Here are the highlights from the final day of August’s primary.
Crist looks to derail DeSantis in the fall
For the second time in eight years, Democratic voters chose Charlie Crist as their gubernatorial nominee, choosing the seasoned veteran over Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, who was vying to become the state’s first female governor. Crist now has just 11 weeks to unify his party, energize the Democratic base and convince independent voters that the state needs a new direction. See the full Florida results here. The stakes for Democrats are high, and not just in Florida, where DeSantis has already pushed an aggressively conservative agenda, promising that a second term would bring new measures to further restrict abortion and make it easier for the public to carry guns. But national Democrats are also now looking to Crist to slow DeSantis’ rise ahead of an expected campaign for the White House in 2024. The task won’t be easy. DeSantis has raised $132 million for the general election, a record for a non-self-funded gubernatorial candidate, and has energized the Republican base more than any other GOP politician not named Donald Trump. His party surpassed Democrats in registered voters in Florida for the first time. And he can point to a state economy that appears to be booming, with more people moving there than anywhere else in the country, record tourism numbers and an unemployment rate of 2.7 percent, nearly a full point below the national rate. But Democrats argued that prosperity was not shared by all. With some of the fastest rising home prices and rents in the country, Florida has become a paradise that many can no longer afford. A property insurance crisis has threatened coverage for millions of homeowners as hurricane season reaches its zenith. LGBTQ Floridians say the DeSantis administration has made the state more hostile toward them, and women say the new abortion restrictions are taking away autonomy over their bodies and forcing them to face medically dangerous pregnancies. Crist’s argument against another four-year DeSantis also relies on Floridians yearning for a less divisive tone from their leader. Throughout the primaries, Crist and Fried portrayed DeSantis as a bully and despot far more focused on running for the White House than governing the nation’s third-largest state. Repeatedly, they have noted, DeSantis has forced the other branches of the state to bend to his will, eliminating any checks on his executive branch.
Florida’s latest hotly contested Senate race is officially coming to fruition
The Senate race between Republican incumbent Sen. Marco Rubio and Democratic Rep. Val Demings continues. Demings won her primary on Tuesday and Rubio was unopposed, creating a race Republicans believe they should win easily, but one that gives Democrats another chance to show they can win statewide in a position that has been properly crawling for years. The two have focused on each other for months — their primary was not competitive — but Tuesday night, the contours of the race were clear: Rubio plans to brand Demings as a “Pelosi puppet” who is inextricably linked to President Joe Biden, while Demings plans to attack Rubio as ineffectual, selfish and wedded to a Trump-dominated Republican Party. The onus is on Demings to prove she — or any Democrat — can win statewide in a state that has been overwhelmingly Republican for years. But Democrats have boosted morale recently: The National Republican Senatorial Committee came up with an ad campaign for Rubio, while Demings was outspending the Republican. Like many Democrats, Demings is also hoping that the furor in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade will propel her to an unlikely victory. “I dream of an America where we protect constitutional rights like a woman’s right to choose. I’ve said it during this election campaign, let me say it again. We’re not going back. We’re not,” Demings said. Tuesday night. Demings has the fundraising advantage — she has consistently outspent Rubio and raised $12.2 million in the second quarter of 2022 — but central to her campaign will be her ability to counter attacks linking her to the movement “defund the police”. Demings, the former Orlando police chief, has already released her own ad refuting the criticism, and her campaigns have long referred to her as “Chief Demings,” not Deputy Demings, in a not-so-subtle response to the attacks. .
Nadler appears in Upper Manhattan’s clash of Democratic titans
Representatives Jerry Nadler and Carolyn Maloney are about the same age, share nearly identical ideological views, and both chair powerful committees in the House, where they both arrived in 1993. But it will be Nadler, boosted by endorsements from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and the New York Times editorial board, who will return to Capitol Hill next year after defeating Maloney in one of the most contested primaries in the recent history of New York. She didn’t want a race either, and, according to Maloney, Nadler urged her to run in another district after their parallel strongholds on Manhattan’s Upper East and West Sides came together at the end of a long redistricting process. Maloney sought to capitalize on the anger of Democratic primary voters over the Supreme Court decision that overturned Roe v. Wade and promised, if re-elected, to focus on passing the Equal Rights Amendment. He also accused Nadler of taking undue credit for his involvement in major local projects, such as building the Second Avenue subway, and — at the bitter end — hinted on camera that he might be “senile.” But Nadler, despite the disappointing debate performance, supported the district’s progressive base. A key endorsement came from Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who cut an ad for Nadler highlighting his support from Planned Parenthood and NARAL, declaring New Yorkers “lucky to have Jerry in Congress.” While the full tally has yet to be finalized, it appears Nadler’s margin of victory could exceed Maloney’s lead — if he holds it — over a third-party candidate, Suraj Patel, who argued the new district needed a new voice . But the 38-year-old, who unsuccessfully challenged Maloney in the final two laps in a different area, went down again.
Sean Patrick Maloney holds off the progressive challenger
The progressive insurgency that has dominated New York politics in 2018 and 2020 was dealt another blow Tuesday when state Sen. Alessandra Biaggi lost her bid to unseat U.S. Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, the party’s powerful campaign chief. in Parliament. Biaggi — who became a hero on the left in 2018 when she ousted the leader of a group of Republican-affiliated Democrats in Albany — moved north of the city to face Maloney, who also switched districts after a drawn-out redistricting process. But Biaggi couldn’t keep up with Maloney on the fundraising front, and even though he left a large chunk of his old electorate behind to run in the 17th District, he benefited from greater familiarity among primary voters. Outside groups also supported Maloney. The Police Benevolent Association of New York City PAC has spent nearly $500,000 against Biaggi. A new PAC, called Our Hudson, was also launched to undermine Biaggi, who was backed by U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. (Ocasio-Cortez, however, has largely stayed out of the fray, never campaigning for Biaggi in the district.) Maloney, a former White House and former President Bill Clinton campaign aide who endorsed him, also got a boost from his colleagues on Capitol Hill in the form of the Democrats’ deflationary bill. The passage of the historic climate, health care and tax bill calmed the nerves — and possibly the appetite for a tough message — among Democratic voters.
Markwayne Mullin to become favorite in race to fill Inhofe’s Senate seat
Republican Rep. Markwayne Mullin will be the GOP candidate for the special election to fill Sen. Jim Inhofe’s seat in the Oklahoma Senate, according to CNN. As the Republican nominee, Mullin is in a strong position to win this fall’s general election in the conservative state. He will face former Democratic Rep. Kendra Horn. Inhofe, a Senate veteran, announced in February that he would retire in January 2023, triggering the special election. Mullin, who represents Oklahoma’s 2nd Congressional District, defeated former Oklahoma House Speaker TW Shannon in Tuesday’s runoff. Mullin advanced to the runoff after leading the first round with 44% of the vote, and that was before former President Donald Trump’s endorsement. Mullin’s campaign website touts his support for the former president, saying, “In Congress, he fought liberals trying to stop President Trump.”
