Scott Powers
Democratic congressional candidate David Richardson has released his first digital video ad, introducing himself in Florida’s 27th Congressional District race and discussing abortion, prison reform, and his status as Florida’s first openly gay lawmaker.
“I decided to talk about these issues publicly. I’m not afraid to talk about this stuff out loud. And I’m not going to be afraid to talk about it when I get to Washington D.C.,” Richardson declares in what could be seen as the video’s theme, though the statement immediately follows his discussion of his prison reform initiatives.
The two-minute, eight-second film “Places” is the third video produced by Richardson’s campaign but the first involving a digital media advertising buy.
Richardson, a state representative from Miami Beach, is in a battle royale for the Miami-based CD 27 seat being vacated by the retiring Republican U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. It’s a district that Democrats appear all-in to try to flip. Nine Democrats, five Republicans and an independent candidate are in the mix. To date, Richardson has raised just over $1 million for his campaign, while seven other candidates, including six of the Democrats, are in six figures for campaign contribution dollars.
Richardson begins the video by describing himself as a progressive Democrat and then relating how he grew up in a modest home with parents who lived “paycheck to paycheck,” and says he understands the struggles people go through to make ends meet.
From there, he follows a theme “Places Have Meanings,” speaking while footage shows him standing in various locations around Miami-Dade County. He notes that he is the first openly gay elected state legislator; he describes how his mother told of having an abortion as a teenager “in a dark scary place” in pre-Roe V. Wade days, and declares he never wants a woman to have to go through that again; and, in front of a jail, he discusses his criminal justice and prison reform initiatives in the Florida Legislature, and states, “everybody deserves dignity.”
