‘Your mama’: Video captures heated exchange between Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, challenger she’s suing

A visit U.S. Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick made to a local Democratic club last week devolved into nastiness when a Primary opponent she’s suing drew her into a heated argument captured on video.

Near the end of the 4-minute exchange, the 46-year-old lawmaker appeared to let loose a classic insult salvo at Elijah Manley, her 26-year-old challenger: “Your mama.”

The squabble, which occurred at the Broward Young Democrats’^[1] Oct. 6 meeting with Cherfilus-McCormick as a special guest, centered somewhat on a $1 million defamation lawsuit^[2] she filed against Manely last month over what she called “blatant lies” he spread about her.

The case remains active, with the most recent court action being a summons^[3] submitted to Manley four days before he confronted her in person.

The suit claims Manley engaged in “a pattern” of false statements in campaign videos and published commentaries. In them, he accused Cherfilus-McCormick of corruption, ethical violations and misusing taxpayer funds.

It lists as defamatory, among other things, Manley’s assertion in July^[4] that Cherfilus-McCormick “took $5.7 million from taxpayers” — a reference to an overpayment from the state to her former health care company that was settled this year^[5] — and an ongoing House Ethics Committee investigation^[6] into whether she broke campaign finance laws.

Manley raised those issues and an older matter^[7] involving Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans her former company received during the pandemic, in a face-to-face meeting with her last week.

That’s where the video starts, with Manley accusing the thrice-elected lawmaker of repurposing the PPP loans to fund her 2021 campaign, an unproven assertion Cherfilus-McCormick maintains is untrue.

Manley, a substitute history teacher with experience organizing progressive groups, said he was there not to cause a scene, but to “hold you accountable.”

“Someone under investigation cannot serve their constituents,” he said.

“I’m here in my official capacity, and you’re making up a whole bunch of stuff that you’re actually being sued on,” Cherfilus-McCormick replied.

“You sued all these other people in the past, and it got thrown out,” Manley retorted.

“They did not get thrown out,” she said.

And she’s right. In July 2022, Cherfilus-McCormick sued another one^[8] of her Primary foes, 68-year-old Dale Holness, for $1 million over campaign texts that told voters she’d embezzled $6 million from taxpayers to “buy a seat in Congress.” That suit has been listed as “inactive” since May 2023, but wasn’t thrown out.

As their argument escalated in front of a small audience, Manley called Cherfilius-McCormick a “pathological liar.” She threw the label back at him.

“I’m not going to play these games with you,” she said. “If you’re going to come up here lying, you’d best be ready for war.”

“You’re at war with your constituents,” he said. “You refuse to hold yourself accountable to your constituents, and you continue to tell lies.”

Broward Young Democrats President Kelly Scurry then interjected, trying to reestablish control of a spiraling situation as the quarrel’s participants derided each other as “disrespectful.”

“If you want to come up here and be disrespectful, let’s rock ‘n’ roll,” Cherfilus-McCormick said. “I’ve got time today.”

“We can rock ‘n’ roll when you’re out of the seat you’re holding,” Manley answered.

“Your mama,” Cherfilus-McCormick appeared to fire back before Scurry successfully got the pair to disengage.

Reached by phone Thursday, Manley told Florida Politics Cherfilus-McCormick did indeed say, “Your mama,” to him multiple times on- and off-camera.

“Everyone in that room heard it, which I find very weird,” he said. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard an elected official say stuff like that unless it’s Donald Trump or something.”

He said that Cherfilus-McCormick’s interruption of him and others attending the meeting to ask her questions betrayed “a lack of temperament” unbecoming of a public official.

“I understand I’m her opponent, but I’m also a constituent. I have the right to go to a town hall and ask her a question, but she tried to pretty much shut me down from the get-go and intimidate me, which isn’t going to work,” he said. “It’s the same thing with the lawsuit, trying to silence her critics. She did that to a couple of people there who asked legitimate questions. I just don’t understand why she was lashing out like this. It doesn’t look good.”

Florida Politics contacted a spokesperson for Cherfilus-McCormick for comment, but did not receive a response by press time. We will update this report upon receipt of one.

Federal records show that while the Congresswoman had more funds remaining in her campaign coffers at the end of the last fundraising quarter, Manley has outraised her more than twofold so far and outspent her more than fivefold.

Through Sept. 30, he amassed $599,000 compared to $227,000 that Cherfilus-McCormick collected. He also spent all but $20,000 of that sum, while the incumbent disbursed about $111,000.

Holness, meanwhile, has collected roughly $45,000 this cycle, adding to about $19,000 in carry-over funds.

Two Republicans, Joseph Rodenay and Sendra Dorce, have raised $35,000 and $2,000, respectively.

Cherfilus-McCormick, the first Haitian American woman from Florida elected to Congress, has represented Florida’s 20th Congressional District since January 2022. She won her seat in a Special Election following the death of Alcee Hastings. Last year, she was re-elected unopposed^[9].

CD 20 spans a majority-Black area in and around western and central Broward County, with a small portion of southeast Palm Beach County. It includes all or part of Fort Lauderdale, Lake Park, Lauderdale Lakes, Lauderhill, North Lauderdale, Plantation, Pompano Beach, Riviera Beach, Sunrise and Tamarac.

It’s Florida’s most Democratic-leaning congressional district, with a Cook Partisan Voting Index rating of D+22^[10].

The 2026 Primary Election is Aug. 18, followed by the General Election on Nov. 3.