Crist Fiscally Responsible? Not So Fast

He did it again: Florida governor and senatorial candidate Charlie Crist cited Cato’s 2008 Governors' Report Card as evidence of his fiscal conservative credentials, this time in a Fox News Sunday debate with his primary opponent Marco Rubio.

Trouble is, the report card’s author, Chris Edwards, has gone on the record again and again explaining how Crist has fallen hard off the fiscal responsibility wagon since the report was released two years ago.

The Florida media has publicized Edwards’ correction of the record numerous times since Crist began citing the Cato rating in his political ads. It is difficult to believe that Crist can be unaware of that.

Here's Edwards in October 2009:

Since I wrote the report in mid-2008, the governor seems to have fallen off the fiscal responsibility horse.

In particular, Crist approved a huge $2.2 billion tax increase for the fiscal 2010 budget, even though he had promised that $12 billion in federal “stimulus” money showered on Florida over three years would obviate the need for tax increases.

About $1 billion of the tax increases are on cigarette consumers, which will particularly harm moderate-income families. The rest of the increases are in the form of higher costs for often mandatory services, such as automobile registration, which is really just a sneaky form of tax increases.

Watch the exchange below. Crist cites Cato at 8:43:

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Transcript here.