The Mobile, Alabama defensive prospect sets official stop in Gainesville, adding defensive backfield firepower to Gators’ 2027 recruiting efforts.

The Florida Gators landed a significant recruiting visit this spring as four-star safety Jaylen Scott set an official visit to Gainesville, joining a growing list of top defensive targets exploring Florida’s 2027 class.

The 6-foot, 165-pound standout from Mobile (Alabama) Williamson is widely regarded as one of the nation’s top safeties in his class and has drawn attention from several Power Four programs. His decision to schedule an official visit followed a productive in-school visit with head coach Jon Sumrall and safeties coach Chris Collins, a connection he emphasized as a factor in his recruiting process.

“The school visit with Coach Sumrall — and my relationship with Coach Collins,” Scott said of what led to setting the trip.

The Gators pursuit of Scott comes as Florida continues to strengthen its secondary under a new coaching regime. Florida already boasts young defensive backfield talent like Jordan Castell, and adding Scott could solidify future leadership in the secondary.

Jalen Scott’s Recruiting Summary

Scott is ranked No. 153 overall and No. 15 at his position nationally according to the 247Sports composite, while the On3 industry ranking has him at No. 112. He has offers from 20 total schools so far, including eight other SEC programs and the Florida State Seminoles.

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Florida attracted a record 143.3 million visitors last year, up 0.2 percent from 2024, Gov. Ron DeSantis’ office announced Friday.

The preliminary estimate is bolstered by domestic tourism, which accounted for 91.5 percent of the travelers. The 131 million domestic visitors were up 0.3 percent from 2024.

Overseas travel was up 4 percent on the 2024 figures, with nearly 9.3 million visitors.

But the 2.9 million Canadian visitors for all of 2025 marked a 14.7 percent drop from 2024.

Last month, tourism leaders in Florida said they were expanding efforts to draw Canadians, where the U.S. has seen a travel backlash over the words and actions of President Donald Trump, from tariffs to calling the U.S.’s northern neighbor the 51st state.

“We’re doing what we can, just as we are with any country outside the United States, to make sure that visitation remains strong,” Visit Florida President and CEO Bryan Griffin said during an executive committee meeting on Jan. 26.

Friday’s release from DeSantis’ office stated that the Canadian visitation remained “consistent with historical trends where Canadian travel represents approximately two percent of total visitation.”

In 2019, the last year before the COVID pandemic, Canadians were at 3.11 percent of the state’s tourism figures, with 4.088 million Canadians among an overall tourist count of 131.07 million.

The release also put fourth quarter numbers at a record 33.5 million travelers, of which 30.31 million were domestic, 2.55 million were overseas and 642,000 were Canadian.

The fourth quarter count is up 0.6 percent from the same quarter of 2024, with domestic visitors up 0.8 percent, overseas travel up 2.7 percent and Canadian visits down 13.1 percent.

At the January executive committee meeting, Griffin anticipated growth with the overseas figures as the top three sources were showing growth: Brazil was up 10.4 percent, the United Kingdom saw a 6 percent increase, and visits from Colombia were 6 percent higher than in 2024.

Gubernatorial candidate Byron Donalds continues to argue that Florida needs a “plan” on how to deal with artificial intelligence data centers, making the case that data stored in Florida is safer than foreign countries or Democrat-controlled places.

“I’m not anti-data center. I’m pro-having a plan,” Donalds said at a Turning Point USA event at Florida Gulf Coast University.

“And this is the part of politics where I guess the word now is ‘performative.’ A lot of people like to be performative these days. It’s actually interesting watching it. Have a strategy. Data centers are going to be a function of American life going forward.”

Noting that the students he was talking to all rely heavily on technology, the Republican Congressman from Naples said, “the more you use technology, the more server space that you’re going to need.”

“The more server space that you’re going to need, the more racks that you’re going to have to figure out. In Florida, the question is, are we going to do that here? Are we going to warehouse our data in Northern Virginia? Or are we going to warehouse our data in California? Or we’re going to warehouse our data in India. Or we’re going to warehouse our data in China,” Donalds said.

He continued along this theme.

“I don’t want to warehouse my data in China. I don’t trust them. I don’t want to warehouse my data in India. I don’t want to get into too deep of a foreign policy conversation, but let’s be very clear. India has to deal with Russia. They share a border. I don’t want my data there,” Donalds said.

“And to be honest, I don’t trust the Democrats in Virginia. I don’t want my data there. I think when it comes to technology, AI and everything else, Florida should lead. We use common sense. We know how to do this thing. We should lead, not play cute, on social media, not just say no without a planning a strategy.”

Leading the Future, a super PAC launched by OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman, 8VC founder Joe Lonsdale and venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, announced it was putting $5 million in support of Donalds and a broader educational effort on the benefits AI will have on Florida’s economic future.

This comes as Gov. Ron DeSantis and others looking to succeed him have argued against AI and its perceived excesses.