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The Florida House of Representatives District 94 race is in our Election Spotlight. This is currently Rick Roth's seat, but the Republican is termed out and is running for the state Senate in 2026.
Four Republicans are running in a primary next month.
They include Christian Acosta, who ran for the U.S. House in Democrat Lois Frankel's district. He's a former nuclear engineer, who has worked as a professor at Palm Beach State College for the past six years. Acosta says the most important resource in Florida is water.
"And we need to make sure that we always have access to water. There are federal government forces, Army Corps of Engineers etc., who are trying to tell us what the level of Lake Okeechobee should be. That should be a state of Florida decision, not a federal government decision."
He wants to ensure that agriculture, landscaping and drinking water are all under state control, not the federal government. Acosta also shares ideas of how to continue to reform the property insurance market.
Our second candidate, Anthony Aguirre, got his economics degree at Florida State University and works in hospitalist medicine and outpatient managed care practices. He says the state pays too much on healthcare and he wants to push for corrective action.
"43 cents of every dollar spent in our budget is towards healthcare, so we really need to focus on that...get a professional from the healthcare side into the Legislature."
Gabrielle Fox is a small business owner. She does bookkeeping services for other small businesses. Fox is also a political blogger who's concerned about the growing cost of living, especially in Palm Beach County.
"We need to look at from a legislative standpoint, is there enough oversight on county-level budgets. Do we need to do an audit. I'm a financial business owner so I'm all about let's look at the books, let's see where maybe there's some wasteful spending.
Fox defends herself against claims that she is antisemitic because of some social media posts and text messages she sent.
"The definition of antisemitic is basically being discriminatory or have hatred towards an entire race or group of people. The only criticism that I've ever given to somebody that's claiming the Jewish faith or heritage is the government of Israel. And criticizing of governments, and this might upset some people, but isn't antisemitic."
The fourth candidate in this race is Meg Weinberger, who operates an animal rescue. She is also the Chair for Moms for Liberty in Palm Beach County.
"Definitely education is so important. I have a daughter that plays soccer in college and will be fighting until my last breath that men would never play against her in college. That's just an absolute nightmare for a mother at least."
And property insurance is another key concern for Weinberger.
"Insurance is a huge...I'm knocking on doors a lot and that is over and over I hear about how insurance effects people and how somebody moves into a home and there's a lien on their house from an insurance issue. It doesn't follow the person, it follows the house and now these people can't get insurance. So really I feel that's a huge issue in this district as well."
The winner of this race will face former Palm Beach Gardens City Council member and Democrat Rachelle Litt in November.