PALM BEACH COUNTY, Fla. — Florida state Rep.-elect Emily Gregory flipped Florida House District 87, defeating Donald Trump-backed Republican Jon Maples on Tuesday night to take a seat Republicans have held for back-to-back terms.
WATCH BELOW: 'I want to tackle property insurance,' Emily Gregory tells WPTV's Kayla McDermott
The victory thrusts Gregory into the national spotlight, as the district includes Mar-a-Lago. A Democrat flipping a district tied to the current president could signal shifts for future elections come November.
She sat down one-on-one with me following her win. Gregory, who introduced herself as “Representative, District 87,” said the title still feels new after an intense campaign focused on voter outreach.
“Amazing, crazy, exciting,” Gregory said. “I think it takes a couple days for it to really roll off the tongue. I've been so focused on doing the work and talking to voters that it’s like a little bit of switching gears right now.”
She told me she plans to make Florida’s property insurance crisis, workforce housing and community mental health the top priorities of her tenure representing District 87, as she adjusts to the sudden attention following her upset victory.
When asked about the cost of living, Gregory said it is driven up in part by property insurance.
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“I want to tackle property insurance. It is such a crisis in this state, rates have skyrocketed, and we are not getting value as policyholders," she said.
Gregory said rising rates are squeezing seniors and first-time buyers alike.
“Seniors are having a hard time staying in their home with these rate hikes, and the first-time buyer is having trouble entering the market,” she said. “Between the insurance, and then you add the taxes, it can be greater than the note, that I want to tackle as my top legislative priority.”
"Do you have a plan on how to do so?" I asked.
Gregory outlined what she called a two-pronged approach. First, she said she supports a state catastrophic fund under which the state would self-insure against catastrophic loss.
WATCH: WPTV talks to Emily Gregory after her victory
“Taking that risk off the back of private insurers, that would do so much to regulate the market and drive private insurers back,” she said, adding she has heard estimates that rates could be reduced by about 70% if catastrophic loss were removed from private insurers’ risk.
Second, she said, the industry itself must be reformed.
“We need to hold insurance companies accountable and not allow them to max out rate hikes and to tax excess profits,” Gregory said. “I want to see the policyholder as the beneficiary of policy, not special interests.”
When discussing property taxes, Gregory pushed back on calls to completely abolish them, saying such a move would not eliminate costs but shift them.
“A complete abolishment of property taxes, I think, is very dangerous and disingenuous,” she said. “It’s not a tax cut, but a tax shift. We will need to make up that revenue somewhere.”
She noted that local services such as trash collection and water treatment still must be funded.
“We will still need those services, so we’d have to find either another source of revenue, which I don’t think anyone’s asking for — a giant increase in sales tax — or nobody wants an income tax, a state income tax,” Gregory said, calling Florida’s lack of income tax “so great for business.”
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She said eliminating property taxes could also mean paying private companies and corporations for services that are currently public goods, which she said would likely be more expensive for residents.
On homeowners associations, Gregory cited her own neighborhood, where she said political signs were banned after a heated presidential election.
“We’ve always allowed political signs,” she said. “After the last presidential election, it got very heated in this neighborhood and it was just abolished just before my first run for office.”
Gregory said she briefly kept a political sign up in a “small stance of good trouble,” calling the ban a restriction of her First Amendment rights. But she said she believes decisions about HOAs should remain local.
“I do think it’s best, though, to have local communities govern that rather than Tallahassee,” she said.
On Election Day, voters did tell WPTV News they feel pushed out by rapid development and inadequate infrastructure, especially in District 87 and Palm Beach County.
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Gregory argued workforce housing must be a “top priority” and criticized policies that allow developers to avoid building affordable units.
“I don’t think that developers should be able to pay to get out of the requirements and only build luxury buildings,” she said.
Gregory said she wants to see workforce housing efforts on a “much larger scale,” prioritizing full-time residents and essential workers, such as teachers, nurses and home health aides.
“They need to live in the communities they serve,” she said.
On two of the topics she ran her campaign on healtchare and education, Gregory said Florida’s teacher pay is among the lowest in the nation and that the state needs to refocus on public education.
“We are 50th in the nation in average teacher pay, which I think is abysmal and unacceptable,” she said.
Gregory said she supports vouchers as a limited tool, not as a replacement for strong public schools.
“I think vouchers should be a lifeline for families that need it most, and not a tool to undermine public education,” she said. “All children, regardless of their parents’ income or the ZIP code they live in, should have access to a safe, high-quality, free education.”
On health care, Gregory said the key is expanding affordable coverage options.
“It’s always about insured and the number of insured,” she said, pointing to options such as the Affordable Care Act and possible state-level versions of Medicare-like policies that people could opt into. She said premiums must be kept within reach.
“You have to have options for people, and the premiums can’t be $5,000 a month for a family of four, that’s just not reasonable,” Gregory said.
WATCH BELOW:
Gregory said reinstating ACA tax credits in some states, typically under Democratic governors, has helped, and she argued that accepting Medicaid expansion would bring immediate benefits in Florida.
“Accepting Medicaid expansion would insure over 1 million Floridians tomorrow, and I think we would see that if we had a Democratic governor,” she said.
Gregory, who said her professional background is in mental health, particularly acute diagnoses, called for expanded access to intensive community-based treatment.
She referenced the Assertive Community Treatment model, which she described as a high-intensity program for individuals with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and psychosis.
“It takes resources and a commitment to supporting those individuals,” she said, noting the need for supported employment specialists, housing specialists, multiple case managers and medication compliance. “You can’t just leave people to flounder.”
District 87 includes the area where the president’s residence is located, drawing national media attention to the race and its outcome.
“It’s certainly a spotlight,” she said. “I feel that all constituents deserve the same amount of attention and prioritization.”
Gregory said she would welcome constituent services requests or state-level policy discussions from the president as she would from any other resident.
“All 180,000 residents of District 87 are my priority,” Gregory said.
Some voters did tell WPTV whey were casting ballots against the President rather than for any particular candidate, saying they wanted “a completely different regime” and “a different change.” Asked whether her victory was a local win or a broader political statement, Gregory focused on the choice voters made.
“I think we know that the voters of District 87 want a different direction, because they had an option to go with what, you know, [was] pretty in sync with the current leadership, with my opponent, and they chose a different path,” she said. “And I’m a different voice in a different direction, and I feel very honored and grateful that they’ve selected me to move forward."
Gregory also addressed the ongoing federal budget stalemate, which she said has led to a government shutdown affecting TSA agents and other workers who have gone without pay.
“I’m just so sorry. I’m so sorry this is happening again — this federal stalemate and this toxicity in national politics,” she said.
She referenced earlier disputes over SNAP benefits.
“We saw it in the fall with SNAP benefits, denying food to hungry women and children,” Gregory said, adding that her Catholic faith informs her belief that people should “feed the hungry, clothe the poor, and just take care of our neighbors.”
Gregory said her central goal as she heads to Tallahassee, likely after the Easter and Passover holidays and around the week of the 20th, when lawmakers are expected to meet on redistricting, is to ensure residents of District 87 feel represented.
“My goal is to make everyone in District 87 proud of the representation and know that there is a fighter in Tallahassee that is — every decision that I make is informed by what is best for the people of District 87,” she said.
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