Skipping the Florida Governor Debate Was the Right Call

On Sunday, Florida Democrat David Jolly did something candidates rarely do: he walked away from the Florida governor debate entirely. With about six weeks left before the November 3 election for governor, Jolly announced he will not share a stage with Republican nominee Byron Donalds at all. If he follows through, it will be the first Florida governor's race without a debate since 1974, as the Tallahassee Democrat reported.

The reaction was instant and predictable. Pundits called it a disaster. Barry University political scientist Sean Foreman told iHeart's Florida News that sharing a debate stage could help Jolly's chances, calling the decision "a huge mistake" in a race where Republicans hold a 1.55 million voter registration edge and Donalds has raised roughly eight times more money. Donalds got his soundbite in too, posting on X: "What happened to 'a dozen times?'"

Here is the contrarian take, in the spirit of my earlier defense of the NYC AI school ban: Jolly made the right call. Not a brave one, and maybe not a principled one. Just the right one.

The Florida governor debate was a setup, not an invitation

Look at how the three debates Donalds accepted came about. On September 18, Donalds' campaign announced it had agreed to three debates: September 29 at Florida A&M University in Tallahassee, October 13 on News4Jax in North Florida, and October 22 on Telemundo and NBC 6 in Miami. The format would be two podiums, no audience, with a policy focus, as the Washington Examiner reported. The catch is that the Jolly campaign was never consulted. "We found out through a press release," Jolly's team said, adding that the terms of the debates "won't be dictated by Byron Donalds."

Meanwhile, Jolly had already accepted two real forums: a joint appearance at the Tampa Tiger Bay Club and a roundtable with CBS Miami journalist Jim DeFede. A Tiger Bay Club board member told the Florida Phoenix that Donalds' campaign initially agreed to the joint appearance, then asked to appear separately, then backed out and offered to send his running mate, Miami-Dade state Senator Bryan Avila, instead. So the candidate now demanding debates is the same one who dodged a bipartisan forum a few weeks ago, which changes how the whole standoff reads.

Agreeing to debate on your opponent's unilaterally announced terms is not courage. It is letting the other campaign run your schedule.

Nobody's mind gets changed at these things anyway

Strip away the civics-class nostalgia and a modern televised debate is two podiums, no audience, and two candidates reciting rehearsed lines while moderators keep time. Even the Donalds campaign's proposed format dropped the town hall element where actual voters ask questions. Foreman himself described the current reality as a debate over whether debates are "useful or just performative theater," the same kind of security theater this site called out in California's AI regulation push.

The polling says this race will be decided by turnout, not persuasion. The latest St. Pete Polls survey had Donalds at 43.5 percent and Jolly at 43.4 percent among likely voters, essentially tied, while the Pollsmax average gives Donalds a 44.4 to 40.8 edge. In a race that close, with both bases locked in, a debate informs almost no one. It mostly manufactures clips for each side's social media team. Jolly skipping it denies Donalds, the better-funded frontrunner, a free primetime platform to look gubernatorial standing next to him.

The cowardice charge does not survive contact with history

Donalds himself refused to debate his Republican primary opponents this year, reportedly telling them it was "not his job" to platform their campaigns. He then won the primary by more than 20 points. Apparently skipping debates is disqualifying cowardice only when the other guy does it.

The contrarian read here is narrower than it looks: a candidate who agrees to be questioned by journalists but refuses a stage-managed shouting match with one specific opponent is making a distinction worth respecting. Jolly said yes to the Tiger Bay Club and to CBS Miami. He said no to three events announced without him, on terms set without him. Those are different things.

Voters still get plenty of chances to compare the two men. Registration for the general election closes October 5, early voting runs October 24 through 31, and Election Day is November 3. Between now and then, both campaigns will spend millions telling Floridians exactly who these candidates are. A Florida governor debate would add theater, not information, and Jolly seems to have decided he is done donating his evenings to his opponent's production.