Former state Sen. Annette Taddeo is turning up the heat on CFO Blaise Ingoglia, whom she hopes to unseat in November.
The Democratic candidate just released a 30-second digital ad accusing the Republican incumbent of favoring insurers and failing to protect public money.
It follows multiple polls showing a competitive contest heading into the General Election.
The new spot, titled “Enough,” uses artificial intelligence-generated imagery depicting Ingoglia hauling money bags through a hospital, past distressed families, and standing inside a burning office with stacks of cash and the Florida flag behind him.
A narrator introduces him as a former party leader — he’s a past Chair of the Florida GOP — hand-picked by Gov. Ron DeSantis, who appointed him as CFO. The ad then links insurance industry assistance and the Hope Florida controversy to rising household costs.
“He gave insurance companies a $3 billion bailout. Ten million meant for sick kids was funneled for political activity,” the narrator says.
“Ingoglia’s corruption has gone wild. And it’s costing you more.”
The video then shifts to Taddeo visiting a suburban neighborhood and addressing viewers.
“I’m running for Chief Financial Officer because we’ve had enough,” she says to the camera. “I’ll lower the insurance rates crushing our families and make sure guilty politicians go to prison.”
The ad, posted to YouTube on Thursday and announced by Taddeo’s campaign Friday, references state reinsurance programs lawmakers approved in 2022, providing $2 billion and $1 billion to help insurers cover hurricane losses.
Ingoglia, then a state Senator, voted for the $1 billion set-aside, but didn’t vote on the $2 billion measure while in the House, state records show.
The ad’s mention of $10 million intended for sick children being rerouted to a political committee is a reference to the Hope Florida scandal, in which Medicaid settlement money was passed through nonprofits to committees opposing recreational marijuana legalization in 2024, before Ingoglia became CFO.
A grand jury concluded that the funds had been improperly diverted for politics, but found insufficient evidence to bring criminal charges. However, the 1st District Court of Appeal this week ordered the report expunged, finding the grand jury exceeded its authority by condemning people it had not indicted and that the report’s circulation violated confidentiality requirements.
Notably, the court also rejected the misappropriation conclusion, determining that the payment went directly from the settling company, Centene, to the foundation and never became state property.
In a press note announcing the ad, Taddeo’s campaign cited a Florida Bulldog investigation identifying 200 Department of Financial Services contracts worth more than $342 million without documentation required in the state’s public database.
The reporting concerned missing records, rather than missing money. State law requires agencies to upload contract and procurement documents within 30 days. The Department’s posting failures began before Ingoglia’s appointment and continued afterward.
The ad hits digital airwaves as a fifth poll showed the CFO race effectively tied. A James Madison Institute survey found Ingoglia and Taddeo with 43% support apiece among likely voters. Among all registered voters, the poll found Ingoglia leads by 2 percentage points — well within the survey’s margin of error.
Four prior polls yielded nigh-identical results, the most recent of which was a St. Pete Polls survey commissioned by Florida Politics, which found Ingoglia ahead slightly with 44.3% support compared to 42% for Taddeo. That difference was also within the survey’s error margin.
Taddeo, a former Miami-Dade County Democratic Party Chair, took nearly 66% of the vote in the Aug. 18 Primary, the strongest showing of any Democrat running statewide.
She’s running at a significant funding disadvantage. Ingoglia controlled more than $3.4 million in his campaign account and political committee on Sept. 25. He also reported more than $1 million in in-kind aid, most of it from the RPOF.
Taddeo had a comparatively meager $392,000 and reported less than $17,000 worth of in-kind assistance, about 78% of which came from the Florida Democratic Party.
Election Day is Nov. 3.
