Sen. Rick Scott (R.) defeated former Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell after the Florida Democrat changed her tune on immigration enforcement, granting Republicans a crucial win in their effort to take the Senate.
Scott led Mucarsel-Powell by 12 points with 86 percent of the vote reported when the Associated Press called the race at 8:01 p.m. on Tuesday. Scott, Florida's former two-term governor, has been floated as a potential replacement for Sen. Mitch McConnell (Ky.) as the top Republican in the upper chamber. With a perilous Senate map, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) had targeted Florida as one of his few offensive opportunities.
During the race, Mucarsel-Powell, a South American immigrant, expressed support for Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE)—a reversal from her 2018 and 2020 congressional campaigns, when she accused ICE agents of racism. And even though she fought to eliminate dark money while serving in Congress, she campaigned this year with Alianza for Progress, a George Soros-funded dark money group that has lobbied for sanctuary policies.
In March, Mucarsel-Powell wrote an op-ed claiming that additional ICE funding, included in a failed border bill, was "critically necessary." Without it, she lamented, ICE "is now preparing to release thousands of detainees and cut detention levels by the tens of thousands."
But during her previous campaigns, Mucarsel-Powell railed against ICE. "There's a lack of transparency and a definite racial bias that has to change," Mucarsel-Powell said in June 2018, claiming that ICE "seems to be arresting people left and right."
Meanwhile, Alianza for Progress, which seeks to mobilize one million Puerto Ricans and "Latinxs" to elect Democrats across the Sunshine State, has advocated that Florida limit its cooperation with ICE. The group isn't required to disclose its donors to the public, but available records indicate the group is primarily funded by the Soros-backed Open Society Policy Center.
"In beautiful Osceola county, Latinos of all backgrounds came together to reaffirm our fight for freedom and to retire Rick Scott in November," Mucarsel-Powell wrote after campaigning with Alianza for Progress in July. "Thank you, @AlianzaCenter, for the work you do to celebrate our culture and empower our communities."
While in Congress, Mucarsel-Powell worked to remove dark money from politics, cosponsoring the For the People Act of 2019. She called the legislation the "largest anti-corruption voter protection bill that has ever passed through the House."
"It was a vote to take dark money out of politics," Mucarsel-Powell said in 2019. "It stops voters from being purged off the rolls. We have had a lot of those problems in Florida."