Florida FL-07 House2016

Court-ordered redistricting made this district three points less Republican, but as recently as June, Democrats couldn't find a candidate against entrenched GOP Rep. John Mica. That changed when Democrat Stephanie Murphy announced her bid just a day before the filing deadline, in part motivated by the gun debate in the aftermath of the nearby Pulse nightclub shooting. Now, this is shaping up to be the ultimate House race of 2016.

At 38 year old suburban mom, Murphy offers a jarring biographical contrast to Mica, who is 73 and has been in Congress 24 years. Murphy's family fled communist Vietnam when she was an infant. After graduating Georgetown's Foreign Service school, she became a national security analyst at the Defense Department before becoming an executive at venture capital firm Sungate Capital and teaching business at Rollins College. 


Mica is best known for his tenure atop the House Transportation Committee and for delivering federal funds to roads and SunRail, but he hasn't had to run a real general election in years and Democrats plan to exploit his votes on guns and LGBTQ protections. Although Murphy got a late fundraising start, Democratic groups have reserved $4 million in the Orlando market and Mica had just $788,000 in mid-August. This race moves to the Toss Up column.

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