Congressional candidate Marla Massie has vowed to represent the swamp of her home state of Florida, not the corrupt swamp of Washington, D.C., like her establishment opponent, Rep. John Rutherford (R-FL), in the Florida 5th Congressional District primary.
Mara Macy joined host Matt Boyle Breitbart News Saturday Early voting has begun for the August 20 primary election.
Massie spoke of the energy behind her insurrection, and Boyle agreed: “There are lots of signs that John Rutherford and the Republican establishment in Northeast Florida are scared. They’re panicking.”
Massie said Republican voters in St. Johns County, one of two counties in the district, began receiving information in the mail on Friday “falsely claiming to be the St. Johns County Republican Party and including on a fake endorsement list candidates not endorsed by that organization.”
Local news media Reported About fraud.
“They literally took the real endorsement list, copied its appearance and put their own candidate, the establishment candidate, in that publication,” she detailed, noting that the guide instructed voters to take it to the polls and select the candidate who was fraudulently listed as the group’s favorite.
“We’re seeing that level of desperation coming from the establishment,” Massie said.
District residents are eager to vote and make a difference, she told Boyle.
“Early voting has been going on in Duval County since Wednesday, and if you look at the breakdown of people who actually showed up to vote early, Republicans outnumber Democrats,” Massie said, explaining that the early voter numbers indicate a boom because Republicans tend to wait until Election Day to vote.
Massie, who called the show from near her polling place in St. Johns County, told Boyle, “A lot of people have signed in my favor and are basically saying they’re supporting me over John. Voting just started today here in St. Johns, and there are definitely a lot of people out there. I’ve only been here for 20 or 30 minutes and they’ve told me the same thing.”
The high energy levels reflected in early voter turnout suggest challengers to incumbent candidates may have an advantage.
“Voter turnout in primaries has traditionally been low,” Massie said, “so we’re hoping for a better turnout than in the past, because we believe people should be motivated to have true representation at all levels of government.”
Massie cited local complaints about the level of representation and service given to Rutherford’s constituents.
“The most common complaint I hear from constituents is when they call his office about an issue, they either don’t get a response or they get a boilerplate response,” Massie explained, “But even when it’s a boilerplate response, it’s usually a response that sells why he doesn’t support what they support.”
Rep. John Rutherford (R-FL) (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
Massie believes it is unacceptable for lawmakers to vote in ways that are completely different to the wishes of their constituents.
“These are the people who put him in office,” she said. “I can’t tell you how many people have said to me, ‘I’ve voted for him all my life, even when he was sheriff, and I’m done. I’m not voting for him anymore.'”
Massie told Boyle about conversations he’d had with people who had voted for Rutherford in the past throughout his long career in public office, and argued that many former Rutherford supporters were “sick, tired and exhausted.”
“His loyal supporters can’t say anything good about him being a good representative, because they know he’s not a good representative, so he’s basically voting against everything we represent in Washington or want to be represented,” she continued.
Massie said Rutherford’s votes did not reflect the views of the people of Florida’s 5th Congressional District.
“He voted for warrantless spying,” she said, referring to Senator Rutherford’s decisive vote to reject an amendment that would have prohibited intelligence agencies from spying on Americans without a warrant. “He votes for every continuing resolution. He votes for every grant to Ukraine. I mean, it’s funding an endless war, and he’s making money off of it. That’s a problem for me. If people in Congress have inside information, I don’t think they should be making money off of it,” she said, promising not to leak it if elected.
Massie went on to elaborate on why voters are unhappy with Rutherford’s delivery style and the growing, palpable anger that’s fueling her campaign.
“John’s friends came and gave me a chance. [him] “Because I’m on their side,” she insisted, “when people ask him to vote a certain way and he doesn’t, I’m on their side. So historically, his voting record in Washington is really the reason people are turning their backs on him.”
Boyle dug deeper into the issue Massie mentioned about Rutherford making money while in office.
This has been a big focus throughout the man’s congressional career. But John Rutherford is under investigation by the House Ethics Committee for failing to properly report various stock transactions and, apparently, [a] Having bought Raytheon for billions of yen the day Russia invaded Ukraine and then voted for every weapons package since, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Raytheon was taking money from taxpayers because Raytheon is a weapons company.
…What I have a problem with is members of Congress buying stock in companies and then repeatedly voting for bills that benefit those companies, thereby improving their own financial position.
This man has been under investigation for months by the House Ethics Committee. He currently serves on the House Ethics Committee. I have never heard him explain that the investigation against him was ultimately dismissed because he recused himself from the vote.
But this happened after Rep. Jackie Walorski, the Democrats had the majority in the House at the time, and the way the House Ethics Committee works is that there are an equal number of Republicans and Democrats on the committee… but [Walorski] He died in a car accident. She was the ranking member of the committee at the time, in August of 2022. And then two weeks later, when Democrats had firm control of the committee, they voted to expunge and dismiss this case against him in mid-August, when no one was paying attention to Congress.
“I haven’t heard anything about whether he voted in favor or anything like that. Frankly, I’m very confused and I have a ton of questions. And now I’ve asked Mr. Rutherford and people close to him if he would be willing to come on the show and explain things and answer questions, or be interviewed and answer questions. He won’t.”
Boyle asked Massie what questions he would ask if Rutherford suddenly wanted to answer them.
“I ask him why he doesn’t vote the way his constituents want him to vote for him,” she responded. “The word ‘representative’ is very clear. He should represent what his constituents want him to represent, and he’s not doing that. So I ask him why he would.”
She continued, “I would ask him why he continues to vote for continuing resolutions with all the ridiculous stuff like DOD travel for abortions and DEI. I would ask him why he continues to send money to Ukraine when he hasn’t even closed his own borders. I’ve been to Darien, Panama. I’ve seen who’s going to be the next president and I can tell you we are in a crisis right now. Why protect other countries’ borders when you can’t protect your own?”
Boyle, who made it clear he would be voting for Massie, asked what steps she was taking to ensure victory on Aug. 20.
“We’re still going door-to-door,” she replied enthusiastically. “We’re in the district. We’re flying all over the place. It’s going to get busier and busier from now on. So if you want to remove him from office, or remove some of the seats that you put on your ballot and replace them with people who are true America First people who want to see our tax dollars spent wisely, you can volunteer to get involved.”
Massie invites voters and donors who would like to learn more about her or are interested in volunteering or supporting: X or Facebook.
“Please reach out to us,” Massie told Boyle, “we want to hear from you, we want to know why things aren’t being represented the way you want them to be represented so that we can address that issue in our campaign and make sure that representation is heard in Washington, D.C.”
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Bradley Jay is Capitol Hill correspondent for Breitbart News. Follow him on X/Twitter. translation:.
