U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, and his challenger, U.S. Rep. Val Demings, greet one another earlier than a televised debate at Duncan Theater on the campus of Palm Seaside State Faculty on Tuesday, Oct. 18, 2022.

Thomas Cordy/AP

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U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, and his challenger, U.S. Rep. Val Demings, greet one another earlier than a televised debate at Duncan Theater on the campus of Palm Seaside State Faculty on Tuesday, Oct. 18, 2022.

Thomas Cordy/AP

MIAMI — Democratic U.S. Rep. Val Demings of Florida went on the assault Tuesday in her first debate towards Republican Sen. Marco Rubio, accusing him of being a serial liar, whereas Rubio criticized her for supporting President Joe Biden’s financial agenda.

Rubio, a two-term senator, and Demings, a three-term congresswoman and former Orlando police chief, confronted questions on the West Palm Seaside debate on matters together with inflation, abortion, voting rights, gun violence, immigration and overseas coverage.

Florida has more and more shifted rightward in current election cycles, giving Rubio the benefit as Republicans now lead Democrats with voter registration within the state. However Demings clearly noticed the talk as a possibility to take Rubio on forcefully as she tries to develop into the state’s first Black senator.

Rubio skirted a query on whether or not he would help a federal abortion ban with no exceptions and as a substitute known as Demings’ place excessive as a result of she wouldn’t say what limits on abortion she would help.

“Each invoice I’ve ever sponsored on abortion and each invoice I’ve ever voted for has exceptions,” Rubio stated.

“What we all know is that the senator helps no exceptions,” Demings responded. “He could make his mouth say something at this time. He’s good at that, by the way in which. What day is it and what’s Marco Rubio saying?”

Following the Supreme Court docket’s determination in June to overturn Roe v. Wade, Rubio has expressed his private opposition to abortion in all instances whereas saying he’d again abortion-restricting statutes that embody exceptions. Demings helps abortion entry at the very least till fetal viability, saying the federal government shouldn’t be the one to find out that.

On gun management, Demings accused Rubio of not doing sufficient to alter legal guidelines to forestall shootings, together with mass killings on the Pulse nightclub in Orlando in 2016 and at Marjory Stoneman Douglas Excessive Faculty in Parkland in 2018.

“How lengthy will you watch folks being gunned down in first grade, fourth grade, highschool, faculty, church, synagogue, grocery retailer, movie show, a mall and a nightclub and do nothing?” Demings stated.

However Rubio defended his opposition to gun restrictions, saying some proposals wouldn’t have stopped lots of the mass shootings and People have a Second Modification proper to guard themselves.

“Every little thing she is for would have finished nothing to cease any of these shootings,” Rubio stated. “Each certainly one of these shooters would have handed the background examine that she retains insisting on. Nobody right here is in favor of mass shootings and violence.”

To deal with inflation, Rubio stated the U.S. must cease spending a lot cash, citing some pandemic reduction funds, and to spice up home oil manufacturing. He chastised the Biden administration for its determination to launch extra oil from the U.S. strategic reserve to assist deliver down costs on the pump.

“Oil reserves don’t exist to win midterms,” Rubio stated.

Demings stated the pandemic reduction cash was needed to assist hurting households and companies.

“After all the senator who has by no means run something in any respect however his mouth would know nothing about serving to folks and being there for folks when they’re in bother,” Demings stated.

Rubio additionally attacked Demings for not passing laws in Washington, saying all she had finished was get put up places of work named after folks. Demings angrily rejected his characterization, noting the buildings had been named after cops who died within the line of obligation.

“It is embarrassing that you just suppose that honoring an individual who was a hero by naming a federal constructing after them is nothing,” she stated.

Demings repeatedly accused Rubio of distorting her file and positions on points.

“I’m actually dissatisfied in you, Marco Rubio, as a result of I believe there was a time once you didn’t lie to be able to win,” she stated.

Rubio maintained that Demings was merely there to help Biden’s and Home Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s agenda, whereas calling himself the simplest senator.

“Within the two phrases I have been there, no U.S. senator has gotten extra finished than I’ve,” he stated. “The one factor she does is vote 100% with Pelosi.”

Requested whether or not he would settle for the outcomes of the 2022 election, Rubio stated, “Positive, as a result of I will win.”

Later, he clarified that “it doesn’t matter what the end result is, I am going to help it, as a result of Florida has good legal guidelines. They are not some loopy legal guidelines like they’ve in Pennsylvania and these different locations.”