TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Former Florida Gov. Buddy McKay, who lost to Jeb Bush in 1998 but remained in office for 23 days after the sudden death of Gov. Lawton Chiles, has died. He was 91 years old.
The former Democratic governor took a nap after lunch Tuesday at his home in Ocklawaha, Florida, and did not wake up, his son Ken McKay told The Associated Press. He said all of the governor’s adult children were present.
“It was a very peaceful end to a wonderful life,” said McKay, who wants her father to be remembered as a champion of Florida’s environment and a champion of minorities.
Floridians praised Mr. McKay not only for his short stint as governor, but also for his accomplishments as a state representative, congressman, and diplomat.
“We mourn the loss of Buddy McKay,” Gov. Ron DeSantis posted on X. “McKay, a U.S. Air Force veteran and lifelong public servant, was dedicated to our country and state. May he rest in peace.”
President Bush offered his condolences to McKay’s family in a social media post, saying his former rival served his state “with honor and honor.”
McKay, who served two terms as Chile’s lieutenant governor, died at the governor’s mansion on December 12, 1998, six weeks after losing the 1998 gubernatorial election to Bush. McKay held the top job for three weeks, focusing on overseeing the final stages of the Bush transition.
“It was very sad,” McKay recalled in a 2012 interview with The Associated Press. “(Chiles) was that far along in his tenure, but everything stopped. For me, there was nothing else to do but be a caretaker and try to help with the transition. The main thing we could do is get out of the way. It shouldn’t have happened.”
The McKays never moved into the mansion, and there has been no Democrat in Florida’s governor’s office since.
“He was very sensitive to the fact that he was there as the final caretaker,” the late Jim Krog, a Democratic political strategist and McKay adviser, once said. “He was clearly conscious of the fact that he was governor and there were some loose ends that needed to be ironed out.”
McKay retired from politics in 1990 and persuaded Chiles, who retired from the U.S. Senate two years ago, to run for governor against incumbent Republican Bob Martinez. The Chiles McKay team was selected in November of the same year and again in 1994.
Mr. McKay, who also served in the Florida House and the U.S. House of Representatives, ran unsuccessfully for three statewide races, but never lost his quiet sense of humor.
“I retired from politics because of my illness,” he said the day after his loss to President Bush. “The voters were tired of me.”
A lifelong policy geek, McKay ended his political career as President Bill Clinton’s special envoy to Latin America and retired to his home near Ocala in central Florida. Even as many Democrats distanced themselves from Clinton in the wake of the Monica Lewinsky scandal, McKay supported the former president. He remained busy in his later years, doing pro bono work for Southern Legal Counsel and serving as a mediator in the juvenile court system.
Mr. McKay narrowly missed the 1988 Senate election, losing to Republican Connie Mack III by less than 1 percentage point. Until the 2000 presidential election between George W. Bush and Al Gore, it was the closest statewide election in state history.
McKay came in as runner-up in a six-way Democratic primary that included former Republican Gov. Claude Kirk and Rubin Askew, who withdrew before the election. He made a comeback and won the final election. Then-Secretary of Insurance Bill Gunter.
With Democrats still controlling much of Florida politics, Mr. McKay was expected to secure the Chiles seat with a landslide victory over Mr. Mack.
But Mr. Mack, who was also a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, came up with the catchphrase that Mr. McKay stuck with: “Hey, buddy, you’re a liberal,” as moderate Florida was moving away from traditional Democratic politics.
After the 1988 election, it took two days for official vote counts to show that Mack had won by fewer than 34,000 votes out of more than 4 million cast.
Like many of Florida’s leading Democratic politicians in the second half of the 20th century, McKay began his political career at the height of the state’s integration movement.
McKay grew up working in the fields with black laborers, attended segregated schools and ate in segregated restaurants.
“It was pretty tough,” he said. “It was always very awkward. My family is in agriculture, and I spent many days working in the fields with African-American crew members, and some of those adults became part of our family. He raised me.”
McKay’s views on race and the possibilities of desegregation changed dramatically during his time in the United States Air Force from 1955 to 1958.
“I didn’t realize that it was possible to solve this problem until I joined the military,” McKay said. “I went in there and from day one it was fully integrated and there were no issues. It was a very freeing experience.”
Kenneth H. McKay Jr. was born March 22, 1933 in Ocala.
“In the old South, where I come from, ‘buddy’ means junior,” McKay said. “Judges and teachers at school called me Kenneth, but no one else called me Kenneth. I’m more Buddy than Kenneth.”
After leaving the military, he became a lawyer and citrus grower. He was elected to the state House of Representatives in 1968, to the State Senate in 1974, and to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1982, but lost his bid for the Senate.
McKay spent his later years in the home he shared with his wife, Anne, on Lake Wear. McKay remained active in his church, tended camellias and enjoyed spending time on the family farm, which raised citrus fruits and cattle, said his son, Ken.
