SEMINOLE, Fla. — Charlie Crist and socialism were equally criticized on Friday by the Republican candidates hoping to face Crist in Florida’s 13thCongressional District contest later this year.


What You Need To Know



Amanda Makki, Anna Paulina Luna, Sheila Griffin and Sharon Newby engaged in a rare in-person candidate forum at the Seminole Recreation Center. The fifth candidate, George Buck, did not attend.

Candidates call out "dangerous socialists", educational system

Makki said that it was three members of The Squad – Congressional Democrats Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar – who are the inspiration for her to run for Congress.

“They’re scary. They’re un-American, and they’re dangerous socialists,” declared Makki, the former Capitol Hill staffer who has raised the most money in the race and earned the endorsement of top GOP Congressional leaders like Kevin McCarthy and Steve Scalise.

Sharon Newby and her husband moved from Illinois to Pinellas County in the late 1970s to take over a business selling home organs and pianos, a business she continues to operate. She said the current state of the country has made her an “unhappy American.”

“I am appalled at what is going on in this country, as close as Coachman Park,” she said, referring to the recent protests following the death of George Floyd. “This is an indictment of our educational system. Where did these people come from who are in front of our children? They are teaching them information that is factually incorrect. Are kids are being taught to be ashamed of our country? What are we doing?” 

Remember "Chain Gang Charlie"?

Sheila Griffin is the president of the Pinellas Suncoast Black Republican Club and has lived in Pinellas since she was two years old. Like her GOP opponents, Griffin espoused her full support for President Trump.

“I know what the president has done for this nation is unheralded,” she said. “It has not been lauded in the manner it should. We have been kept safer and stronger because of him, and right now I’m paying close attention to every piece of legislation that moves, because we are never going to be a socialist nation, and Marxism is not going to live here.”

“I believe right now our biggest threat in our country is fighting Marxism,” declared Luna, a U.S. Air Force veteran, who at 31 is the youngest candidate in the field. “I’m a devout anti-socialist, and yes, that needs to be stated.”

Luna also bashed the Democratic incumbent for his tough anti-crime philosophy in the 1990s, when he earned the moniker of “Chain Gang Charlie.” She cited a photo where Crist stood over three black prisoners on their knees in chains.

“I’ve had family members in and out of prison, and I can tell you one thing: If that was my dad in that photo - of which it could have very well been, and he was in shackles because he got arrested for a drug charge - I would have been horrified because that’s my father, and although he may have struggled, people deserve second chances.”

Luna went on to say that it would take somebody who had the humility – and not just the finances – to win the seat.

“We’re not doing Bloomberg 2.0. We’re not doing David Jolly 2.0,” she said.

The coronavirus and the economic shutdown came up at one point in the debate. Griffin said that there had not been an adequate “cost-benefit analysis” of shutting down businesses. 

We watched as our whole nation was taken hostage as a drill to see how it would take, and take over America,” she said, adding that “we got taken over by a lie.”

The candidates' comments on the pandemic all came before Gov. Ron DeSantis' announcement that he would be shutting down bars in the state due to the recent major increase of COVID-19 infections.

Going after the front-runner

Tipping her hand that she believes that Makki is the front-runner, Newby said she was “worried about one of the candidates on this stage. She comes from a very liberal part of this country.” 

Makki lived in Maryland but moved to Pinellas five years ago. Newby countered that as a long-time resident, she had paid more than $700,000 in property taxes over the years in Pinellas. “That’s worth something,” she said. 

Though the event was the rare political forum this year that took place in-person, attendance was sparse, with seating set far apart for social distancing purposes. Attendees had their temperatures taken at the door, and everyone wore face masks – even the candidates who weren’t speaking — after they were told to by the staff at the Seminole Recreation Center. 

The event was recorded by the Central Republican Pinellas Club and will air on their Facebook page.

The congressional seat has only been held by Crist since 2016, after the district was redrawn and moved from being a classic “swing-district” that leaned slightly Republican to a much more Democratic-leaning seat. The district went for Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump by 3.2 percentage points in 2016.