MIAMI — Miami's surfboard-salesman-turned-politician is launching his second bid for higher office, only this time he's aiming higher.
City Commissioner Ken Russell announced Thursday that he plans to challenge U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio in 2022, a surprise declaration from a Democrat with a relatively short record in partisan politics. His political career began with a long-shot 2015 campaign that saw him beat well-funded opponents with greater name recognition to represent Miami's District 2, which includes most of the city's waterfront.
Now, he's a City Hall veteran with one aborted run at federal office already behind him. In the 2018 congressional race to replace then-Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Russell dropped out of a crowded Democratic primary field, choosing to bow out rather than make the ballot — which, win or lose, would have forced him to resign his city commission seat. He was easily re-elected to a second and final four-year term on the commission in 2019.
Russell would have to resign his commission seat effective no later than January 2023 if he officially qualifies next year to make the ballot for the Senate race.
In casting his lot in the Democratic primary to challenge Rubio, a two-term Republican, he'll likely face long odds once again. U.S Rep. Val Demings, a former Orlando police chief who played a central role in Donald Trump's first impeachment trial and made President Joe Biden's shortlist of potential running mates in 2020, is expected to launch a campaign for U.S. Senate, though she has not yet officially declared her candidacy.
"There will be naysayers," said Russell, who creates original woodcarvings and once traveled the world as a champion yo-yo player, and later as a Russell Promotions representative. "They'll say, 'Who is this guy? A city commissioner?' I say that I'm a neighbor who wants to solve problems."
Florida's U.S. Senate election is considered a pickup opportunity for Democrats in 2022, though Rubio's status as a well-known incumbent likely puts the race a tier below other competitive states like Pennsylvania and North Carolina on the national map where incumbent Republicans are retiring. The Senate is currently split evenly between both parties, with Vice President Kamala Harris' tie-breaking vote giving Democrats a slim margin of control.
South Florida Democratic strategist and lobbyist Evan Ross said Demings, who would be the country's third Black woman senator if elected, is the presumptive favorite in the Democratic primary.
"Taking on Val Demings in the primary is mission impossible," Ross said. "We'll see if Ken can do a good Tom Cruise impression."
So far, little-known candidates Joshua Joseph Weil, Josue Larose, Edward Abud and Allen Ellison are the only declared candidates in the Democratic primary, according to Federal Election Commission and Florida Department of State records.
Russell, the son of a U.S. World War II veteran and Japanese professional yo-yo player, says he doesn't mind if he's considered an underdog once again.
"This is not about a career-seeking politician trying to move up," he told the Herald in an interview Wednesday. "To me, this is about an average citizen trying to help my neighbors."
To make his case, he's billing himself as an everyman who will champion Florida's environmental issues in Washington, from water quality to sea level rise to Everglades restoration. Sitting steps away from Biscayne Bay in downtown, he laid out the environmental theme of his campaign Wednesday while recalling his days as a fledgling activist demanding cleanup of the contaminated city park across the street from his house, and as a kitesurfing instructor who spent several hours a day in the water.
He said more federal dollars should be steered toward Florida water projects, and the Army Corps of Engineers' approach to protecting coastal areas should have more green and less gray concrete. Russell, who has bolstered his partisan chops recently by leading the Florida Democratic Party's Municipal Victory Program, described recent trips to Naples, Stuart and Pinellas County to talk to local officials about protecting the Biscayne Aquifer, restoring shorelines and safeguarding cities against rising tides fueled by climate change.
He likes to talk about his seat on the board of directors for the Everglades Trust.
"Where there's water, there's trouble," he said. "And we need to work together to fix it."
The future of the state's environment is a bipartisan issue, Russell argued, that will make him a viable Democrat in a divided political landscape. Beating two-term incumbent Rubio, a bilingual, Miami-born Republican in an increasingly red state with a significant Hispanic population, will be challenging for any Democrat.
In 2016, Rubio cleared the Republican primary field after ending his presidential run. He ultimately defeated Democratic Rep. Patrick Murphy for a second term with 52% of the vote, outpacing Trump's performance in the state by four percentage points.
Rubio will likely have the Republican primary field to himself after Trump endorsed his reelection bid in April.
Fundraising could also be a challenge for Russell. Many donors to city commission candidates, Russell's fundraising base, also support Republicans like Rubio at the federal level. National Democratic donors and big-money groups are likely to back Demings, according to multiple sources, leaving Russell in a potential no-man's-land for campaign cash.
Russell, who has improved his Spanish over the years, is already taking jabs at Rubio. A three-minute video announcing his campaign opens with Russell comparing his woodworking to the kind of hands-on politics he says he'd bring to Washington. Later, he referenced Rubio's controversial "small hands" comment about then-candidate Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign.
"I like to work with my hands," he says, "not worry about how big they are."
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(Miami Herald staff writer Alex Daugherty contributed to this report.)
