Darryl Paulson, retired USF political scientist who got national attention recently by predicting U.S. Rep. Bill Young would leave office at the end of his current term, now says the opposite.

Young, he says, has changed his mind, in response to intense lobbying from national Republicans and the changing political winds.

Young didn’t say anything about his political plans when he spoke at lunchtime to the Suncoast Tiger Bay Club. Surprisingly, none of the members of the club, who pride themselves on directing tough questions at politicvans, asked about it.

Paulson, himself a Republican with a long relationship with Young, says he’s not just speculating – “Let’s just say I had it from a good source” when he made his former prediction, he said. Paulson says the same source now tells him Young will run again for at least one more term in Congress, and probably will announce it at a Pinellas County Republican Party fundraising dinner in February.

Republicans dread the day Young retires, because it would be tough for them to hold his increasingly Democratic district in an open-seat race.

“Times and circumstances have changed” since he made his first prediction about Young last fall, Paulson said, citing GOP wins in the New Jersey and Virgina governor’s races, the retirements of a couple of Democratic senators, and Scott Brown’s Massachusetts Senate win.

“Young is being deluged by local, state and national party officials to run again. … Republicans think they have a legitimate chance of winning the House.”
In that situation, he said, the party doesn’t want to have to spend money to defend Young’s seat when they could use the money elsewhere.

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