Marco Rubio Calls Val Demings an 'Extremist' After She Announces 2022 Senate Run

Florida GOP Senator Marco Rubio went on the attack Wednesday against Val Demings soon after the congresswoman announced she will challenge him for his Senate seat in 2022.

In a taped message, Rubio, who has held office since 2011, responded to Demings' announcement that she will seek the Democratic nomination, calling her a "do-nothing House member." He also said she was "ineffective," "far left and extremist."

Rubio posted his video response to the news of Demings entering the race on his official Twitter account. Rubio opened the video by saying, "I've always known that my opponent for the Senate was going to be a far-left, liberal Democrat. Today, we just found out which one of them [Senate Majority Leader] Chuck Schumer's picked."

Rubio then criticized Demings' record while touting his own. He said, "Congresswoman Val Demings is a do-nothing House member without a single significant legislative achievement in her time in Congress. By comparison, one nonpartisan group ranked me the most effective Republican in the entire Senate."

He also claimed that during the pandemic Demings "was sitting back home, praising the governors of New York and California" and "hysterically predicting that we're going to have mass death if we didn't keep our schools closed and our entire economy on lockdown." By comparison, he said, he was working on the bipartisan Paycheck Protection Program "that saved half a million Florida small businesses and millions of Florida jobs."

Rubio further attacked the Democrat for calling for police reforms and voting against voter ID laws. Aligning her with progressive lawmakers, Rubio said Demings voted with "socialist Nancy Pelosi 100 percent of the time." He also said she frequently sided with "the Marxist Squad" on the issues, referring to a group of House members that includes Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib.

His video concluded by saying: "In the weeks ahead, the voters of Florida are going to be reminded my record is significant and common sense achievements. And they're also going to learn more about how ineffective and far left and extremist the real Val Demings is when she's in Washington. And 2022 Florida is going to have a choice between two very different candidates and two very different records."

Demings announced her run in a three-minute video shared on a YouTube channel launched for her campaign. In it, she spoke of serving in Orlando's police department, where she became the department's first female chief of police.

In the video, Demings said, "When you grow up in the South poor, Black and female, you have to have faith in progress and opportunity. My father was a janitor, and my mother was a maid. She said, 'Never tire of doing good, never tire.'"

She continued, "I've never tired of standing up for what I believe is right. Now I'm running for the United States Senate because of two simple words: never tire."

Newsweek contacted Rubio and Demings for comment but did not hear back in time for publication.