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Alexander Vindman, the one-time National Security Council (NSC) aide whose testimony before Congress fueled the first impeachment of President Donald Trump, on Tuesday announced he’s launching a Democratic Senate campaign in Trump’s adopted home state of Florida.
Vindman, a retired Army lieutenant colonel, is aiming to challenge GOP Sen. Ashley Moody, who was appointed last year by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to fill the Senate seat left vacant when then-Sen. Marco Rubio stepped down to serve as Secretary of State in Trump’s second administration.
Republicans are defending their 53-47 Senate majority in this year’s midterm elections, and the 2026 Senate race in GOP-dominated Florida, which Trump carried by 13 points in 2024, was not considered a top target for Democrats. But Vindman’s campaign launch could give Democrats a known candidate who would likely bring national attention to the race.
Vindman, who was born in then-Soviet-controlled Ukraine, was in the spotlight as he testified in front of Congress about Trump’s infamous 2019 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that ultimately led to the Democrat-controlled House impeaching the president. Trump was later acquitted by the Senate.
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National Security Council aide Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman testifies before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Nov. 19, 2019, during a public impeachment hearing of President Donald Trump’s efforts to tie U.S. aid for Ukraine to investigations of his political opponents. (Andrew Harnik/AP Photo)
A combat veteran, Vindman was subsequently fired from his position with the NSC. He became a vocal Trump critic and later wrote two books and worked as a senior adviser for VoteVets, a Democrat-aligned group that helps to elect veterans.
“I stepped up when my country needed a soldier, I reported corruption at the highest levels of government, and now I’m stepping up again to fight for Floridians,” Vindman said in a social media post.
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And spotlighting his past clash with Trump, Vindman charged in his video that “this president unleashed a reign of terror and retribution, not just against me and my family, but against all of us.”
Former National Security Council Director for European Affairs Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman walks at the Capitol to review transcripts of his testimony in the impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump, in Washington, Nov. 7, 2019. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo)
Vindman also became one of the first candidates to include a clip of this past weekend’s fatal shooting by federal agents in Minneapolis, Minnesota, of Alex Pretti, a VA nurse who was protesting Trump’s immigration crackdown.
“Today our country is in chaos. Thug militias attacking citizens,” Vindman said in his video under clips of the Pretti shooting as well as the fatal shooting of Renee Good, another U.S. citizen in Minneapolis who was demonstrating against the tactics of immigration enforcement agents.
Vindman also highlighted the issue of affordability, arguing “skyrocketing costs are crushing ordinary people, while the billionaires and career politicians profit.”
And Vindman claimed that Republicans “put Moody in the Senate to be a ‘yes’ vote for Trump and the billionaires. She’s not Florida’s senator. She’s theirs.”
This year’s Senate showdown in Florida is a special election, with the winner serving out the final two years of Rubio’s term before having to run again in 2028 for a full six-year term.
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Moody, who won two statewide Florida attorney general elections in 2018 and 2022, has been endorsed by Trump and doesn’t face any serious competition for the GOP nomination.
Republican Sen. Ashley Moody of Florida is running in the midterms to serve the final two years of now-Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s term in the Senate. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
Vindman, who lives in left-leaning Broward County in southern Florida, joins a field of Democratic Senate candidates that includes state Rep. Hector Mujica and Brevard County school board member Jennifer Jenkins.
Whoever wins the Democratic primary will face a steep uphill climb against Moody.
The Cook Report, Inside Elections, and Sabato’s Crystal Ball, three top nonpartisan political handicappers, rate the race as solid or safe Republican.
“Florida is a ruby red state and Democrats have no path to flipping its Senate seat in 2026,” National Republican Senatorial Committee regional press secretary Nick Puglia told Fox News Digital. “Anyone who thinks otherwise is not living in reality.”
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Vindman isn’t the first member of his family to run for federal office.
His twin brother, Eugene Vindman, was elected to Congress in 2024, succeeding now Gov. Abigail Spanberger in a district in northern and central Virginia.
