Florida’s 18th Congressional District, which includes Port St. Lucie and part of Palm Beach County, swung from 51-48 Romney to 53-44 Trump last year, and Republican Brian Mast won an expensive open seat race 54-43. However, Democrats are hoping that Mast’s vocal support for Trumpcare, including his floor speech where he accused Democrats of lying about the bill, will give them an opening here. Politico reports that retired Army Major Corinna Robinson is talking to state and national Democrats about getting in, and she confirmed her interest.
Robinson has run for Congress once before… but in South Dakota. In 2014, Robinson challenged GOP Rep. Kristi Noem in a campaign that generated very little outside attention, and lost 67-33. Robinson relocated to Florida in January for what Politico describes as “via a Pentagon job and Brookings congressional fellowship to support the counter terrorism program at Joint Special Operations University at U.S. Special Operations Command in Tampa.” (Tampa is nowhere near this seat.) While one enthusiastic unnamed Democratic strategist praised Robinson as a “fucking unicorn,” Mast, who is also a veteran, would likely assail her as a carpetbagging non-unicorn.
So far, this race has yet to come into focus. Veteran Pam Keith, who took 15 percent of the vote in the 2016 Senate primary, recently formed an exploratory committee. It’s unclear what other Democrats are interested in challenging Mast.