Tom Gallagher's problem in the past was waiting too long to launch a statewide political campaign.
He won't make that mistake again.
That worries Gov. Jeb Bush.
Even though Gallagher's next race, for governor in 2006, is three years away, he's having a lot of conversations these days with friends, fundraisers and strategists. He already has decided to extend his alliance with media strategist Mike Murphy, who advised Jeb Bush in 1998 and 2002 and has helped other Republican governors, most recently Arnold Schwarzenegger.
"If Mike Murphy is involved in a governor's race in 2006, it will be with me, if I'm involved," Gallagher said this week. "If you're looking for an organized effort for 2006, the answer's no, there's not one. Do I talk to people about it, when they ask me? Of course I do."
Gallagher, who has held three Cabinet offices after 13 years in the state House, wants Floridians to know he's focused on the job he won without opposition last year.
As Florida's first elected chief financial officer, he oversees insurance and banking and pays the state's bills, a role that makes him a spending watchdog (his office is in the midst of an audit of Florida's three school voucher programs).
But Gallagher keeps a close eye on the political calendar, and his early work on 2006 appears to have gotten the governor's attention.
Bush sent a private e-mail to friends last week, warning Republicans that early politicking threatens to disrupt the party unity his brother's presidential campaign will need in Florida next year.
"I am aware of the enormous pressure that is being put on each of you and it would mean a great deal to me personally if you would agree not to commit to a candidate until we can finish the 2004 presidential cycle," Bush wrote.
Bush even invoked the possibility of another 537-vote squeaker in 2004.
Gallagher said he didn't think the memo was directed at him. But he's the only one working actively behind the scenes this far from 2006.
Gallagher has run for governor twice, in 1986 and 1994. Both times, he lost the Republican nomination to more conservative rivals: Bob Martinez the first time, Bush the second. In both races, Gallagher finished third in the primary. He did not get into the 1994 race until May, too late to make an impact. Bush was uncatchable by then.
He hopes the third time's the charm, but fate has put him on a collision course with Bush. Some Republicans speculate that the governor might try to anoint another Republican who would run to the right of Gallagher in 2006, where history shows he is vulnerable.
Charlie Crist, Florida's attorney general, comes to mind.
A new poll commissioned by a private industry deals largely with the subject of reforming Florida's system of amending the Constitution. The pollster also sampled 400 Republicans on their early preferences for governor in 2006 and asked some questions that were clearly about Gallagher, such as his past support for raising taxes for prisons.
The poll, while clearly a name-recognition contest, showed Crist favored by 24 percent, U.S. Housing Secretary Mel Martinez by 14 percent and Gallagher by 12 percent. (A fourth possible candidate, Lt. Gov. Toni Jennings, was not one of the choices in the poll.) For now, despite occasional policy differences with the governor on the budget and education policy, Gallagher wants to be the loyal party soldier. As a vice chairman of the Bush-Cheney campaign in Florida, he will attend a fundraiser Friday in Fort Myers with Cheney. But he has no plans to put his next campaign on ice.
"It's something I don't want to take off the radar screen at all," Gallagher said. "If I've been accused of anything, it's starting too late in many campaigns. I don't want to do that, either."
- Steve Bousquet is deputy chief of the Times' capital bureau in Tallahassee.
