He’s a rare Democrat endorsed by the Florida Chamber of Commerce. “I am able to reach across aisles,” he said. “I am a pro-business Democrat but I have also been endorsed by Equality Florida (a leading LGBTQ group) … look at my record as a problem solver.”

Rosenwald said his accomplishments in Oakland Park include “driving affordable housing policy, introducing a community wellness initiative, attaining a perfect score on the Human Right Campaign’s Municipality Equality index for LGBT individuals’ needs, advancing more green space in the city, requesting traffic signage and guardrails to make traffic safer, and even saving a historic tree threatened by removal for development.”

This open or universal primary is a welcome improvement over the familiar tactic of recruiting write-in candidates to limit turnout to one party’s voters or the other. Write-ins can’t win.

District 98 includes all or part of Oakland Park, Pompano Beach, Deerfield Beach, Fort Lauderdale and Tamarac. House members serve two-year terms. A legislator’s salary is $29,697.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writers Pat Beall and Martin Dyckman and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Editorials are the opinion of the Board and written by one of its members or a designee. To contact us, email at letters@sun-sentinel.com.

It’s also a referendum of sorts for an office nationally recognized for advocacy.

Public defenders don’t simply represent people accused of a crime. They represent the poor, including people whose homelessness or untreated mental health needs contributed to their arrest. Poverty is the thread running through the caseload of a public defender’s office, and more than 50,000 of those cases land at the doorstep of the P.D.’s office each year in Palm Beach County.

During her 23 years, Haughwout won praise for championing mental health access, re-entry programs for convicted offenders and efforts to keep nonviolent offenders out of jail. The agency offers higher salaries, has less turnover and frequently better client outcomes than other Florida public defenders.

Two men, two paths

Eisinger, who has won Haughwout’s endorsement, would build on this solid foundation.

Frankel would take the office down a different path, prioritizing closer ties to prosecutors and police and playing a bigger role in policies.

There’s no good reason to do that, however, and good reason to avoid it. The Sun Sentinel recommends Daniel Eisinger for Public Defender in the 15th Judicial Circuit of Palm Beach County.

Born in Tel Aviv, Israel, Eisinger emigrated to the U.S. in 1980. After earning a law degree from UF in 2003, Eisinger, 45, began his legal career in the Public Defender’s Office. He worked in homicide, supervised the misdemeanor division and led the felony division before advancing to chief assistant six years ago.

In addition to administrative duties, Eisinger carries his own caseload. He launched a misdemeanor mental health court to connect low-level offenders with professional help. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he worked with the chief judge to lower bond for certain nonviolent offenders awaiting trial, easing jail crowding and the likelihood of a super-spreader event.

Not a politician

Eisinger’s endorsements include three former Florida Bar presidents. Much of his campaign money comes from the legal community, including 29 assistant public defenders and the Miami-Dade public defender. Unlike Frankel, he’s not a natural politician, but in this race, that’s an asset — not a liability.

By contrast, law enforcement support and Delray Beach businesses, many of them in development and real estate, dominate Frankel’s support.

Frankel, 52, went to work for the Palm Beach County public defender’s office in 1999, two years after graduating from University of Toledo College of Law.

In 2001, he launched his own firm. He was elected to the Delray Beach City Commission from 2009 to 2015 and again from 2018 until March. He served two years on Palm Beach County State Attorney Dave Aronberg’s sober homes task force.

“I want to go back where I started my legal career,” said Frankel, who has been eying the job since 2015.

It’s not a good fit

Endorsed by Aronberg, the local Police Benevolent Association and Fraternal Order of Police, Frankel prioritizes increased collaboration among public defenders, prosecutors and law enforcement.

It’s not a good fit. Public defenders and law enforcement may be friendly adversaries, but they are adversaries just the same. Clients are best served when it stays that way.

A 2018 investigation by Gatehouse Media found that in Martin County, where the public defender urged her staff to get along with prosecutors, clients spent twice as long behind bars than those of the Palm Beach Public Defender’s office, where Haughwout pushed her staff to challenge prosecutors.

Frankel views the public defender as a policymaker and emphasizes his years at City Hall, where he compiled a pro-growth record.

Some Delray policies risked putting more poor people in jail. In 2021, Frankel backed criminalizing aggressive panhandling in the popular downtown district, balking at requests to postpone a vote until a task force could provide input.

The homeless in Delray

Two years later, complaints about homeless people resurfaced. Because just 16 of the estimated 104 homeless people in Delray created most of the problems, commissioners had an opportunity to partner with social service or medical providers and focus on getting the handful of chronic offenders off the street for longer than a brief jail stay. Frankel called for more law enforcement.

Frankel’s response that the 2021 panhandling law has not been challenged in court does not address the fact that it could put more people behind bars, or that if he wins, he could end up defending people he indirectly helped get arrested.

The four-year position pays $212,562.

Because the only two candidates are Democrats, this is a universal primary. All voters can cast ballots, regardless of party registration. The Democratic candidates’ names will appear on all ballots, including those sent to Republicans and independents. The winner will be determined on Aug. 20.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writer Martin Dyckman and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Editorials are the opinion of the Board and written by one of its members or a designee. To contact us, email at letters@sun-sentinel.com.

Dislodging a well-known, well-financed 20-year incumbent is a tough challenge, but Republicans have an obvious clue as to whom Bradshaw would rather not face — it’s Gauger.

Gauger impresses us as the far stronger candidate. We recommend his nomination in the Aug. 20 primary, to give voters a viable option in November.

The Palm Beach County Police Benevolent Association (PBA), which has long been close to Bradshaw, endorsed him the day he announced for a sixth term in May 2023. PBA sources overall have contributed at least $4,750 to Bradshaw’s campaign.

Follow the PBA money

They have also given six $1,000 contributions to Diaz. That accounts for some 12% of his meager fund-raising so far.

Diaz says his PBA support is no different than Gauger’s support from the Fraternal Order of Police. But there’s a major difference: The FOP, unlike the PBA, is highly critical of Bradshaw.

Unions and other interest groups often place bets on both sides of a campaign. But in this instance, the PBA has put that $6,000 on a candidate who lost in a landslide against Bradshaw four years ago and would likely lose again. The PBA would be all in for Bradshaw in November.

It’s time to give another Republican a chance.

Decades of experience

Gauger and Diaz are former Palm Beach career sheriff’s deputies. Gauger, 76, retired as chief deputy after 51 years in the sheriff’s office and is a consultant and paralegal. Diaz, 62, joined the office after serving in the military police and rose through the ranks over 27 years.

More recently, Diaz was deputy chief of police in Bartow for two years, a job he resigned to run for Palm Beach sheriff.

He left Bartow amid discord that led to the departure of Chief Bryan Dorman. A consultant’s report cited a “leadership crisis” that cost Dorman the respect of many officers and said that the local state attorney did not trust the agency’s work on major crimes.

News accounts said the report implied that Diaz contributed to the turmoil by openly bad-mouthing Dorman in front of other officers.

“As far as undermining the chief, I never did so,” Diaz said as he and Gauger debated their backgrounds in a joint interview with the Sun Sentinel Editorial Board. Diaz did say that he had told Dorman that he should go to the city manager and resign.

Diaz maintains that Bartow hired him “to fix their investigations” and that he was a whistleblower.

No immigrant crackdowns

Aside from who should replace the Democratic sheriff, Gauger and Diaz agree that the department is ill-suited to participate in any sort of manhunt for undocumented immigrants such as their party’s presidential candidate proposes. Both would limit their actions to arresting them for specific crimes.

They also oppose arresting homeless people who aren’t committing crimes — the underlying intent of a new state law, HB 1365 — and would be proactive in helping the homeless.

They would also halt the controversial longevity bonuses that Bradshaw pays to retiring executives. Gauger said that when he retired, he thought his “was too much, it’s wrong.” He also said the department doesn’t need four helicopters or a fixed-wing plane “that sits in a hangar.”

Their sharpest policy differences are over community policing — Gauger strongly supports it and Diaz is a skeptic — and who’s more Republican.

“I’ve been a Republican since I was 18,” Diaz said. “I’ve not been a Republican for a year and a half.”

Conceding that he’s a former Democrat, Gauger said he “didn’t leave the party, the party left me.”

For a nonpartisan PBSO

The sheriff’s office should be nonpartisan, he added, because it’s about “safety and serving the community.”

Gauger, of Wellington, has bachelor’s and master’s degrees in liberal studies and social work from Barry University and has also had courses at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government and the University of Louisville. Diaz, who didn’t say where he lives, cited bachelor’s and master’s degrees in criminal justice and homeland security and emergency management from Kaplan University.

Their questionnaires and a video of the Sun Sentinel interview can be accessed online.

The sheriff’s salary, set by state law, is $270,489

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writer Martin Dyckman and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Editorials are the opinion of the Board and written by one of its members or a designee. To contact us, email at letters@sun-sentinel.com.

Some say his longevity has made Bradshaw too set in his ways. He’s inflexible about awarding lavish bonuses to departing senior staff members and refuses to show in sufficient detail how he would spend the tax money he asks for annually.

Those are pertinent criticisms. But the basic question is whether Bradshaw has more to offer than Alex Freeman, his challenger in the Aug. 20 primary, open to Democratic voters only.

Bradshaw’s experience running one of the state’s largest law enforcement agencies is a clear advantage over Freeman’s experience at smaller agencies. For Democrats, Bradshaw is the only option, and would be the stronger nominee in the general election on Nov. 5.

We offer this recommendation without enthusiasm. We make it in the hope that Bradshaw, if re-elected, might finally return the public’s trust by providing line-item budgets, forsaking the controversial bonuses, and keeping the Police Benevolent Association at a respectable arm’s length when it comes to disciplining deputies for excessive force or other misconduct.

Bradshaw, 76, leads about 4,500 employees, including 1,556 sworn law enforcement officers and 700 sworn correctional officers. This year’s budget is $877 million and he’s asking the County Commission for $75 million more next year, a record amount.

He defends his budget as transparent, but without line-item detail, it’s not. Freeman strongly favors line-item budgeting, a point in his favor (it’s hard to believe this is a debatable point in 2024). A budget cast only in broad categories is too easy to manipulate, once it’s in effect.

Notably, Bradshaw’s budget puts off for the second straight year any replacement of patrol cars, radios, laptops and other essential equipment, as the news site Stet News has reported in detail. In bare-bones detail, Bradshaw says he’ll ask for $165.2 million more for those over the ensuing five years, most of it in 2025 — after the election.

Untouchable for too long

Bradshaw was West Palm Beach police chief before he was elected sheriff in 2004. He has been politically untouchable ever since, winning his 2020 primary with 61.3% of the vote and the general election with nearly 65%.

Freeman, a former Riviera Beach police chief and a familiar foe, lost badly to Bradshaw in the 2016 and 2020 primaries.

Financially, the candidates are worlds apart. Bradshaw has raised more than $806,000 to Freeman’s $53,835.

Both Democrats submitted Sun Sentinel questionnaires and participated in a joint interview, which was recorded and is accessible online.

Bradshaw maintains that “this is absolutely the wrong time to change leadership.” He speaks of improving mental health for jail inmates and chairs a regional homeland security committee.

Too many lavish bonuses

Defending what Freeman called $2 million in longevity bonuses to retiring PBSO executives, Bradshaw said they are contractual agreements he cannot break. Nonetheless, they ought to be reviewed frequently (he said they were reviewed by lawyers in 2021).

Both candidates agree that it would not be their business to hunt down undocumented immigrants as former President Trump says he would have local police do.

“You can’t get the trust of the people in the community if they’re worried about being deported,” Bradshaw said.

Freeman, 55, was a Riviera Beach police major before retiring in 2014. He became police chief in Midway, a small town near Tallahassee, leaving in 2022. Then he was briefly an assistant chief for tiny Jupiter Inlet Colony (pop. 405), which he’s now suing in federal court over alleged racial discrimination.

His retirement in Riviera Beach followed the City Council’s firing of a new city manager who hadn’t interviewed Freeman, who applied for the vacant chief’s job.

A knock on Joe Biden

Although Bradshaw is the stronger, more experienced candidate, our lack of enthusiasm owes in part to a cheap shot that he took at President Biden during last week’s joint interview when he was asked about his own fitness to serve.

Bradshaw would be 80 in the last year of his next term — a year younger than Biden is now.

“People who know me know that I’m a young 76,” Bradshaw said. “My mental acuity is nowhere near the president’s … people will tell you I’m sharper than that.”

To extol himself at the president’s expense was uncalled for.

The sheriff’s salary, set by state law, is $270,489.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writer Martin Dyckman and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Editorials are the opinion of the Board and written by one of its members or a designee. To contact us, email at letters@sun-sentinel.com.

In our view, Gregg Lerman, a West Palm Beach criminal defense attorney with deep experience, is the most likely change agent among three Democrats. Whoever wins the Aug. 20 primary will face a Republican on Nov. 5 and Adam Farkas of North Palm Beach, with no party affiliation. We recommend Lerman as the best choice for Democrats.

The other candidates, Alexcia Cox and Craig Williams, are senior executives in the state attorney’s office, which has 120 prosecutors and 220 supporting employees. They’re squabbling over conviction rates and which of them is more up to the job, and that does not bode well for how either would lead it.

Fortunately, Lerman is a credible alternative. He says his 39 years as a defense attorney give him “unique insight into the causes of crime and what can be done to reduce it … what programs need to be expanded, such as certain diversion programs, drug court, veterans court and drug offender programs.”

It is not unusual for a lawyer to cross over from one side of the courtroom to the other. It’s often a prosecutor leaving to become a defense attorney, having been trained at public expense.

Both sides of the legal table

There’s no reason why a defender should not go the other way. The same discipline applies to both — that of applying logic to the evidence and the law and advocating your side of the case. American justice depends on competent representation for both the public and the defendants.

Candidates fielded our questionnaires and participated in a joint hour-long interview. During that discussion, we heard no compelling answer why the office’s conviction integrity review unit, one of only five among the state’s 20 judicial circuits, seems dormant.

Cox, who said Aronberg picked her to establish it, said it had reviewed “maybe 120 petitions” when she left it. None was granted, which to Cox meant “we were happy about the fact that we had not determined there was a case in our office that warranted exoneration.”

Similar offices in three other circuits had no trouble finding convictions where justice miscarried. Everything that humans do is susceptible to error.

Lerman, referring to a conversation with the Florida Innocence Project, said it had tried to contact Aronberg’s office about a convicted murderer named Lawrence K. Johnson Jr., and “never got a response.” Johnson was convicted on DNA evidence that his advocates say was faulty. Lerman, who was his defense attorney, agrees.

Lerman’s agenda

Lerman, 64, of Palm Beach Gardens, earned his law degree from Nova Southeastern University School of Law.

“Issues such as elder fraud, drug addiction, mental illness and homelessness must be better dealt with by the system,” Lerman told us. “Finally, the office must be held accountable to the public when law enforcement crosses a line. A badge is not a ‘hall pass’ that puts somebody above the law.”

Cox, 44, the deputy chief assistant state attorney, cites her experience leading the domestic violence unit and as “the only person here who has successfully prosecuted a police officer in Palm Beach County.” That was Nouman Raja, convicted of manslaughter in 2019 for shooting a stranded Black motorist.

Even so, Cox said, she has been endorsed by two police unions because “they know I’m the best person for the job.” She graduated from the Florida State University College of Law.

Williams, 59, the current chief assistant state attorney, is a Nova graduate who has been a prosecutor for 27 years. He supervises 45 felony prosecutors and says he brought the office up from “dead last” in Florida’s conviction rates to number three, with a 95% conviction rate. He promises leadership to keep Palm Beach County from having “a mass exodus of good prosecutors and support staff.”

Most recent campaign reports show receipts of $208,446 for Cox, who also has a PAC that’s raised $36,455, and $97,616 for Lerman, including a $10,000 loan to himself.

Williams reports $257,945, including $75,000 in loans to himself. The state attorney’s salary, set by the state, is $218,939.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writer Martin Dyckman and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Editorials are the opinion of the Board and written by one of its members or a designee. To contact us, email at letters@sun-sentinel.com.

That vote is an obligation and an opportunity and is not to be taken lightly.

The power of a state attorney is enormous, and so is the discretion.

Those have rarely been abused so flagrantly as by the former Palm Beach State Attorney Barry Krischer 18 years ago when he let the child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein off with a sentence so light that it could hardly be called punishment.

Krischer used a grand jury as cover for a charging decision he could have made on his own authority.

An experienced prosecutor

We believe that Sam Stern, one of two Republicans running, is qualified to be the kind of well-balanced prosecutor the public deserves — competent, forceful but compassionate, tough on crime but also mindful that some people accused of crimes are innocent. We recommend Stern’s nomination.

“The government always wins as long as we do the right thing,” said Stern, a 44-year-old West Palm Beach resident and native of New Jersey.

He’s currently in private practice, and despite his relative youth, he’s an experienced federal and state prosecutor.

“It’s absolutely inappropriate for the state attorney’s office to dump a case on the grand jury,” he told us. “The proper use is to bring in testimony.” The Epstein grand jury, he said, was used as an excuse to not prosecute Epstein aggressively.

‘A dual mandate’

Stern said he will dig into official corruption, which is too often overlooked in South Florida.

Florida allows prosecutors to charge all but capital crimes on their own authority.

“There is a dual mandate,” Stern told us, “to not just be a processing facility, but to find criminality where it is not obvious or apparent.”

Stern’s rival in the Republican primary, Forrest Scott Freedman, did not participate in a scheduled joint interview. He did submit a questionnaire, which we have posted online with Stern’s and a video of Stern’s interview.

Freedman’s negligible fundraising ($3,885 in public contributions through June, compared to $95,468 for Stern) puts him at a distinct disadvantage against any of three potential Democratic nominees in a county where the GOP still trails in registration, though the gap has narrowed.

This year, with local resident Donald Trump atop the GOP ticket, a qualified, well-spoken Republican could be competitive in a Palm Beach County race for an office such as state attorney, where partisanship should not matter.

A shifting political landscape

Democrats are in serious disarray nationally over President Joe Biden, and the local Democratic Party is a mess. That creates opportunities for Republicans. (Also on the November ballot is Adam Farkas of North Palm Beach, with no party affiliation.)

Stern has an impressive résumé and a distinctive family pedigree. His father, Herbert Stern, was a crime-fighting prosecutor in New Jersey and later a federal judge.

The father’s connections to Chris Christie, the departing U.S. attorney who was running for governor, reportedly figured in the younger Stern’s appointment as an assistant U.S. attorney at age 29. He left a year later after a Democratic prosecutor replaced Christie.

Sam Stern, for whom Florida has been a second home, worked in the Palm Beach state attorney’s office after moving here permanently.

A Fordham University law graduate, he began his career as a state prosecutor in Hudson County, N.J., long considered a hub of public corruption.

Stern has taught trial practice at the University of Miami School of Law, the National Trial Advocacy College at the University of Virginia School of Law, and authored a textbook on cross-examination.

In private practice, he specializes in white-collar defense.

Asked how he would deal with high turnover among low-salaried assistants, Stern said in our questionnaire that it would depend on his leadership and on “my mission … to recruit, train and run the finest office anywhere.”

Freedman said in his questionnaire that he would commission an audit to find office funds that could be redirected to salaries. If that’s not sufficient, he would lobby for more money.

Freedman, 53, of Boca Raton, is in private practice. He appears to be running a conventional anti-crime campaign. He says he would improve the state attorney’s office “once I have access to the complete picture and the books that will only occur if I am elected.” He hasn’t done the homework Stern has.

Before moving to Florida in 1991, Freedman was an assistant D.A. in Boston for four years. He’s a graduate of Washington University School of Law.

The state attorney’s salary, set by the state, is $218,939.

The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Opinion Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Opinion Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writers Pat Beall and  Martin Dyckman, and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Editorials are the opinion of the Board and written by one of its members or a designee. To contact us, send an email to letters@sun-sentinel.com.