Angie Nixon, a progressive state lawmaker from Jacksonville, whose pointed and passionate criticism of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis generated headlines and made her a symbol of political resistance, won the Democratic primary of U.S. Senate on Tuesday.
Nixon, whose campaign was centered on the economic needs of working people, was up against Alex Vindman, a first-time candidate and relatively new Florida resident with a national profile and a fundraising advantage of roughly 17 to 1.
At an election night party in Jacksonville, a singer belting out the national anthem was hitting the high note on “the land of the free” when the screen behind her flipped to show the Associated Press had called the race. The room erupted, and for the next half hour, supporters in pink, Nixon’s signature campaign color, danced, cheered and held up their phones while they waited for the candidate to appear.
Nixon thanked Vindman for his military service before sharply turning to the general election. In November, she will face incumbent U.S. Sen. Ashley Moody, Florida’s former attorney general, whom DeSantis appointed to the seat last year to replace Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“We know that our democracy belongs to everyday people,” she told a crowd of roughly 250. “Folks like Ashley Moody like to claim the mantle of morality, but their actions tell a very different story.”
Angie Nixon has represented Jacksonville’s Moncrief neighborhood in the Florida House since 2020. A member of the Democratic Socialists of America and the Working Families Party, she owns Cafe Resistance, a Jacksonville bookstore. Her campaign has centered on affordability, wages and working-class voters, and she has said that on her first day in office she would file legislation to reinstate the enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies that expired at the end of 2025. Florida leads the nation in ACA marketplace enrollment and also has one of the highest state counts of uninsured people in the country.
Speaking to the press Tuesday night, Nixon said her biggest challenges in November will be combatting “disinformation” spread by Moody’s campaign. “But again I believe organized people beat big money every day.”
The Democrats are locked out of power in Tallahassee, and Nixon’s unapologetic resistance to Republican governance has left her legislative record thin. But she was more known for her activism.
In April, the Florida House reprimanded Nixon for using a megaphone on the House floor during debate over congressional redistricting.
Vindman is a retired Army lieutenant colonel who served as the National Security Council’s director for European affairs and testified in President Donald Trump’s first impeachment about the July 2019 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Vindman ran a centrist camapaign focused on corruption and the need for congressional checks on the Trump administration. But some strategists have said his campaign was a sleepy one, centered more on the general election than on the primary, where he faced an experienced campaigner.
Vindman declined to debate Nixon during the campaign. He conceded the race Tuesday night, applauding her “hard work” and Democratic nomination to the U.S. Senate. “”I will be standing by her,” he said, “and my hope is that she wins this election, because again, the stakes couldn’t be higher.”
Sharmila Venkatasubban is The Trib’s senior editor and health reporter and a Report for America corps member. You can reach her at sharmila.venkatasubban@floridatrib.org.
