Lt. Gov. Nuñez to head FIU, leave DeSantis administration

by Jay Waagmeester, Florida Phoenix
February 7, 2025

Florida International University trustees voted Friday to install Lt. Gov. Jeanette Nuñez as interim president, meaning she will leave her statewide-elected office 23 months before her term expires. Trustees expect she will assume the presidency officially after a formal search.

“The governor’s office has contacted me and suggested that we consider Lt. Gov. Jeanette Nuñez as the next leader for FIU,” Board of Trustees Chair Roger Tovar said during a special meeting held via Zoom. “Subsequent to that, I have had several conversations with the Lt. Gov. Nuñez, who confirmed her interest in leading this great university, which happens to be her alma mater.”

During a news conference on immigration Friday morning, DeSantis said the leap actually was her idea. He applauded Nuñez for her support for his policies as lieutenant governor, including efforts to “bring some sanity” to higher education. 

“This is something she was interested in doing, she had my endorsement and my support, and I think that she’s somebody that is very well regarded in the community anyways,” DeSantis said. 

The interim hiring would be effective Feb. 17. The university must launch a formal search to name a president, although trustee Dean Colson said the “probable results of the search are already known.”

Sitting FIU President Kenneth Jessell, who served for three years and whose contract was set to expire in November, will become senior vice president and chief administrative officer. Tovar called the administrative changes “additive.”

“I have complete confidence in the lieutenant governor,” Jessell said. “She’s a double Panther, and I look forward to supporting her. I look forward to continuing supporting our students, our faculty, our staff, our alumni, our great supporters and donors, and our community.”

Finding funding

Trustees praised Jessell’s leadership while emphasizing a desire to boost fundraising efforts. 

“Given the university FIU is today, a top 50 public preeminent research university, we need to increase our endowment to at least $500 million and triple our annual fundraising. World class universities have healthy endowments. This is imperative for the university’s future,” Tovar said.

The move, notably, comes shortly before the 2025 legislative session starts, when lawmakers will decide how much state support the Miami institution will receive.

Tovar said Nuñez’s experience as a health care lobbyist and lieutenant governor make her “an ideal leader to help transition FIU into the future,” noting her connections in the community and in Tallahassee.

She graduated from FIU in 1994 with a bachelor degree in political science and international relations and in 1998 earned a master degree in public administration. 

Nuñez posted to X following the vote, saying she is “deeply committed to the success of FIU. I look forward to working with the Board of Trustees in the coming days.”

Her salary as lieutenant governor is $135,000. The outgoing president, Jessell, made a base salary of $650,000.

Opposition

Trustee Noël Barengo, representative of the FIU Faculty Senate, was the lone no-vote on Nuñez. He questioned the need to remove Jessell before the contract ended and voiced “deep concern about what we see as another effort by the governor’s office to interfere with public higher education.”

Several of the about 15 people speaking during public comment questioned Nuñez’s qualifications to serve in higher education, as well as the need for a new president given the lack of criticism of Jessell’s leadership. 

“Jeanette Nuñez is a textbook example of what happens when politicians prioritize partisan loyalty over genuine leadership. Rather than standing up for people, for the people of Florida, Nuñez has acted as a rubber stamp for policies that erase history, limit opportunities, and push a narrow, exclusionary agenda,” said Kassandra Toussaint, mentioning Nuñez’s recent walk-back of her previous support for in-state tuition for Dreamers.

Every public-comment speaker was against the change in leadership.

“FIU deserves better than a yes-woman for DeSantis’ dangerous agenda,” Toussaint said. “We deserve leaders who fight for all of us, not just those who fit their narrow vision of who belongs.”

DeSantis specifically mentioned the Adam Smith Center for Economic Freedom at FIU, a think tank studying free-market policies labeled as non-partisan. He suggested the center might increase its activity under Nuñez. 

“I think you have pretty much every right-of-center former head of state in the entire Western hemisphere has been there to talk, and so they’ve really been great at promoting free enterprise and the rule of law and constitutional government. I think they’re going to be able to do a lot more of that going forward,” the governor said.

Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried called the hiring “Republican hypocrisy.”

“Just a few weeks after she backflipped on protecting in-state tuition for Dreamers — Jeanette Nuñez will now lead one of the most diverse colleges in the state. With her record, how can she be trusted to lead the college with the largest population of Hispanic students in the country?” Fried said in a prepared statement Friday morning. 

“Her appointment is just the latest move in Ron’s hostile takeover of Florida’s colleges and universities, as he continues to install political hacks and loyalists to push his partisan agenda,” Fried continued. “It has nothing to do with improving Florida’s cratering educational outcomes and everything to do with rewarding loyalty.”

‘Engaged governor’s office’

Naming of an interim president often follows the retirement or resignation of a sitting president. The transition at FIU defies common practice, Colson acknowledged.

“Is the current way we are selecting a president a perfect system? I don’t think so. Is the current selection process what was anticipated when the Florida Constitution was amended to create an independent board of governors? Again, I don’t think so,” Colson said.

“But will FIU find itself not just surviving but thriving over the next decade under its new leadership team? Well, I think so, and for that reason, I’m hopeful in support of your motion.”

Colson advocated for the Board of Governors to revise its presidential selection rules. 

“We all know that the BOG is an independent constitutional body, but its rules did not anticipate the reality of an engaged governor’s office being involved in the hiring of our presidents. I don’t think this engagement is going to change in the next two years. And I think you can’t help but wonder what happens in two years when we have a new governor — are these presidencies going to be included in the jobs that a new governor might want to fill during his or her transition or first few years in office?”

Presidential searches often take months, requiring appointment of a formal search committee that names a shortlist of finalists (in the case of University of Florida and Ben Sasse the list was as short as one) that must be approved by the Board of Governors and university trustees. 

The transition from interim to permanent president would cost “a lot of time and money,” “when the probable results of the search are already known,” Colson said. 

Florida Phoenix is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Florida Phoenix maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Michael Moline for questions: info@floridaphoenix.com.

SUMMARY: Summarize this content to 100 words: RAMALLAH – Israel released 183 Palestinian prisoners on Saturday in the latest exchange for Israeli hostages held in Gaza, part of a ceasefire that has paused the war but whose future is uncertain.Israel views the security prisoners as terrorists, while Palestinians see them as freedom fighters resisting a decades-long military occupation. Nearly every Palestinian has a friend or family member who has been jailed by Israel at some point, for militant attacks or lesser offenses like rock-throwing, protesting or membership in a banned political group. Some are held for months or years without trial in what is known as administrative detention, which Israel says is needed to prevent attacks and avoid sharing sensitive intelligence.Eighteen of those released Saturday had been sentenced to life and 54 were serving long sentences for their involvement in deadly attacks against Israelis. Seven of those convicted of the most serious crimes will be transferred to Egypt ahead of further deportation.Among those being released are 111 Palestinians who were rounded up after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel, which triggered the war. They had been detained without trial.Here’s a look at some prominent Palestinian prisoners released since the truce went into effect on Jan. 19.Iyad Abu ShakhdamAbu Shakhdam, 49, was sentenced to the equivalent of 18 life sentences over his involvement in Hamas attacks that killed dozens of Israelis during the second intifada, or Palestinian uprising, between 2000 and 2005. Among the most infamous of those attacks was a double suicide bombing that blew up two buses in the southern Israeli city of Beersheba in 2004, killing 16 Israelis, including a 4-year-old, and wounding over 100 others. In interviews with Arabic media, he described his militancy as a desire for revenge stemming from his brother’s killing by Israeli security forces in 2000. Abu Shakhdam was on the run for weeks before his arrest in his hometown of Hebron in the West Bank in November 2004, following a gunfight with Israeli security forces in which he was shot 10 times. During 21 years in prison, his family said, he finished high school and earned a certificate for courses in psychology.Jamal al-TawilAl-Tawil, 61, a prominent Hamas politician in the occupied West Bank, has spent nearly two decades in and out of Israeli prison, in part over allegations that he helped plot suicide bombings.Most recently, the Israeli military arrested al-Tawil 2021, saying that he had participated in violent riots and mobilized Hamas political activists in Ramallah, the seat of the semi-autonomous Palestinian Authority and Hamas’ main rival. He had been held without charge or trial since then. After his arrest, he went on hunger strike for more than three weeks to protest his administrative detention. During one of al-Tawil’s stints in Israeli prison in the early 2000s, he ran a successful electoral campaign from custody to become mayor of Al-Bireh, a West Bank town abutting Ramallah. U.S. court documents from 2007, filed by the families of Israelis killed during the second intifada, show that al-Tawil had served for years as chairman of Al-Islah Charitable Society, a front organization to raise money for Hamas. The case accused al-Tawil of recruiting a Hamas militant to carry out a 2001 suicide bombing that targeted a crowded pedestrian mall in Jerusalem, killing 11 people.His daughter, 32-year-old journalist Bushra al-Tawil, was among the dozens of women and teenagers released in the first round of prisoner-for-hostage exchanges on Jan. 19.He was among at least seven Palestinian prisoners who were immediately taken to a hospital after their release on Saturday.Mohammed el-HalabiThe Palestinian manager of the Gaza branch of World Vision, a major Christian aid organization, was arrested in 2016 and accused of diverting tens of millions of dollars to Hamas in a high-profile case that drew criticism from rights groups. He was freed on Feb. 1. Both el-Halabi, 47, and World Vision vigorously denied the allegations and independent investigations found no proof of wrongdoing. One independent audit found that el-Halabi had enforced internal controls and ordered employees to avoid anyone suspected of Hamas ties.Rights groups say el-Halabi was denied a fair and transparent trial, as he and World Vision had no chance to review the evidence against them. U.N. experts say el-Halabi was questioned for 50 days without access to a lawyer. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison.Israel has attributed the closed hearings to sensitive security information being relayed.Shadi AmouriAmouri, 44, from the northern West Bank city of Jenin, was arrested for his alleged role in manufacturing the powerful car bomb that detonated beside an Israeli bus packed with passengers on June 5, 2002, killing 17 Israelis in what became known as the Megiddo Junction suicide bombing. The attack during the second intifada took place in northern Israel. The Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility.Amouri was sentenced to life in prison, plus 20 years. He was among those transferred to Egypt on Feb. 1 and released into exile.Zakaria ZubeidiZakaria Zubeidi is a prominent former militant leader and theater director whose dramatic jailbreak in 2021 thrilled Palestinians across the Middle East and stunned the Israeli security establishment.Zubeidi was a senior militant in the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade in the urban Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank. After the second intifada in 2006, he co-founded a theater in Jenin to promote what he described as cultural resistance to Israel. The Freedom Theater has put on everything from Shakespeare to stand-up comedy to plays written by residents.In 2019, after Zubeidi had already served years in prison for attacks in the early 2000s, Israel arrested him again over his alleged involvement in shooting attacks that targeted buses of Israeli settlers but caused no injuries.Zubeidi, who was released on Jan. 30 into the West Bank, had been awaiting trial in prison. He denies the charges, saying that he gave up militancy to focus on his political activism after the intifada.In 2021, he and five other prisoners tunneled out of a maximum-security prison in northern Israel. All six were recaptured days later.Mohammed Abu WardaA Hamas militant during the second intifada, Abu Warda helped organize a series of suicide bombings that killed over 40 people and wounded more than a hundred others. Israel arrested him in 2002, and sentenced him to 48 terms of lifetime imprisonment, among the longest sentences it ever issued. As a young student, Abu Warda joined Hamas at the start of the intifada following Israel’s killing of Yahya Ayyash, the militant group’s leading bomb maker, in 1996. Palestinian authorities said at the time that Abu Warda had helped to recruit suicide bombers, whose attacks targeting crowded civilian areas in Israeli cities killed scores of people in the early 2000s. Abu Warda was released and deported on Jan. 30. Mohammed Aradeh, 42An activist in Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Aradeh was sentenced to life in prison for a range of offenses going back to the second intifada. Some of the charges, according to the Israeli Prison Service, included planting an explosive device and attempted murder.He was credited with plotting the extraordinary prison escape in 2021, when he and five other detainees, including Zubeidi, used spoons to tunnel out one of Israel’s most secure prisons. They remained at large for days before being caught.From an impoverished and politically active family in Jenin, in the northern West Bank, Aradeh has three brothers and a sister who have all spent years in Israeli prisons.He was welcomed as a sort of cult hero in Ramallah on Jan. 25 as family, friends and fans swarmed him, some chanting “The freedom tunnel!” in reference to his jailbreak. Mohammed Odeh, 52, Wael Qassim, 54, and Wissam Abbasi, 48All three men hail from the neighborhood of Silwan, in east Jerusalem, and rose within the ranks of Hamas. Held responsible for a string of deadly attacks during the second intifada, the men were handed multiple life sentences in 2002. They were accused of plotting a suicide bombing at a crowded pool hall near Tel Aviv in 2002 that killed 15 people. Later that year, they were found to have orchestrated a bombing at Hebrew University that killed nine people, including five American students. Israel had described Odeh, who was working as a painter at the university at the time, as the architect of the attack.All three were transferred to Egypt on Jan. 25. Their families live in Jerusalem and said they will join them in exile.Mohammad al-Tous, 67The 67-year-old al-Tous had held the title of longest continuous Israeli imprisonment until his release last Saturday, Palestinian authorities said. First arrested in 1985 while fighting Israeli forces along the Jordanian border, the activist in the Fatah party spent a total of 39 years behind bars. Originally from the West Bank city of Bethlehem, he was among the prisoners exiled on Jan. 25. ___Follow AP’s war coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-warCopyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

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SUMMARY: Nearly three years post-invasion, Putin’s forces are advancing while Ukraine faces manpower and arms shortages. A new U.S. president may soon cut military aid to Ukraine, giving Putin little incentive to negotiate. Russian and Western experts suggest Trump hopes to facilitate peace, yet his approach may inadvertently undermine Ukrainian sovereignty. Zelenskyy argues any deal should involve Ukraine. Despite heavy Russian casualties, Putin remains unyielding, viewing negotiations as a means to further his goals. Trump’s ability to influence the war is limited; sanctions and NATO membership are ongoing challenges. The situation remains complex as both sides maneuver for power and security.

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