Florida Politics36%
Michael Carbonara, 18 months into campaign, says he will keep positive message through Aug. 18 Primary 52%
By Jacob Ogles66%
8/2/2026, 3:30:10 PM
BS Summary: This article contains 28 faulty reasoning types, including Sunk Cost Effect, Unattributed Quote, and Indoctrination, with Appeal to Emotion as the most egregious example at 15.2% saturation with 114 hits. Analysis detected 1,277 faulty-reasoning hits from 751 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 45.3% and a BS Rank of 52% (12,852 of 26,790 articles). This article is worse (more manipulative) than 52.00% of the article peer group.
The campaign trail to Congress has changed a good deal since Michael Carbonara first announced his candidacy.
Originally a challenger to Democratic U.S.
Rep.
Debbie Wasserman Schultz in a district that no longer exists, Carbonara ran a race with little attention, one his own party had written off despite his seven-figure investment .
Now, he finds himself in a competitive GOP Primary bracing to run in a battleground seat targeted by Democrats and Republicans alike.
“I jumped into this fight almost 18 months ago when this district was a D+5 district against Debbie Wasserman Schultz.
And when I jumped in, I mean, all the odds were against me,” he said.
“Everybody said, ‘Don’t do it.
Don’t waste your money.
It’s a waste of time.
You can’t beat her.’
And I never wavered.”
He also did not know redistricting would put him in a race for Florida’s 22nd Congressional District, an expansive district stretching from Weston in Broward County west to Marco Island in Collier County.
The nearly coast-to-coast district covers parts of four counties and spans three media markets, making the now $3.77 million out-of-pocket investment Carbonara committed to the race more critical.
The race has also exposed Carbonara to attacks from members of his own party.
Belinda Keiser , Vice Chancellor of Keiser University, has set up websites criticizing his foreign business dealings.
Third-party groups have also criticized him in texts and mailers, and Carbonara can’t help but suspect those are connected to another GOP Primary opponent, Askar Brands founder Casey Askar .
He noted that Askar sued U.S.
Rep.
Byron Donalds , now a front-runner for Governor, over political messaging in a 2020 campaign.
“I wouldn’t be surprised, you know, by any of the dirty tricks that any of these two candidates here may be pulling,” he said.
Carbonara said he won’t go negative in messaging, but does point out the tensions between Askar and Donalds, and also points to a history of Democratic political donations Keiser made in the past to Democratic candidates including Hillary Clinton .
As for attacks on him, Carbonara notes he left leadership positions at all of his companies, including Ibanera, the fintech business criticized in the recent attacks from Keiser.
The business is engaged in litigation with the Middle East-based Zand Bank.
“I have full faith that the business is being operated and doing — they’re doing everything that they’re supposed to be doing,” Carbonara said.
“Ibanera is actually a financial institution that’s regulated and required to follow strict AML, anti-money laundering, guidelines.”
Carbonara said he has traveled the district as much as possible to get to know its needs, and will host more town hall events to answer questions from voters.
He notes the district is the largest agrarian district east of the Mississippi River, demanding an understanding of agriculture issues, on top of the matters impacting wealthy coastal communities.
A Republican Primary will take place Aug. 18, but Carbonara would like to turn attention toward Democrats.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has already added Democratic candidate Pia Dandiya to its Red to Blue program, and Carbonara expects the Democratic National Committee to fight hard for the turf.
“They’re very upset that there was a redrawing of the maps.
They’re losing four seats potentially this November in Florida, and they’re not going to give up without a fight,” Carbonara said.
“That’s why we have to show up on Nov. 3 with our best candidate forward.”
If anything, the increased attacks on his character are something Carbonara sees as a sign of panic from opponents.
He feels confident heading into August, he said.
It should mean something, Carbonara said, that he entered the race before any talk of redistricting, putting out a message before the seat had more registered Republicans than Democrats.
“There’s a lot of energy on the ground.
We have a lot of support, and our message has been the same since the beginning,” Carbonara said.
“We’re running to restore our freedoms, our economic freedoms, our affordability, safety, personal liberties, because we need that baseline and foundation of freedom so that we all can have access to the American Dream.
We need to reverse a lot of these Democrat socialist policies that have eroded our freedoms, and this is how we do it: We get out there and we talk to the people and we get the right people in office to restore those freedoms.”
Speakers
2speakers61%attributed speech292writer words
Selected voice
97%flagged-word coverageMichael Carbonara
442 attributed words96% of attributed speech58% writer coverage
Attribution is sentence-level. Pattern percentages are calculated only from words assigned to that voice.
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