{"id":224621,"date":"2026-04-09T10:12:13","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T10:12:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/224621\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T10:12:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T10:12:13","slug":"brice-barnes-becomes-latest-democrat-seeking-to-flip-neal-dunns-seat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/224621\/","title":{"rendered":"Brice Barnes becomes latest Democrat seeking to flip Neal Dunn’s seat"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brice Barnes\u00a0has spent years advocating for her family members with disabilities. Now, she says she is ready to run for Congress.<\/p>\n

The Democrat from Tallahassee has announced her campaign to replace retiring<\/a>\u00a0U.S. Rep.\u00a0Neal Dunn\u00a0in Florida\u2019s 2nd Congressional District.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m fed up with the chaos in Washington, like so many other families,\u201d Barnes told Florida Politics, \u201cand talking to them across North Florida, people know it\u2019s just not working for families like ours.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barnes joins a crowded<\/a> group of Democrats who had planned to challenge Dunn, a Panama City Republican first elected in 2016. In her campaign announcement, Barnes highlighted her background, which she believes will connect with voters from Tallahassee to Panama City.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m a mom of three, and I see firsthand that life simply isn\u2019t working for families in North Florida right now,\u201d she said. \u201cWhether I\u2019m at my kids\u2019 practices or on a parent text chain, the conversation is always the same. Our dollars aren\u2019t stretching as far as they once did. From the rising cost of groceries and gas to the skyrocketing price of insurance and health care, the pressure on working households is real. Washington is full of people who talk, but North Florida deserves a leader who actually knows how to get things done.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

She believes that, given the current political climate, it is possible to build a broad coalition to turn the District from Republican to Democratic control. This comes only a few years after most voters there supported President\u00a0Donald Trump\u2019s return to the White House.<\/p>\n

When Florida Politics asked if the election would focus on affordability or Trump\u2019s\u00a0current unpopularity<\/a>, she said the two issues are \u201cone and the same.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe same people that probably voted for Donald Trump, the same families who voted for him on affordability issues several years ago, are still having the same affordability issues now, or it\u2019s gotten worse,\u201d she said. \u201cI think they\u2019re looking for a solution. And I think that people are not wed as much to party lines as they\u2019re looking to end the chaos and for folks to find solutions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barnes is very familiar with the challenges families face. Her sister,\u00a0Lara Jane Parker, had cerebral palsy. Barnes\u2019 parents spent years working through a difficult health system and eventually saw the Americans with Disabilities Act become law.<\/p>\n

As an adult, Barnes helped develop\u00a0Independence Landing<\/a>, an affordable community in Tallahassee where people with disabilities can live on their own. Parker lived there before she passed away.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Barnes also faced health challenges in her own family when her son was diagnosed with a rare eye condition at age 12 that needed surgery. She took him to the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio for treatment, but had to fight with insurance the entire time, even though the situation was urgent.<\/p>\n

\u201cWithout that procedure, he would not be able to drive at all. It preserved his eyesight, so that he is able to do and have all the same opportunities as everybody else.\u201d<\/p>\n

She is frustrated that Congress has given so little attention to these challenges facing families across the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cToo many people in Washington are focused on political theater while families here are struggling to keep up,\u201d Barnes said in a statement. \u201cI\u2019ve spent 20 years building movements and forging partnerships to solve problems in our community. I\u2019m running for Congress to bring that same focus on real results, because families in North Florida deserve someone who understands their lives and will fight for them every single day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barnes was involved in the\u00a0Floridians Protecting Freedom<\/a> campaign, which supported a constitutional amendment to overturn Florida\u2019s six-week abortion ban. Although the measure did not reach the 60% needed to pass, Barnes pointed out that most voters in her District supported it. This makes her more confident that people in the District want a change in the state\u2019s direction.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs I traveled around this District \u2014 and not only this District, but the state \u2014 I learned a whole lot,\u201d she said. \u201cObviously, people care about core issues like health care and personal freedom and limiting government\u2019s interference.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Brice Barnes\u00a0has spent years advocating for her family members with disabilities. Now, she says she is ready to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":224622,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[101501,73265,28,30,29,73266,101502,446],"class_list":{"0":"post-224621","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-brice-barnes","9":"tag-cd-2","10":"tag-florida","11":"tag-florida-headlines","12":"tag-florida-news","13":"tag-floridas-2nd-congressional-district","14":"tag-floridians-defending-freedom","15":"tag-neal-dunn"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224621","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=224621"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224621\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/224622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=224621"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=224621"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=224621"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}