‘Do not vote for the worst Mom ever.’ Does a Florida candidate have a daughter problem?

Outgoing Florida Senate Appropriations chairperson Kelli Stargel, R-Lakeland apparently has a daughter problem.

Sen. Stargel, who is leaving her seat to run for Congress in the crowded GOP primary race for the newly drawn U.S. House District 15, got a “no” vote from her daughter Mary “Hannah” Stargel via a series of TikTok videos that pleaded, “Do not vote for the worst Mom ever.”

Last year, Stargel’s other daughter, Laura, wrote an op-ed for a Florida newspaper opposing legislation that banned transgender females from participating in women’s and girl’s scholastic sporting events.

Kelli Stargel voted for the 15-week abortion ban in March and supported Florida’s trans student sports ban in 2021.

‘Do not vote’ plea

“So, Senator Kelli Stargel of Florida, the one who just passed the 15-week abortion bill for the state of Florida, which excludes incest and rape is now running for Congress,” Hannah, 28, said in the TikTok video captioned “Do not vote for the worst mom ever” on Monday.

“This is the same senator who passed the bill saying that trans middle schoolers and high schoolers will have a harder time to play sports in the state of Florida than even in the Olympics. Considering the fact that Kelly Stargel is my mother and sent me to a troubled teen facility when I was only 15, I don’t think that she really has a right to tell you or anybody else who can and can’t be a mother, because she wasn’t even a mother to her own children.”

Hannah told Axios Tampa Bay, which reported the flap between mother and daughter on Friday, that “Anybody can speak out against somebody. But I feel like I have more firsthand experience with my mom and that could make a difference.”

Among the issues she says she has with her mom, aside from her mom’s voting record, Hannah, who identifies as bisexual, says she was sent to a Christian boarding school in Texas by her parents and was neglected.

“This is the same woman who wouldn’t feed me if I didn’t go to church on Sunday,” she said in her TikTok post. “After numerous years of telling me I was hard to love, putting me through tons of years of neglect, putting politics before everything else and, honestly, just being a horrible, horrible person to look up to, is this really somebody you want up in DC passing laws for you and your children, telling you what to do with your body?”

‘Loves her family’

On Tuesday, Sen. Stargel released a statement regarding Hannah’s TikTok post to Florida Politics that said, “I love my daughter with all of my heart.”

On Friday, Florida Politics reported Hannah’s response concerning her political parents: “I think my mom still loves me, but the way that they show love is very much through their filter.”

At a Senate hearing honoring Stargel in March, members of her family, including husband John (a member of the Florida House in 2002-2006), son Robert and daughter Laura, were in attendance. The Stargels are also parents to Rebekah and Amanda.

“She loves her family more than anything,” said Sen. Debbie Mayfield, R-Melbourne, at that Senate presentation

In May 2021, Laura Stargel wrote on opinion piece published in the Orlando Sentinel against Gov. Ron DeSantis’ support of the ban on transgender females participating in women’s and girl’s scholastic sports.

“Excluding transgender children from sports will exacerbate feelings of discrimination and severely impact their mental and physical health,” Laura wrote in her editorial.

Campaign website

Hannah’s posts following her mom’s announcement of a congressional run, however, are the most direct.

“If I can do anything in my power to make sure that Kelli Stargel does not become the congresswoman for Florida that would be awesome,” she said in her TikTok post.

Meantime, Kelli Stargel’s campaign website touts that in Tallahassee she “fought to prioritize Florida’s families” and “consistent conservative values.” She faces at least six other Republican candidates for the seat.

“Let’s take this battle to Washington, D.C.!”