{"id":30837,"date":"2014-05-13T16:45:48","date_gmt":"2014-05-13T20:45:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/?p=30837"},"modified":"2014-05-13T16:45:48","modified_gmt":"2014-05-13T20:45:48","slug":"benacquisto-issues-statement-after-dreikorn-announces-candidacy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/2014\/05\/benacquisto-issues-statement-after-dreikorn-announces-candidacy\/","title":{"rendered":"Benacquisto Issues Statement, After Dreikorn Announces Candidacy"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Michael Dreikorn to challenge Benacquisto for senate seat<\/strong><\/p>\n

Michael Dreikorn has just announced his candidacy for the State Senate District 30. After withdrawing from the race for Southwest Florida Congressional District 19 on May 2 due to lack of campaign funds, Dreikorn now says he has gained thousands of supporters and has promises of more donations.<\/p>\n

“I’m a fast learner,” Dreikorn said today.<\/p>\n

“After the congressional race I had to do some soul-searching and essentially make some analysis for the next steps, whether to continue the campaign for Congress or sit back for a couple of years and watch things happen,” the Pine Island businessman said today. He decided not to sit back, Dreikorn said.<\/p>\n

He will challenge Benaquisto again, who holds the District 30 seat and opted to run for re-election after losing the primary.<\/p>\n

“The reason I got involved in the congressional race was I was very upset with the state of government,” Dreikorn said. “This level of dissatisfaction continues. That dissatisfaction is not just with Washington. It’s with Tallahassee.”<\/p>\n

After he withdrew from the congressional race, Dreikorn had said he would run for a legislative seat, but didn’t say he would mount a campaign immediately. Dreikorn lives in Bokeelia and is also president of the Bokeelia Civic Association. Dreikorn filed his candidacy papers Monday night in Tallahassee, opened a bank account, and said he has “promises of donations right away.”<\/p>\n

“This will not be the kind of campaign you had last time,” he said.<\/p>\n

He acknowledged that he again will be the underdog.<\/p>\n

“This is a race that is equally as challenging, that has equal importance,” he said.<\/p>\n

It’s going to be a tough battle,” Dreikorn said. “That’s the way I am. I’m a pit bull when I’ve got my teeth into something I think is important. I do not let go. I’m fighting to be the voice of the people. That is my only motivation.”<\/p>\n

Sen. Lizbeth Benacquisto issued this statement by email:<\/strong> “I have a tremendous amount of respect for anyone who steps forward to run for public office. Like we’ve done this year, cutting taxes for hardworking Florida families and small business owners, protecting our children, ensuring their access to a world class education, keeping our promises to seniors and honoring our veterans are my continued priorities as your State Senator.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Michael Dreikorn to challenge Benacquisto for senate seat Michael Dreikorn has just announced his candidacy for the State Senate District 30. After withdrawing from the race for Southwest Florida Congressional… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30837"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30837"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30837\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}