The other day, there were a flurry of reports in the political press about how some extremist lunatics in the House GOP conference were going to force an impeachment vote against Biden, even though it could never win and would just make life difficult for Republicans who depend on independent voters for reelection. MAGA Mike, the weakest Speaker in history opposes it but no one particularly care what he thinks. One of the reports I read emphasized that any member could force the vote and suggested three who were likely to: Marjorie Traitor Greene (GA), Andy Biggs (AZ) and— not Boebert or even Gaetz… a different Florida psychopath, freshman Anna Paulina Luna.
Luna represents a very different district than the one Gaetz represents. His Panhandle district has a partisan lean of R+38. Her Tampa Bay district, primarily Pinellas County, went from a very swingy R+1 to a safely gerrymandered R+12. That margin has given her the leeway to behave like Gaetz, Greene and the other extreme MAGAts who aren’t liked by swing voters and independents— or even mainstream Republicans. So a local poll released yesterday shouldn’t have come as as big a shock as it did.
Luna may be in trouble with her voters. Blue Dog Whitney Fox has pulled ahead of her by nearly 4 points. Fox won convincingly in a 5-way primary and she’s eager to take on Luna. It’s worth noting that Pinellas County also favors Kamala over Trump by 5 points a favors Democratic Senate candidate Debbie Mucarsel-Powell over Rick Scott by 3.
Whitney Fox- 47.8%
Anna Paulina Luna- 44.3%
Jacob Ogles reported that “About 53% of voters in the district supported Trump for President in 2020 against Democrat Joe Biden in 2020. But the latest poll suggests Pinellas voters may swing back to the left in a big way… Among independents about 51% plan to vote for Fox while less than 39% favor Luna.”
Luna has raised $2,252,369 to Fox’s $842,866. Although there are no Florida candidates on the DCCC Red to Blue page, Ogles also reported that Luna is one of just two Florida incumbents targeted by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which has signaled it intends to spend generously on the race.” That sounds like it came from the candidate rather than from the DCCC. It's understandable, though, that the campaign could be mixing up the DCCC and the Blue Dogs; many people do. And, Fox is being backed by another big Democratic right-wing operation, Welcome PAC, financed by anti-progressive fanatic Reid Hoffman and various members of the Walton family. I’m sure Fox is better than Luna, but if you’d rather contribute to progressives winning in November and allow the Waltons and Hoffmen to finance their conservative candidates, please give what you can to the candidates on this page.
Last week, before the polling was done, Claire Heddles and Katherine Swartz reported that Luna is a flop as any kind of an icon for Latino voters. “[C]onsultants say Luna, a young Mexican American woman, brings a symbolic presence to a national Republican ticket that’s previously struggled to appeal to voters of color. ‘There’s not a deep bench of these folks, and a lot of Latinos who were heavily engaged in communicating Republicanism to the American voting public have left the party,’ Mike Madrid, a GOP consultant focused on Latino voters and the co-founder of the anti-Trump group The Lincoln Project, told NOTUS. But he doesn’t see Luna’s role as persuading new, diverse Republican voters. ‘These candidates who are more performative than substantive really serve more as a justification for the base, as opposed to a persuasive tool to bring more people into the fold,’ he told NOTUS. ‘Her chief characteristic is not her substantive understanding of policy, it’s her fealty to Donald Trump, and that’s what they’re looking for.’”
Luna is a lunatic. Hopefully good riddance.
I spent a lot of time between 2005-11 in Pinellas County litigating about the construction of a new transit facility. I know the area.
I checked the CD maps--part of Kathy Castor's CD still extends into Pinellas. Her (now-retired) COS for 16 years is a close friend. I presume her small swath of SW Pinellas leans blue. The northern edge of Luna's CD appears to extend up into Pasco, which is presumably redder.
Luna SHOULD be vulnerable in that CD, especially in her first re-election run. I'm no more enthused about getting another Blue Dog in the Dem caucus than you are, but it's the kind of race that Dems need to win if they're going to retake the House.