HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, Fla. — Hillsborough County Democrat Jessica Harrington says that she’s essentially been running for the Florida House District 64 seat for the past two years after losing to then-GOP incumbent Jamie Grant in 2018.

Her new Republican opponent in the 2020 contest, family attorney Traci Koster, has barely been in the race for two months.

“I think somebody described it as jumping into the washing machine full cycle,” says Koster. “That’s really what it’s been like.” She says that she’s not sure if “there’s ever a right or perfect time to do something like this. But certainly the timing has been a big part of it.”

Koster was picked by Republican party officials in Hillsborough and Pinellas in mid-August to run for the seat just days after Grant announced that he was stepping down from the Legislature to serve in Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration as the state’s chief technology officer.

The district leans Republican by about seven percentage points, and a recent St. Pete Polls survey has Koster up by five points. Yet Harrington, a 7^thgrade civics teacher, is confident that she can flip the seat on Nov. 3.

“We have been able to garner support from Republicans, Democrats and independents, because people feel that a teacher is the best profession that you can send to Tallahassee, because we can work with everyone,” she says. “We feel that it doesn’t matter what the numbers say, it’s going to show on Election Day that the people are behind us.”

Koster says that she had contemplated running in the district once Grant had completed his term, and had to act quickly once he announced he was stepping down. 

The two candidates differ on many issues, including school choice.

“My kids go to a charter school and I think that nobody is better situated than a parent to know what’s best for their children, particularly with respect for their education,” Koster says. “I think every child is different. I think we need to meet the children where they are in terms of their education.”

Harrington says she actually started her career as an educator at a charter school, so she says she understands the importance of parents having choice and charter schools in the community.

“The problem is that right now they’re really taking funds from public schools for charters and they’re really pitting the schools against each other and that’s not right,” she says. “Wouldn’t parents have more choice if all of their schools were good?”

Regarding the state’s unemployment system, state Democrats last week called for nearly doubling the amount of weekly benefits for those unemployed, as well as expanding the number of weeks that one could stay on unemployment.

Harrington supports the idea, while Koster says she doesn’t know if the state could afford it.  

“I know Florida’s budget is hurting, and it’s going to be hurting because of this pandemic, but families’ budgets are hurting, too,” she says. “And to take more money out of their pockets? That’s the problem. Where does the money come from?”

Koster supports Gov. DeSantis’ recent call for legislation that would crack down on disorderly protesters.

“If you are peacefully protesting, this proposed legislation doesn’t impact you,” she says. “It’s for the people that are not peacefully protesting, and they need to be deterred from that behavior.”

“We’ll definitely take a look at that deeper, and hopefully the Legislature can come up with a better way,” says Harrington, who calls the proposal a “distraction” by the governor to take away focus on how he’s handled the pandemic. “Maybe we can address the issues of why the civil unrest is happening. “

Harrington considers herself a progressive Democrat and is a member of the Democratic Progressive Caucus of Florida. That became an issue over the past week after Koster wrote on her Facebook campaign page that Harrington “wants to ban our law enforcement officers from serving as school resource officers.”

Her source for making that statement came directly from the Democratic Progressive Caucus of Florida’s platform, which reads “we oppose the deployment of public, private or off-duty law enforcement in our schools or at our election sites.”

Harrington then responded in an “open letter” to Koster on the Daily Kos website that said “I fully support funding school resource officers, community police officers and sheriff’s deputies.” She went on to question Koster’s integrity in the letter.

Koster later posted other planks from the Progressive Caucus’ platform that she said Harrington supported.

Spectrum Bay News 9 asked both candidates about the exchange on Wednesday. 

Harrington said that her own political views are not synonymous with those of the Progressive Caucus. 

“When a candidate gets endorsed by a group or a different organization, it does not mean that candidate believes or is going to do everything that that group believes. It just means that you are the candidate that’s closest aligned to it,” Harrington said. “Just like when my opponent accepted money from the GEO Group. Does that mean she wants to separate children from the border? Does that mean she is for human rights abuses?” (The GEO Group runs private prisons and has faced accusations of human rights abuses against inmates in its facilities.)

“That’s a fine position and she’s welcome to say that,” Koster responded. “That has not been what she is saying. Instead, she has resorted to personal attacks as far as my integrity goes. So if she wants to come out and specify what she does and doesn’t agree with, that’s her prerogative, certainly. We have only pointed out her affiliation with that group and what that group stands for.”