Fred Costello, an Ormond Beach dentist and former mayor and state lawmaker, is attempting a run at Congress for a third time, having lost to Ron DeSantis in the 2012 and 2016 Republican primaries. He is attempting to convince voters in Florida's U.S. House District 6 that he's "one of us," a longtime resident of Volusia County, as opposed to his GOP rivals Michael Waltz and John Ward, who have homes in St. Johns County. Democrats John Upchurch, Stephen Sevigny and Nancy Soderberg are also in the race, with primary elections set for Aug. 28.
Q: When and where were you born?
Costello: I was born and raised in Orlando, Florida. My dad was a World War II vet in the Army Air Corps, and so growing up I had decided I wanted to be in the Air Force. So I went into the Air Force and after serving in the Vietnam era, chose to come back to Central Florida. Being born and raised in Orlando, I decided why in the world would I want to live there when I could come to the beach? So I moved to Ormond Beach in 1977 and have had my dental practice here in Volusia County, Congressional District 6 for 40 years. Love it here. Raised my family here. And plan to celebrate many future family events right here in the Ormond Beach area.
Q: And what church did you go to growing up?
Costello: I went to what is now called the Community of Christ. I’m currently a member of Tomoka Christian non-denominational. I believe that we need to focus on what our Judeo-Christian values are in our country.
Q: What year did you graduate from Edgewater High School?
Costello: 1967. Go Eagles!
Q: Where did you go to college?
Costello: I went to Graceland University, which is in Lamoni, Iowa, very small, little school. I was the fourth generation to go there. ... I went to the University of Iowa College of Dentistry.
Q: You met your wife Linda at Iowa. Was she from Iowa?
Costello: She was from Illinois and her parents moved to Iowa.
Q: I was going to ask you about your children. Did you have three total?
Costello: Three children and six grandchildren.
Q: And two were adopted from Honduras?
Costello: Yes.
Q: How did you come to run for public office?
Costello: When I went to build my (dental) office, it took two years to get the permits and one year to build the office. It was very frustrating. So I’m complaining about how long it took to build the office, and a city commissioner was a patient, and he said why don’t I put you on the planning board? I said, what’s that? And he said that’s where you establish the regulations and decide what you have to go through, the process, to be able to build. ... So I’m the chairman of the planning board for a number of years. I think I’m done. ... I get drafted to run for city commission, because I was prepared. ... I’m proud of the things I was able to accomplish when I was mayor for eight years.
... The reason I’m running for Congress is when I’m in the Florida House, Medicaid expansion. I’m happy, honored, grateful, pleased to give anyone that’s disabled the Medicaid that they need. We need to take care of people that need our help. I don’t like giving benefits to people that are conning the system. So we wanted to give Medicaid expansion to those who were disabled, or who had children at home and chose to stay home and not to get a second or third job so they would make enough money to qualify for the exchanges. But the federal government wouldn’t let us do that. You had to give it to everybody or nobody, so we chose nobody.
Q: You are from Volusia County, however some of the other leading candidates don’t live in the district. Why do you think that’s important?
Costello: I understand us. People know who I am. As far as the other candidates on the Republican side, it doesn’t matter to me where they live. They don’t live here. What matters to me is they have never cared about us. They have never served us. They have no desire to be a part of us.
Q: You’ve called for a return to Judeo-Christian values consistently through your campaigns. Which president, Trump or Obama, is a better example of exhibiting those values?
Costello: I think President Trump, in the past, has had a lifestyle that I would not have had. ... I don’t know that he has lived an exemplary life, but he is living a transparent life today. The policies that he’s putting in I think are good for our country. And I’m proud to support what he’s doing. I don’t support a lot of his past.
Q: I didn’t hear you talk about President Obama much.
Costello: President Obama said many of the right things and then did nothing about them. Think about him telling Syria … drawing the red line, and then redrawing it, and redrawing it. And then talked about leading from behind and he talked about, that we need to be one nation, but then he would say something that basically was a racist comment, that if a white person had said the same thing that President Obama said, it would have been considered racist. And I’m not trying to call President Obama racist. I’m just simply saying that President Obama was eloquent, was gracious, but his policies didn’t bring us together. They focused on what divided us. And President Trump’s verbiage tends to separate us, but his policies bring us together.
Q: And I’m not trying to nail you, but I do want to know if there was something specific that you would refer to about when you feel like Obama said something that came across to you as racist.
Costello: I apologize that I don’t know offhand, but think about some of the things … Black Lives Matter. In other words, I … I was a member of the NAACP for 10 years and I have not renewed for this year because the letter that came with the renewal was so egregious to me, that it was so racist from the black perspective. And I don’t want to quote the wrong thing, but my point is, that’s kind of the way President Obama came across, that we needed to overcome things that were years ago, that aren’t today, but we need to penalize people today for things that were done years ago, and I don’t believe in that.