Florida Democrat Val Demings Discourages Candidates from Investing in ‘Certain Rural Areas’ Where They Keep ‘Losing’

Rep. Val Demings (D-FL), who is running for U.S. Senate in Florida, suggested that Democrat political candidates forgo investing their “limited resources” in “certain rural areas” where Democrats continuously lose as she spoke to the state black caucus at an event this month.

Demings questioned why Democrats “keep going” to the Republican-voting rural areas when their energy should be directed toward black voters during a meet-and-greet in Orlando with the Democratic Black Caucus of Florida on December 4, per a clip of the event that the caucus posted to social media.

“The problem that the Democratic Party has had is, look, we know there are always limited resources,” Demings said. “And sometimes when you’re trying to decide, ‘Where do I go?’ … ‘Who am I going to invest in?’ And we talk about this in Congress, about certain rural areas across the country that we have been losing since the mid ’70s. Why do we keep going there?”

She added, “I’m not saying— you don’t give up on anybody, but go stick with the one that brought you to the dance, and African Americans, black people, have been the strength of the Democratic Party since the beginning.”

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Demings said that, as an example, she visited Quincy, Florida, a black-majority city in northern Florida’s Gadsden County, where President Joe Biden won by close to 40 percent in 2020.

“I cannot win this race depending on the four or five largest blue counties,” Demings said in reference to places like Broward, Orange, and Palm Beach. “I’ve got to go into some smaller counties and talk to people about things that matter to them and pick up that one to two percentage points. I can do that, and I’m going to do that,” she said, adding that Democrats must not “take the base for granted” and that she wants “black women” to show her that they are “the strength of the Democratic Party” for the midterms.

“Take no one for granted. Take no vote for granted,” said Demings, the leading Democrat candidate hoping to unseat incumbent Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) next year.

Florida’s health department deems 30 of the 67 counties in the state to be rural. Of those 30 counties, most are, according to the past several presidential election results, red counties. Twenty are currently deeply red, having voted in favor of former President Donald Trump by 70 percent or more in 2020. Only one of the 30 counties, Gadsden, the sole black-majority county in the state, voted in favor of Biden last year.

Breitbart News asked the Demings campaign for clarity on the Florida Democrat’s suggestion that her party’s candidates discontinue investing in “certain rural counties” that have long been red but did not receive a response.

Write to Ashley Oliver at aoliver@breitbart.com. Follow her on Twitter at @asholiver.