Gov. DeSantis names Ashley Moody to US Senate
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has announced Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody will replace Marco Rubio in the Senate.
ORLANDO, Fla. – It’s official: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has announced Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody will replace Marco Rubio in the senate. DeSantis announced the news during a Thursday morning press conference in Orlando.
Moody will replace Marco Rubio, who is President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for secretary of state.
Who is Ashley Moody?
What we know:
Ashley Moody was first selected to be the 38th attorney general in Florida on Jan. 8, 2019. She was reelected in 2022 and is in the middle of her second term, which runs through 2026.
During her first term, she campaigned on a pledge to voters that she’d be a prosecutor, not a politician.
She won the Republican nomination over State Rep. Frank White and defeated Democrat Sean Shaw in the general election. She won more votes than any statewide candidate in Florida that election cycle, including DeSantis and U.S. Senate candidate Rick Scott.
In 2022, she earned a second term after winning with nearly 61% of the vote. She attracted more votes than DeSantis or Rubio earned in their own landslide victories.
She is married to Justin Duralia, deputy chief of the Plant City Police Department. They have two sons.
Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody speaks during a roundtable discussion at the American Museum of the Cuban Diaspora in Miami's Coral Way neighborhood on Monday, Feb. 7, 2022. (Matias J. Ocner/Miami Herald/Tribune News Service via Getty
Early life: Florida Strawberry Queen
The backstory:
Ashley Moody, 49, is not new to the Florida political scene. In fact, she has been a well-known face for state political observers for nearly a decade.
Moody is a member of a fifth-generation family from Plant City, Florida, which is located in Hillsborough County.
She is the daughter of senior U.S. District Judge James Moody, who represents the state’s middle district.
She first experienced a claim to fame in 1993 when she was named the Florida Strawberry Queen at 17 years old.
College career
Ashley Moody attended the University of Florida and quickly recognized her own interest in politics.
She earned a master’s degree in international law at Stetson University College of Law and then completed her Juris Doctor at UF.
Professional experience
After college, Ashley Moody worked at Holland & Knight, a Florida law firm, where she worked on commercial litigation.
She then became an assistant U.S. attorney in Florida’s Middle District, prosecuting drug, firearm and fraud offenses. She then became a Hillsborough County circuit court judge at the age of 31, the youngest circuit court judge in the state at the time.
Ashley Moody speaks following Senate appointment
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced Thursday that Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody will replace Marco Rubio in the Senate.
Priorities: Law enforcement, opiod epidemic, human trafficking
Local perspective:
According to her website, Ashley Moody has prioritized a number of issues during her time in office: supporting law enforcement, tackling the opiod epidemic, combating human traffic, while supporting initiatives to protect “federal overreach” and Florida’s children.
Two of her legislative slogans have been: “Fighting for a safer Florida” and “Building a strong Florida.”
She also has been a vocal supporter of both President-elect Trump and Gov. DeSantis’ policies.
Moody has been instrumental in defending DeSantis’ conservative agenda in court and has joined other Republican-led states in challenging the Biden administration’s policies, suing over changes to immigration enforcement, student loan forgiveness and vaccine mandates for federal contractors.
In elevating her to the new position, DeSantis praised Moody as a key player in his political battles, a law and order prosecutor who’s prepared to help Trump “secure and shut the border,” combat inflation, and overhaul what he described as a federal bureaucracy “run amok.”
In recent months, Moody has joined other attorneys general in targeting social media platforms, alleging they are dangerous to young people’s mental health. She asked the U.S. Surgeon General to add a warning to all social media platforms.
“Studies show that there is a link between youth’s use of social media and psychological harm,” she said in a press release. “We are fighting to protect our youth online by calling on Congress to pass legislation requiring a U.S. Surgeon General warning on these platforms. This warning would not only highlight the inherent risks that social media platforms presently pose for young people, but also complement other efforts to spur attention, research and investment into the oversight of social media platforms.”
In Florida, she supported the passing and signing of H.B. 3, which restricted how old children have to be to use social media platforms in the state, while also requiring websites to create age-verification systems to protect children from inappropriate content, such as adult websites. Similar laws are being challenged in other states, including one in Texas, which is being considered by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Ashley Moody in the Senate: What will that look like?
Big picture view:
Sen. Marco Rubio has not yet resigned from the senate, but he is expected to do so as he goes through the confirmation hearings to be secretary of state, as tapped by President-elect Trump.
Gov. DeSantis was tasked with appointing Sen. Rubio’s replacement: Ashley Moody. She will be the second woman to represent Florida in Congress.
At the press conference, DeSantis said Moody would “mostly likely” be sworn in Monday afternoon, following Trump’s inauguration.
Moody will be expected to hold her new seat until a special election in 2026. The winner of the special election would serve the remainder of Rubio’s term. However, they will have to run for election again in 2028.
In a post on X, Moody said she would take her role confirming judges and justices “seriously to ensure that, like Justices Thomas and Alito, they share the values and concepts of law as our Founding Fathers understood them.”
Who will be the next Florida attorney general? Who is James Uthmeier?
What we know:
Gov. DeSantis said he intends to name James Uthmeier, his current chief of staff, to replace Ashley Moody as attorney general.
Uthmeier once worked in Rubio’s senate office and later served in the U.S. Department of Commerce under Trump. He also previously ran DeSantis’ unsuccessful presidential bid as campaign manager.
Political expert reacts to Senator Ashley Moody
Dr. Susan MacManus, a political analyst and Professor at USF, joins FOX 35’s Garrett Wymer on FOX 35 News+ to give her live reaction to Governor Ron DeSantis appointing Florida’s Attorney General Ashley Moody to replace Marco Rubio in the U.S. Senate.
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The Source: This story was written based on Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ press conference, Ashley Moody’s remarks, her official bio, and previous reporting.
