Source: Charlie Crist to run as an independent

Via Dan Riehl
All signs today pointed to the possibility on Thursday, now Fox News 35 is a reporting a source inside the Crist campaign has said Crist will announce on Friday he will run as an independent:

Dr. Rick Foglesong is the President of the faculty at Rollins College, one of our political analysts who has time and time again predicted a run by the governor as an independent. And now, he says he has a source inside the Crist campaign staff.

Dr. Foglesong said, "A person I know in the Charlie Crist campaign has told me Charlie Crist would veto the merit pay bill, and he did. Further, he said he would announce tomorrow, that's Friday, that he would run as an independent."

Fox 35's Tracy Jacim asked, "Where is this supposed to happen?" Dr. Foglesong said, "South Florida." Jacim asks, "Miami?" Foglesong said, "Yes." Jacim asks, "How reliable is this source?" Foglesong replied, "I trust the source."

Fox 35 contacted the Crist campaign staff by e-mail, and they would neither confirm nor deny this claim, and expressed surprise we were asking.

But a new Quinnipiac poll of 1,250 registered republicans offers support to the theory. It shows the governor badly trailing former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio in the GOP primary with only 33 percent of the vote to Rubio's 56 percent.

Fox News was not able to find a campaign event for Crist in Miami today, nor did that seem to be the most convincing portion of Dr. Foglesong's statement.    Senator John Cornyn commented on the potential for a Crist independent run saying, "I would think that would be the end of his political career as a Republican, so I doubt that will happen. " Whether Crist will attempt a career-ending run as an independent remains to be seen.  Senator Cornyn and the NRSC own this fiasco, however.   If Crist runs as an independent, he won't be the only one facing the backlash of an angry mob.