TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — U.S. Rep. Val Demings launched a bid for the U.S. Senate on Wednesday, raising hope among Democrats of ousting Florida’s Republican Sen. Marco Rubio from the evenly divided chamber.<\/p>\n
With the Senate now split 50-50 between Democrats and Republicans, the Florida race will undoubtedly be among the most high profile and expensive battles next year.<\/p>\n
The Orlando congresswoman used a video on social media to begin introducing herself to a wider audience. In the video, Demings showcases her rise from a working-class background to become the police chief of one of Florida\u2019s largest cities before ascending to the U.S. Congress.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you grow up in the South, poor, Black and female, you have to have faith and progress and opportunity,\u201d she says in her video.<\/p>\n
Demings was on the short list of potential running mates for now-President Joe Biden after helping lead the first impeachment against then-President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n
Some Florida Democrats had hoped that Demings would instead take on Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is banking on reelection next year to help propel him for a possible run for the presidency in 2024.<\/p>\n
In her Senate announcement video, Demings takes aim at Trump, calling him a \u201clawless president.\u201d Then she takes aim at Rubio.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are some in Washington who prefer the same old tired ways of doing business,\u201d she says, \u201ctoo tired to fight the efforts to suppress the people\u2019s vote. They fall back to tired talking points and backwards solutions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rubio hit back Wednesday, calling Demings, who was first elected to Congress in 2016, a \u201cfar left extremist” with an undistinguished legislative record.<\/p>\n
\u201cLook, I’ve always known that my opponent for the Senate was going to be a far left liberal Democrat. Today we just found out which one of them Chuck Schumer\u2019s picked,\u201d Rubio says in a video, referring to the top Democrat in the Senate. He called her a \u201cdo-nothing\u201d member of the U.S. House.<\/p>\n
That’s an argument Democrats have also made in the Senate against Rubio, who they charge has been more focused on pursuing political ambition, not accomplishment. Rubio announced he would not run for reelection six years ago to make a bid for the White House in 2016 but abandoned that effort after getting little traction.<\/p>\n
If Demings wins the race, she would become only the third Black woman to serve in the Senate, after fellow Democrats Carol Moseley Braun of Illinois, in the 1990s, and Kamala Harris of California, before she became Biden’s vice president.<\/p>\n
Despite her law enforcement background, Republicans have attempted to tie Demings to activists calling for greater scrutiny on how police operate. Demings has forcefully pushed back by highlighting her 27 years as a law officer. Demings is married to Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings, also a former Orlando police chief.<\/p>\n
Already, Rubio is attempting to brand Demings as a socialist \u2014 a playbook that Republicans have used with much success in Florida, which has a significant population of voters whose families fled Cuba and other Latin American countries with a history of repressive leaders.<\/p>\n
\u201cDesperate people will do and say desperate things,” Demings told the Orlando Sentinel in an interview ahead of her campaign launch, “and I don\u2019t blame Rubio and the GOP for being very concerned about me running for the United States Senate against Marco Rubio.\u201d<\/p>\n