Jason Bellamy-Fults stood in a Tallahassee hearing room packed with union members in March and pleaded with Florida senators to block the latest legislative attack on the organizing rights of public workers.

Several hours later, the Gainesville Local 1205 member and husband of a schoolteacher watched with disgust as the Fiscal Committee’s Republican majority voted to send the bill to the Senate floor.

His own senator, Jennifer Bradley, was among them, siding with a trickle of corporate union-busters who spoke instead of the 100-plus workers who testified to the duties and dignity of public employees and how good, union jobs changed their lives.

Bellamy-Fults was livid, especially with Bradley. If she’d stood with workers, the 10-8 vote would have been a tie, derailing the bill for 2026.

“I left there mad as hell,” he said. Fuming on his way home, he made it his mission to find someone to run against her. Not for a moment did he imagine his own name on the ballot.

“I spent a solid month calling everybody I could think of,” he said. “Every elected official, everyone I could think of locally, saying that this was not OK. That she ran unopposed last time and we can’t let her run unopposed again. I told them: ‘If you will do this, I’ll be your number-one volunteer. I’ll help you raise money. I’ll do anything I possibly can.’”

Person after person told Bellamy-Fults that the district was too conservative, that a pro-worker candidate didn’t stand a chance against a corporate-backed opponent with a massive war chest.

Eventually, he said: “I’d bugged enough people that they stopped answering my calls or they turned it back on me, saying, ‘You’re the one running your mouth about it. Why don’t you do it?’”

And so he did, filing to represent Senate District 6 in north-central Florida with the enthusiastic support of his wife, Shay, an activist in her teachers’ union.

His campaign is laser-​focused on workers, unions and working families — none of whom, he said, are getting a fair shake in the Legislature.

“These people up there, it’s so obvious where their money is coming from and what their agenda is,” he said. “They are incredibly anti-union, and that hurts workers and working families. Every single session, they’re coming back to the table with more ways to break unions.”

From IBEW brothers and sisters and supporters throughout the seven counties he would represent, Bellamy-​Fults is building a campaign from the ground up. Toward that end, he was delighted by the success of his first house party in May, an ice cream social hosted by a friend.

“You hear ‘house party’ and think, ‘I’ve got to invite big rollers,’” he said. “I said: ‘Let’s not think about that way. Let’s think about people that we know, that are invested in this community and that are doers — people who will get out and knock on doors, make phone calls. I asked my friend to come up with a list of 30, 40, 50 doers, and that’s what she did.”

He’s been inspired and coached by Local 1205 President James Ingle, who was elected to the Gainesville City Commission on a working-class platform in 2024, his third try. The two have been friends since Bellamy-Fults began his apprenticeship in 2010.

Ingle describes him as “very bright,” a hard worker, devoted volunteer and genuine to his core.

“Jason understands the struggles people are facing,” he said. “I think that’s one of the biggest problems we have in Florida. You don’t find workers in the Legislature. You find MBAs and lawyers and business owners. You don’t find waitresses or bus drivers or construction workers.

“Without their voice, the Legislature makes all these horrible decisions that are so far removed from the consequences,” he added. “They don’t even know what they are. But Jason does. He’s struggled, he’s been hungry, he’s worked with his hands.”

Another inspiration is state Sen. Brian Nathan, a Tampa Local 915 organizer who won a special election in March in a deep-red district and is on Florida’s ballot again in November. (See story.)

“We had a real heart-to-heart about how to survive the campaign trail,” Bellamy-​Fults said. “He told me to keep it real, be yourself, say what you think. Go out there and fight for working people because — win or lose — that’s the win.”

Nathan’s words affirmed his own beliefs. “It’s been my mantra. People think 51% of the vote is the win, and I’ll take 51%, don’t get me wrong,” he said. “But the win is working people standing up and fighting back.”

Bellamy-Fults and his younger sister were raised by a single mother, a waitress who eventually was able to open her own restaurant. It was a family affair.

“They are incredibly anti-union, and that hurts workers and working families. Every single session, they’re coming back to the table with more ways to break unions.”

_{– Jason Bellamy-Fults on the Florida Legislature}

“We were always working from an early age,” he said, describing lean years growing up and juggling multiple jobs as a young man. “I know how much hustle it takes for most working families to keep a roof over their head.”

Getting into Berea College in Kentucky’s Appalachians was his lucky break. The private liberal arts school is tuition-free, accepting motivated students in financial need. Among other benefits, he had healthcare coverage for the first time.

He majored in biology but focused on sustainability, a field that balances environmental concerns, fairness and economic growth. After graduating, he won research grants that sent him to Asia for two years to study Eastern approaches to sustainability.

Returning to Gainesville, he threw himself into volunteer work with the Community Weatherization Coalition, a program that helps people reduce their utility bills.

“I was in the very first class of energy coaches,” Bellamy-Fults said. “You go to somebody’s house with a crew, sit down with them, look at their utility bill and explain it to them. Then we do a thorough investigation of the house, three to four hours seeing how they’re using electricity, how they’re using water. We also install some things, like energy-efficient lightbulbs, water-saving aerators, we bring pipe installation — a bunch of different things.”

He’s recruited IBEW members as volunteers, one of many reasons he’s proud to be part of Local 1205. “We’ve got a really cool local, and we’re really known in this town because we’re so active in the community,” he said.

It was a co-worker’s comment 16 years ago that put him on the path to becoming a journeyman wireman.

“I was working at a grocery store, and a buddy of mine there who knew I was interested in energy issues said: ‘Hey man, you should look at the IBEW. They’ve got an apprenticeship school here.’”

Currently, Bellamy-Fults is working in academic technology at the University of Florida, a job he was offered while studying for a master’s degree. But he remains an active Local 1205 member and serves as recording secretary.

He urges fellow IBEW members to consider running for local and state offices or, if that’s outside their comfort zone, to volunteer for labor and other pro-worker candidates.

“If you don’t get involved in politics, politics will get involved in you,” he said. “We’ve got legislators who vote against us every single time. When they’re coming to destroy your union, when they’re coming to get rid of the already crappy unemployment system that we have and to take away your right to vote, you sit on the sidelines at your peril.”