Big Sugar is trying to take out Carlos Guillermo Smith

One of Florida's most powerful industries is targeting one of the few lawmakers who stands up to it

Photo credit: Frank Kovalchek

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About a week ago, mailers began landing in Orlando-area mailboxes promoting Susan Plasencia, a Republican running against Democratic state Rep. Carlos Guillermo Smith in one of Florida’s most fiercely contested state House races.

The advertisements touted Plasencia as a politician who would “support local businesses.” And the disclaimer said the ads were paid for by the Florida Chamber of Commerce.

It should have said that Big Sugar paid for them.

Because that’s where the Florida Chamber of Commerce gets its money. Records show that nearly 60 percent of the funding for the Florida Chamber of Commerce PAC — the entity that paid for the pro-Plasencia ads — comes from the state’s two giant sugar producers.

The Florida Chamber of Commerce PAC has raised about $2.3 million this year. Nearly $1 million of that money — $950,000, to be exact — came from U.S. Sugar Corp. Another $400,000 came from Florida Crystals Corp.

(Three more big businesses — electric utility Florida Power & Light, health insurer Florida Blue and grocery chain Publix Super Markets account for another 20 percent of the chamber PAC’s cash. So we have a business-lobbying group that claims to speak for all businesses that is actually funded by a handful of corporate giants. That sure sounds familiar.)

This illustrates something important about front groups like the Florida Chamber of Commerce: They are brand-laundering organizations.

U.S. Sugar and Florida Crystals want to kick Carlos Guillermo Smith out of the Florida Legislature. But they also know that many voters would recoil if they saw that Big Sugar — an industry notorious for polluting the Florida Everglades — was paying for ads promoting his opponent. That’s particularly true in a more progressive place like House District 37, which covers the eastern suburbs of Orlando and includes the University of Central Florida.

So the ads are sent instead by the Florida Chamber of Commerce — a group that many voters might mistake for a friendly local organization that hosts community barbecues and publishes an area business guide…instead of a Tallahassee lobbying shop that fights for cutting corporate taxes and against raising the minimum wage.

It’s easy to see why a Big Sugar-funded front group would target Smith.

In 2021, for instance, the sugar industry and its allies — including the Florida Chamber of Commerce — lobbied a bill through the Florida Legislature that gave sugar growers more legal protection when they set fires in their cane fields, a harvesting technique that produces a toxic soot known as “black snow” that may cause health problems for people living in nearby communities.

There are 160 lawmakers in the Florida Legislature — 120 in the state House and 40 in the state Senate. Smith was one of just eight who voted against this bill. (Vote sheets here and here.)  

And earlier this year, the sugar industry and its allies — again, including the Florida Chamber of Commerce — lobbied another bill through the Legislature that was meant to give sugar growers an advantage in the battle for water stored in Lake Okeechobee, which is also needed to avoid toxic algae blooms in the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee Rivers and to restore freshwater flow in the Everglades. This bill was so egregious that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis vetoed it.

And once again, Smith was one of just eight lawmakers who voted against it. (Vote sheets here and here.)

So you can see why Big Sugar prefers Susan Plasencia instead.