The Republican Party of Florida received a belated Christmas gift last week when troubled retired Army lieutenant colonel and Trump impeachment witness Alexander Vindman declared himself a Democratic candidate for United States Senate. Vindman appears to have been a Florida resident since at least April 2023, when public records suggest he purchased a $1.9 million, five-bedroom house with a swimming pool in an upmarket section of Fort Lauderdale.

If that strikes you as a reach for a mid-career army officer who retired at age 45, consider Vindman’s career trajectory since his 2019 impeachment testimony, in which he denied that he was a whistleblower on a call between President Trump and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky and took the Fifth when asked the names of those with whom he discussed the call. Myriad impressive-sounding fellowships at left-of-center nonprofits rapidly came his way, as did a book deal capitalizing on his 15 minutes of fame. Naturally, as the books of leftist darlings usually do, that book shot to the top of The New York Times bestseller list. Vindman has had cameos playing himself on Curb Your Enthusiasm, in which he farcically spills the beans on an incriminating call he overhears Larry David making, and he appeared in a pro-Joe Biden 2020 campaign ad made by the reputationally tarnished anti-Trump Lincoln Project.

Only a few months before Vindman’s high-end Florida real estate purchase, Vindman and his twin brother Eugene established a defense industry firm called Trident Support. The Vindmans have claimed that Trident raises funds to repair damaged military equipment in Ukraine, the land of their birth, which Alexander has claimed offered to make him its defense minister. But the Pentagon alleges that the brothers used their company to pitch a multimillion-dollar deal to act as middlemen between Ukraine, the Biden administration, and NATO.

Eugene, who retired not long after Alexander left service, was subsequently elected to Congress, narrowly defeating a Republican candidate in Virginia’s 7^th district, which was vacated by Virginia’s new Democrat governor, Abigail Spanberger. Last November, the Washington Post reported that War Department general counsel Earl Matthews wrote the House Ethics, Oversight, and Armed Services Committees, alleging that the Vindmans had not sought the required State and Army Department consent to work on behalf of a foreign government and may, as retired Army officers, have acted in violation of the emoluments clause. The Vindmans continue to cry political persecution, but investigations may well be forthcoming.

Awash in cash from multiple income streams that no ordinary retired lieutenant colonel would enjoy, while clad in the trappings of patriotism, Alexander initially may have moved to Fort Lauderdale, a rare patch of blue in Florida’s crimson landscape, to benefit from our state constitutional prohibitions on income and inheritance taxes without having to stomach the politics of his fellow Floridians. But taking a shot at the Senate seat Marco Rubio vacated last year to become Secretary of State seems to have been irresistible to the newly arrived Florida Man.

The odds are against Vindman. Republicans now outnumber Democrats statewide by 1.4 million, a reversal of the 300,000-voter lead the Democrats held in Florida as recently as 2018. No Democrat has won a Senate election in the state since 2012. All statewide electoral offices, 20 of the state’s 28 House seats, and supermajorities in both houses of the state legislature are now held by Republicans, who generally win by double digits. Ashley Moody, Rubio’s appointed replacement, served two terms as the state’s popular attorney general and faces no significant opposition in this year’s GOP Senate primary.

Against this, Vindman is a new arrival with no prior connection to the state. His only claim to fame is having testified unflatteringly about Trump in the failed impeachment proceedings seven years ago. After Vindman’s brush with infamy, Trump went on to win Florida by absolute majorities in the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections. In 2024, he beat Kamala Harris by 13 points. Vindman’s campaign did, however, take in $1.7 million on its first day, more than any other Senate candidate in Florida’s history. Even if he loses, a failed Senate race will put him on the roster of well-compensated mainstream media analysts, prime him for appointments in a possible future Democratic administration, and at the very least draw attention to his business dealings. In the end, that may well be all that matters to him.