Former Democratic Florida Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell is taking a new jab at Sen. Rick Scott with a new ad that again highlights her Hispanic roots and as new polling shows her reducing her opponent's advantage in the race for one of the two state's Senate seats.
Mucarsel-Powell is taking the case to voters in Spanish, a state where the Hispanic voter population is rapidly growing, currently holding around 3.5 million voters. In the newly shared ad, titled "The Important Things," Mucarsel-Powell recounts how her mother's immigration story allowed them to experience the American Dream, a rhetoric that tends to fare well with Latinos.
"My mom brought me to the United States from Ecuador for the opportunities that only exist here," the candidate said in the new ad. "Those opportunities allowed me to go from working a minimum wage job to becoming the first South American immigrant in Congress and running for the U.S. Senate."
But now, she argues, those chances are becoming scarce due to incumbent Rick Scott.
"Our affordability crisis began under his leadership, but instead of lowering the costs of living, Rick Scott wrote the plan to raise taxes on the middle class, end Social Security and Medicare as we know them, and take away women's freedoms," Mucarsel-Powell says.
The ad is just the latest attempt from the Democratic challenger at closing the gap in race that has grown increasingly tight in the Sunshine State.
Just last week, the Ecuadorian-American launched a new campaign on WhatsApp to reach voters and attack a sea of disinformation. The effort includes two channels on the messaging platform— one in English and another in Spanish.
"It's particularly created to target Latino voters across the state to provide them with accurate, factual information coming straight from the source," Mucarsel-Powell, who is also the only Latina candidate running for U.S. Senate this year, told NPR.
Democrats in Florida face an uphill battle undoing a strengthened GOP hold in the state in recent years, particularly in an election where former President Trump is expected to add to GOP turnout in the state. Nevertheless, they are still confident they can win certain races ahead of November.
BOLD PAC, the campaign arm of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, has identified the Florida Senate race as a top target to address disinformation and reach Latino voters.
Likewise, Scott's once-comfortable polling edge against his Democratic challenger seems to be diminishing.
In a recent The Hill/Emerson College poll, conducted between Sept. 3 and Sept. 5, 46% of Florida voters support Scott, while 45% support Mucarsel-Powell. Nine percent said they were undecided.
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