The sheriff who lost his job after Parkland is asking voters for a second chance.
Ousted Broward sheriff Scott Israel took another step on his comeback campaign Monday when he filed the paperwork to launch a reelection bid.
Israel, first elected in 2012 and again in 2016, lost his job as Broward’s top cop in January when newly elected Gov. Ron DeSantis suspended him from office and blamed him for the Broward Sheriff’s Office’s botched response to the Feb. 14, 2018, shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Israel, 63, is challenging his removal.
But regardless of whether he’s reinstated by the Florida Senate — which under Florida law has the power to overturn a governor’s suspension — Israel would need to be elected in 2020 in order to run the agency going forward. He began the process of seeking reelection Monday when he walked into the Broward Supervisor of Election’s office and submitted paperwork to open a campaign account.
“We as a team are going to run one way or another for a third term so this was going to happen, anyway,” Israel said in an interview.
Israel, a Democrat, believes he still has the support of Broward County and says he’s been railroaded by DeSantis, a Republican.
A state panel voted unanimously last week to revoke BSO’s accreditation, citing the agency’s mishandling of the response to shootings in Parkland and at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport as the grounds for its decision. But Israel bristled at those findings, and told the Miami Herald that the reasoning put forth by the Commission for Florida Law Enforcement Accreditation “sounded like I was reading the governor’s fictitious bill of particulars.”
Israel will presumably run in next year’s August Democratic primary against Sheriff Gregory Tony, the former Coral Springs sergeant DeSantis appointed to run BSO upon Israel’s suspension. Israel blamed BSO’s loss of accreditation on Tony’s absence from the Commission for Florida Law Enforcement Accreditation hearing but otherwise declined to comment on his replacement’s performance.
“That will be an issue for the campaign,” he said.
Tony, who owns a firm specializing in mass casualty incidents, has not yet filed paperwork but has said he’ll run to keep his job in 2020. Also campaigning: H. Wayne Clark, Willie Jones, Al Pollock, David Rosenthal, Andrew Maurice Smalling, and Santiago C. Vazquez Jr.
Israel’s campaign announcement Monday angered some Parkland parents who lost children in the shooting. Ryan Petty, whose daughter, Alaina Petty, was murdered at Stoneman Douglas, called Israel “a failure.”
Max Schachter, whose son, Alex, was also killed, said it was Israel’s “failed policies and procedures that led to my little boy being murdered.” Schachter sits on the state commission that reviewed the sheriff’s response to the shooting and uncovered a number of faults.
“Every day I go up in Alex’s room, and he’s not there,” said Schachter. “And it’s partly that sheriff who is to blame.”
Schachter praised Tony, on the other hand, for moving to build a $30 million training facility and showing accountability by firing several deputies, including the former school resource officer at Stoneman Douglas High School.
Israel, who raised his kids in Parkland, said he prays for the families who lost children in the shooting, and understands their anger.
“They lost children. I’ll never push back at any time for a Parkland parent. As far as I’m concerned they can say whatever they want and that’s OK,” he said. “But the sheriff serves almost 2 million people and almost 600,000 people voted for me [in 2016]. When more people vote for someone else, then I can walk away with my head held high.”
This story was originally published July 1, 2019 at 3:25 PM.