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How Rick Scott counts to 700,000 jobs

Becky Bowers
By Becky Bowers October 5, 2011

Rick Scott, the candidate, ran on a platform of creating jobs. That's why the businessman-turned-politician won a bruising Republican primary last summer, he said. That's why he squeaked by Democrat Alex Sink in November 2010. "That was my whole campaign," he said in February. "Seven steps to 700,000 jobs over seven years."

And more than a year since candidate Scott rolled out his 7-7-7 plan, Gov. Scott still talks frequently about those 700,000 jobs.

But just how do you keep track?

Scott the candidate offered one measure: "Our plan is seven steps to 700,000 jobs," he said in a debate a year ago, "and that plan is on top of what normal growth would be." Now Scott the governor is offering another. "700,000," he told reporters Oct. 4, 2011, when asked how many jobs he promised to create.

"But the initial promise was to create 700,000 on top of projected growth," Scott was asked.

"No," Scott said.

While the creation of those jobs is a central promise we're tracking on the Scott-O-Meter, we wanted to rate Scott's statements about his promise on our Flip-O-Meter, which PolitiFact Florida created to measure whether a candidate's shifting on any particular position.

Read our analysis here.

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How Rick Scott counts to 700,000 jobs