WASHINGTON--Insurgent challengers fell flat in Florida on Tuesday as Republican U.S. Senator Marco Rubio won his party's nomination to seek re-election in November and U.S. Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz won her Democratic nominating race.
The non-traditional campaigns of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, who exceeded expectations in his failed Democratic White House bid, gave rise to speculation other insurgent politicians could gain traction this year. But that was not the case, at least in closely watched nominating races in Florida.
Rubio, who abandoned his presidential campaign in March, cleared the initial hurdle in his battle for a second six-year term in the U.S. Senate. He defeated novice politician Carlos Beruff, a millionaire homebuilder, who embraced Trump.
U.S. Representative Patrick Murphy, a Democrat, won his party's Senate nomination on Tuesday and is expected to give Rubio a spirited challenge in the autumn campaign. But Rubio might still harbour presidential ambitions. There were media reports this week that he had refused to commit to serving all six years of a Senate term if he were re-elected in November.
In early results on Tuesday night, Wasserman Schultz beat law professor Tim Canova, an outspoken Wall Street critic aligned with Sanders. In July, Wasserman Schultz resigned as head of the Democratic National Committee after emails were leaked suggesting members of the DNC favoured former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton over Sanders instead of maintaining a neutral role in the presidential nominating race. The episode helped fuel Canova's campaign, which also got a boost from Sanders' former supporters.
Another big-name politician, U.S. Senator John McCain, was being challenged by a Tea Party conservative in Arizona's Republican nominating vote. Results were expected later on Tuesday in McCain's race against former Arizona state Senator Kelli Ward, who, like Beruff, has embraced Trump.
