🌊 How Florida Took Over DC

Florida is the hottest state in the new administration. How’d that happen?

March 31, 2025

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By Max Towey

In the 2004 presidential election between John Kerry and George W. Bush, a secret and powerful society loomed large: Yale University’s Skull and Bones, a secretive group to which both candidates belonged.

Skull and Bones – despite admitting just 15 students per year – has wielded a staggering level of influence throughout US history: It’s produced three presidents (William Howard Taft, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush), three secretaries of state, and legions of successful businessmen, including Bill Gates’ Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen.20 years later, a new group at the University of Florida is drawing parallels: Florida Blue Key (FBK).

The group’s rise has matched Florida’s as a Republican powerhouse.

The state – which had almost exclusively Democratic governors from 1900 to 2000 and voted for Barack Obama twice – has become staunchly red and, in the process, emerged as the new administration’s center of power.

The president, chief of staff, and secretary of state – arguably the three most powerful people in the executive branch – are all Floridians, as are National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, Attorney General Pam Bondi (who replaced Florida congressman Matt Gaetz), and the Republican National Committee co-chair, Lara Trump.

Many of these officials have ties to the same group: Florida Blue Key.

In this deep dive, we examine Florida Blue Key and how the once-blue state took over US conservative politics.

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Editor’s Note

It’s a Monday morning so we’ll keep this short. Hope you had a nice weekend and thank you all for reading. If you have any thoughts on today’s story or if there are stories you want us to cover, please send them in here. 

And in case you missed our last five stories, find them here: 

–Max and Max