TALLAHASSEE — A survivor of the mass school shooting in Parkland is featured in a new ad from Democratic presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg.
The Florida ad launched Friday is part of a series featuring survivors of gun violence that the campaign plans to run in 12 states.
The former New York City mayor, an outspoken advocate for gun control, is spending millions of dollars on an ad during this weekend’s Super Bowl that features a Houston mother whose son was shot and killed.
The Florida ad features Sari Kaufman, now a senior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, where a gunman shot and killed 17 people in February 2018. Kaufman has become an activist since the shooting and last year spoke out against Florida legislation that allowed teachers to carry guns in the classroom.
“A lot of politicians run away from the issue of gun violence, and Mike runs toward it,” Kaufman says in the Bloomberg ad.
The Bloomberg campaign said the digital ad would run until March 17, the date of Florida’s presidential primary.
Bloomberg has focused intently on Florida, bringing in staff and spending millions of dollars to saturate the television market with ads. On Monday, the campaign will use Orlando as the starting point for a multistate bus tour to call for action to prevent gun violence.
After the Parkland shootings, the Republican-led Florida Legislature passed a sweeping school safety measure that raised the minimum age to buy a rifle to 21. The National Rifle Association has challenged the law in federal court.
That same year, Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund, a nonprofit advocacy group largely financed by Bloomberg, donated a total of $500,000 to a political committee controlled by state Sen.
Bill Galvano, a Bradenton Republican.Galvano has come under fire for the donations as the Florida Senate considers a measure that would require unlicensed gun sellers to record, among other things, a purchaser’s identification and criminal background history, the make and model of the gun and the date of the sale. The information would have to be notarized and saved.
Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican who opposes the bill, last week defended Galvano as a supporter of President Donald Trump.
A Jan. 21-23 poll by Republican pollster Ryan Tyson showed former Vice President Joe Biden leading other Democratic contenders in Florida. The survey of 600 likely voters, which has a 4 percent margin of error, showed Bloomberg in single digits.
Tyson said Bloomberg is likely doing better than the phone survey suggests. Tyson conducted an internet poll concurrent with the phone survey where participants could see a ballot. That survey showed Bloomberg in a three-way tie with Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren.