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Democratic Senate nominee Angie Nixon is facing bipartisan blowback by touching the third rail of southern Florida politics by saying something that could alienate the region’s substantial Cuban American population.
The controversy erupted over the candidate’s response to a seemingly straightforward question as to whether Cuba is a dictatorship.
“You know, that is what people have told me. I have never been to Cuba, and so I will have to take their word for it,” Nixon told CBS News.
The question was no doubt inspired by Nixon’s membership in the Democratic Socialists of America which praised Cuba’s late, longtime dictator Fidel Castro.
By not being straightforward with her own opinion and qualifying it to what people “told” her, Nixon, a Florida state representative since 2020, seemed to ignore decades of documented history of the oppressive regime that has sparked thousands of exiles to flee the island nation.
Most have fled to Florida, “a state shaped by generations of Cuban exiles,” as one news outlet put it.
Nixon later pushed back in an X post on critics who said her answer demonstrated a refusal to acknowledge Cuba’s government as a dictatorship, which included an initial report by CBS that she had skirted the question.
“It’s disappointing to have to say this, but CBS News, this is a serious failure of editorial reporting,” Nixon wrote.
“I clearly state in this clip that while I have not personally been to Cuba, I have spoken with Cubans who have described it as a dictatorship, and I believe them. To claim I declined to answer the question is categorically false. That is not journalism. It is misinformation.”
CBS subsequently deleted its original post that reported the nominee had failed to answer the question.
However, that didn’t stop a wave of criticism from both Democrats and Republicans saying answers to this question should not require clarification.
Among those denouncing Nixon’s comments was Phil Ehr, the Democratic nominee in Florida’s 28th Congressional District, who blasted Nixon in a post earlier this week.
“Cuba is a communist dictatorship,” he wrote. “Anyone seeking to serve in the United States Senate should be able to say those words without hesitation.”
He continued, “Angie Nixon has never been to Gaza, yet she has had no problem calling what happened there a genocide and encouraging others to antagonize those supporting Israel’s right to exist.”
He didn’t stop there, criticizing her affiliation with a socialist party:
Nixon voluntarily joined the Democratic Socialists of America, an organization that has sent delegations to Havana to meet with Cuban government officials and publicly praised the achievements of Cuban socialism. Meanwhile, the Cuban people live under a regime that imprisons political opponents, suppresses dissent, and denies its citizens the most fundamental freedoms.
Ehr was not the only Florida Democrat to object. Elliott Rodriguez, the party’s 27th Congressional District nominee, said that while he and Nixon “agree on many issues,” there was no agreement on Cuba.
“Cuba being a dictatorship is not a matter of opinion. It is a fact,” Rodriguez wrote on X, adding that some have lost their lives fighting for freedom. “The suffering of the Cuban people should never be a matter of debate.”
Republicans similarly denounced Nixon’s answer.
“Like many of her Democrat colleagues who can’t seem to define what a woman is, we now have a candidate for the U.S. Senate who can’t define a dictatorship,” Scott wrote on X.
Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL), who is running for governor, didn’t hold back, describing Nixon’s response as “the craziest thing I’ve ever heard,” Fox News reported.
Nixon’s stance on Cuba has been questioned before, prompted by her noncommittal response toward Fidel Castro, saying, “I don’t believe he’s someone that should be praised.”
Nixon’s most recent answer followed her response to an initial question how she would handle Cuban Americans “who have concerns about voting for you.”
She answered that she has been “fighting on the front lines for my entire adult career” for Cuban Americans and criticized Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Trump administration for deporting undocumented Cubans.
“I am someone who is going to be accessible, ethical, and someone they can trust,” she said.
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