The debate in Florida between current Republican Senator Marco Rubio and current Representative Val Demings, for the Senate seat that Rubio currently holds, had its moments. But what it really shows is that the Democrats’ only strategy between now and election day is to keep hammering on abortion – because they think it’s all they’ve got.

Democrats can’t run on the economy, they can’t promise to cut inflation, they cooked their own goose after proclaiming that “defund the police” was the way to go, only to be forced to retreat on that as the crime rates have spiked, and Joe Biden has no coattails to ride. The man has a walker with tennis balls on the feet, and a lot of Democrats in tight races have said that they don’t want old Grandpa Joe showing up to campaign for them.

So what does that leave Val Demings with? Abortion.

“Senator, how gullible do you think Florida voters are?” Demings asked, after Rubio accused her of supporting abortion until the “moment of life.”

Rubio pushed back on Demings’ accusation that he doesn’t support any exemptions to abortion laws, raising his co-sponsorship of Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-S.C) federal proposal to prohibit abortions after 15 weeks but includes exceptions for victims who become pregnant through rape or incest.”

“The extremist on abortion in this campaign is Congresswoman Demings. She supports no restrictions, no limitations of any kind,” Rubio said. “She supports taxpayer-funded abortion … up until the moment of birth.”

Like most Democrats in this first election cycle post-Roe v. Wade, Demings cannot bring herself to put a limit on abortion. Notice that she didn’t outright deny what Rubio said, she just whined that he said it. Florida has a 15 week abortion ban law, but apparently there is a pending challenge to the law in the courts from the Unitarian Universalist Church of Miami that says the 15 week ban violates “religious free exercise.” So much for “science,” hmmmm? But I digress. The issue of abortion has reverted back to the states, and Rubio’s position is consistent with current Florida law. Demings won’t say what she does want, which means she wants abortion available at any time for any reason during a pregnancy. If she didn’t, she would say that. But we have seen this repeatedly from other Democrat candidates in other states. They will not put any limits on abortion, because this is the only issue they’ve got. And Demings is going right along with the Democrat party line. Will this play well in Florida?

The other pet cause of the Democrats right now? Climate change. Demings tried to invoke this regarding Hurricane Ian, while Florida is cleaning up and rebuilding post-storm.

During the hour-long debate, the moderator also asked the candidates about climate change as the state continues to recover from Hurricane Ian, a near Category 5 storm that decimated much of Southwest Florida in late September, killing at least 119 people and racking up a projected $50-plus billion in insured losses — an amount that would make it the most expensive storm in state history.”

“We have got to get serious about climate change, climate change is real,” Demings said. “If we don’t do something about it, we are going to pay a terrible price.”

She added that enough resources to “adequately respond” need to be provided to the Federal Emergency Management Agency while Rubio said FEMA reimbursements to local governments devastated by natural disasters like hurricanes need to be dispersed quicker.”

“What is happening for a lot of these cities and counties is, they have to spend a lot of money on the front end, money out of their budgets,” he said.”

Democrats and the media have not been doing a lot of coverage of Hurricane Ian lately. Hmmm, why is that?

The way you can tell that DeSantis is doing an outstanding job dealing with Hurricane Ian is that you are not hearing anything from the media whatsoever about his handling of Hurricane Ian.

— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) October 6, 2022

After the AP got slapped for pushing “fake news” regarding a bridge that was damaged and then replaced, all that was left was to mock Ron DeSantis’s white boots. Which means that Demings can only address how FEMA needs to move faster, and blame the hurricane on “climate change.” WE MUST DO SOMETHING™, Demings insists. And Doing Something™ always, always, ALWAYS includes spending plane loads full of cash. Will Florida be up for that, especially if DeSantis is competently handling the recovery effort (and is running for re-election himself)?

The entire debate between Demings and Rubio can be seen here:

The race has been dubbed a “sleeper” by the media, even though they were definitely sniping at each other. Democrats have largely left Demings on her own in this race, which, if they thought they could really win, they would not have done. After all, this is a Senate seat, and both sides are fighting tooth and nail for every single one of those.

Demings is viewed by Florida Democrats as their strongest candidate of the 2022 midterms. There was initially an internal tug-of-war between some Democrats who wanted her to run against DeSantis for governor. But after some key Democrats pushed her to run for Senate, including DNC Chair Jaime Harrison, she decided to try and stop Rubio from winning a third Senate term.”

Demings, who served as a House impeachment manager during impeachment proceedings against former President Donald Trump, has raised $65 million even though she has largely been abandoned by national groups more eager to spend to protect incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia, Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire and Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada.”

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, for instance, has not financially helped Demings at all, a surprise exit from Florida Senate races considering some outside groups, including the DSCC, gave roughly $50 million in 2018 to the failed re-election campaign of former Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson. Demings has brought in huge sums in small dollar donations, collecting nearly $8 million alone in August through ActBlue, the Democrat’s biggest small dollar fundraising platform. It was the biggest haul of any Democratic candidate nationally that month.”

Rubio has raised nearly $45 million, and has a roughly $3 million cash-on-hand advantage over Demings, whose campaign has spent nearly $60 million compared to $35 million spent by Rubio.”

And yet, even with all that money raised and spent, the national Democrats aren’t spending a dime on Demings, who is still running behind Rubio in the polls. Real Clear Politics rates the Florida Senate race as a “GOP Hold.” Rubio is certainly more vulnerable than, say, DeSantis, but Demings is a toe-the-line Democrat (voting 100% with Joe Biden) in a year that is promising to be brutal. Abortion, despite the Democrats’ attention to it as their “winning” strategy, is not working for them. We will see in just a few weeks just how much, and where, the “focus on abortion” strategy has helped or hurt the Democrats.

Featured image: composite image of Senator Marco Rubio (official Senate portrait, cropped, public domain) and Representative Val Demings (official House portrait, cropped, public domain)