Angie Nixon shakes up the world of Florida politics

I took more than a little heat for TBT endorsing Angie Nixon in the Democratic primary to replace the United States Senate seat vacated by Marco Rubio. She had no chance, I was told, and our support of her candidacy reflected little more than my obsession with class-based politics and the war crimes being committed in Gaza and the West Bank, which Nixon opposed and Vindman was, at best, mealy-mouthed on.

That argument may have seemed supported by the fact that The Bradenton Times was literally the only newspaper in Florida to back Nixon when we issued our endorsement on July 10. The only other publication to join us was The Miami Times, which issued a midnight-hour endorsement on  August 14. Most importantly, Vindman had the endorsement of the Miami Herald. 

This was not some sort of protest endorsement on our behalf, and it was founded on far more than those two admittedly important factors. Let's get down to brass tacks. Vindman made his bones when, as Director of European Affairs for the National Security Council, he testified that during a 2019 phone call between President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Trump asked Zelenskyy to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden's son, Hunter, while his father was campaigning for president. This led to an abuse-of-power charge against the president.

That act demonstrated courage and intestinal fortitude. Beyond that, however, Vindman's platform was chock full of the same sort of milquetoast, neo-liberal establishment fare that has been driving away Democratic voters in droves. He is not a Floridian. He moved here to run for the seat, ran on a massive out-of-state war chest, and was campaigning to be one more business-as-usual Democrat who would move to D.C. and join a sea of like-minded establishment politicians.

What I saw in Angie Nixon was a fighter at a time when this country needs nothing more. Nixon, a lifelong Floridian with deep roots in Jacksonville, has never been afraid of ruffling feathers. The moment she was reprimanded by the Florida House in May for using a megaphone during a loud, boisterous protest intended to interrupt the congressional gerrymandering vote, my mind was made up. Nixon clearly knew that democracy was more important than decorum, and she was willing to go to the mat for it.

Unlike Nixon, Vindman does not support universal healthcare, and his foreign policy is little more than the politely articulated MAGA-lite neoliberal worldview that is killing the party that used to represent those who got their shower after work, rather than before. That seems like an easy choice. And when it comes to electability, Nixon proved what Andrew Gillum suggested when he came up less than 1 point short of beating Ron DeSantis in the 2018 gubernatorial race: progressive, FDR-type, working-class politics go much further than those of the neoliberal Democratic establishment in the Sunshine State.  

On Tuesday, Nixon secured a historic upset victory, defeating a much better-funded rival to earn the party’s nomination in a landslide (12 points as we went to press), and she did it with a fundraising disadvantage of Vindman's $16 million to her $975,000.

Nixon, the second Black woman to win a Democratic Senate nomination in Florida (after Val Demings, who lost to Rubio in 2022), will now face incumbent Republican Ashley Moody, who was appointed by DeSantis, in November's general election. Moody has run on little other than President Trump's endorsement and the idea that she will fall in lockstep with the administration's increasingly unpopular agenda. I think that will give Nixon a fighting chance, even here in Florida. 

Dennis "Mitch" Maley is an editor and columnist for The Bradenton Times and the host of our weekly podcast. With over two decades of experience as a journalist, he has covered Manatee County government since 2010. He is a graduate of Shippensburg University and later served as a Captain in the U.S. Army. Click here for his bio. Mitch's new novel, Fish Kill, is currently available here, along with his previous books. He can be reached at editor@thebradentontimes.com.