From Florida Phoenix:
Democratic Senate candidate Alex Vindman touts his fundraising lead over Ashley Moody
Meanwhile, his campaign doesn’t appear eager to debate fellow Democrat Angie Nixon before the primary.
Democrat Alex Vindman in Tallahassee April 22 announcing his bid for the U.S. Senate. (Photo: Christine Sexton/Florida Phoenix)
Alex Vindman has a Democratic primary election he needs to get through against Jacksonville state Rep. Angie Nixon next month, but his campaign is already fixated about running against Republican incumbent Ashley Moody in the general election in November.
Vindman held a rare statewide conversation with Florida political reporters Thursday morning to boast about how his second quarter fundraising totals far surpass Moody’s.
Vindman is a retired Army lieutenant colonel, combat veteran, and former director on the National Security Council making his first bid for public office. His campaign announced Wednesday that it had raised $8.5 million in the second quarter, nearly $5 million more than Moody, who announced she had raised $3.6 million in the second quarter and has now raised more than $14 million across all of her political committees.
Vindman has raised a total of $16.7 million since he entered the Senate race at the beginning of this year.
The Vindman campaign also announced that 20% of his in-state contributions had come from registered Republicans and independents — 13% from non-party-affiliated voters and 7% from registered Republicans.
But fundraising totals alone won’t be enough. In 2022, Democratic Senate candidate Val Demings held a massive fundraising edge over then-GOP incumbent Marco Rubio and still lost by 16 percentage points.
“Ashley Moody is no Marco Rubio or Rick Scott,” said Vindman campaign aide Blakely Wall. “She is not known in this state, has never really run a real campaign, and Alex is building a campaign to win.”
Although the Vindman campaign may believe Moody isn’t so well known as a senator, since she’s only been in that office for a year-and-a-half, she was elected twice statewide as attorney general in 2018 and 2022.
Before he faces Moody, however, Vindman will face Nixon in the Democratic primary on Aug. 18. There is little public polling to indicate what that race looks like, but Vindman doesn’t appear worried about it. His campaign has consistently rejected Nixon’s call for at least one televised debate, with Wall repeating Thursday that the campaign still “haven’t made a decision” about engaging with her.
Meanwhile, Moody doesn’t appear to see much difference between the more left-leaning Nixon and Vindman, who is running a more centrist campaign.
“This November, voters have a clear choice: a fifth generation Floridian who has devoted her career to backing law enforcement and fighting for policies that bring real prosperity to Florida families, or whichever tax-hiking, open-border, defund-the-police socialist the Democrats choose,” Moody said in a press release Wednesday.
“They turned California and New York into cautionary tales of failed liberal ideals, and now they have Florida in their crosshairs. But we will never let that happen, not on my watch,” Moody added. “Together, we are going to keep Florida the envy of the nation.”
Israel
Among the fissures that seem to be developing between Nixon and Vindman is the issue of Israel, which has become a flashpoint in the Democratic Party. Vindman has previously described himself as a strong supporter of the U.S.-Israel alliance, although he told Fox-13 that no ally should receive a “free pass.”
Nixon, on the other hand, has been a vocal critic of Israel’s military action in Gaza, and received intense criticism from both Republicans and Democrats in the Florida Legislature when she sponsored a resolution calling for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas conflict just a month after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack.
Nearly half of House Democrats in Congress voted Wednesday to cut off $3.3 billion in funding to Israel, showing the growing divide within the party.
The Phoenix asked Vindman how he would have voted on the issue.
“I would have to take a look at that,” Wall responded.
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