CNN contributor Ana Navarro, a former political strategist, blasted the Democratic Party Tuesday for nominating former Democratic Rep. Charlie Crist of Florida to run against Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis.
“I’m going to be watching what happens in Florida frankly because I think it’s going to be so determinant. In Florida we’ve come to have very close races,” Navarro, a co-host on “The View,” said. “Ron DeSantis beat Andrew Gillum by something like 40,000 votes and I think tonight Ron DeSantis is going to come out of there with no help from Donald Trump as a vanquishing, you know, conqueror and with much bigger numbers, frankly because the Democrats ran a recycled has-been who had been a Republican, an independent and is now a Democrat.” (RELATED: ‘Thank God There’s Only One Donald Trump’: Navarro, Behar Spar Over DeSantis)
Crist served one term as governor of Florida after winning the 2006 gubernatorial election as a Republican before changing his affiliation in 2010 to run as an independent for the Senate seat that Republican Sen. Marco Rubio won. In 2016, he changed his party affiliation to Democrat and defeated Republican Rep. David Jolly for the first of three terms in the House of Representatives, according to Ballotpedia.
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“Wow, how do you really feel about Charlie Crist?” host Erin Burnett asked Navarro, a frequent critic of former President Donald Trump and Republicans who back him.
Crist trailed DeSantis by 15% in a Data For Progress poll, while a Fox35/InsiderAdvantage poll showed Crist facing a 10% deficit and a Spectrum News/Siena poll showed DeSantis with a 12% lead. Crist defeated Democratic Commissioner of Agriculture Nikki Fried, garnering 60.2% of the vote, in an August primary and resigned from Congress effective at the end of the month.
DeSantis won the 2018 gubernatorial election against Democratic Mayor Andrew Gillum of Tallahassee by 33,683 votes.
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