A GOP candidate was secretly recorded threatening to send a "hit squad" after primary rival Anna Paulina Luna, who is running for a Tampa Bay-area congressional seat.

During a 30-minute call with a conservative activist that was recorded before he became a candidate, William Braddock repeatedly warned the activist to not support GOP candidate Anna Paulina Luna in the Republican primary for a Tampa Bay-area congressional seat because he had access to assassins.

“I really don't want to have to end anybody's life for the good of the people of the United States of America,” Braddock said at one point in the conversation last week, according to the recording exclusively obtained by POLITICO.

Reached by text message, Braddock refused to say whether he made any threats about Luna to the person who recorded him, Erin Olszewski.

Asked repeatedly via text if he mentioned Russian-Ukrainian hit squads, Braddock wouldn’t give a yes or no answer, saying he had not heard the recording and that it’s “allegedly me … there is no proof of that.” He also suggested the recording “may even be altered and edited.”.

She said she made it because she was concerned about Braddock’s “unhinged” dislike of Luna that he had previously expressed.

Petersburg, Fla., police and gave a heads-up to her friend Luna, who filed a petition for an injunction against Braddock.

Luna and Olszewski each received a temporary restraining order against him last week.

It's unclear exactly why Braddock has such dislike toward Luna.

Olszewski, who initiated and recorded the call just after midnight on June 9, said she phoned Braddock at his insistence because he kept trying to get her to appear on a health care panel for an event he was organizing.

After having a few conversations with Braddock, however, Olszewski said she became concerned that he wanted to use her to advance his candidacy and that he left her “threatening” messages about Luna that sounded “unhinged.”.

With such a closely divided Congress currently in Democratic control, Braddock said on the recorded call that the “pivotal” St.

Petersburg-based district will take on outsized importance in 2022 to keep America from devolving into a “communist-socialist s---hole.” When Olszewski asked him why he had Russians at the ready, Braddock indicated they were to stop Luna.

She's gonna disappear,” Braddock said in the recorded call, pledging Olszewski to secrecy.

POLITICO also obtained a separate recording, a voicemail message, Braddock left with a consultant in which his phone number was identical and voice seemed to match the information Olszewski shot in her video.

Petersburg police declined to comment on the recording or whether it was legally recorded.

“The folks in possession of whatever recording they think they have of myself or someone else (which may even be altered and edited) will be facing civil damages suit(s) when the paperwork is file [sic] with the county and felony charges after I file with the local police department,” Braddock said in his text message to POLITICO.

“I strongly advise not to get involved because the civil suits will continue to be filed until people stop sharing them because whomever is on the recording did not consent to be recorded in my humble opinion.”.

In her filing for an injunction, Luna also mentioned how Braddock claimed in the call with Olszewski that two other potential Republican candidates in the race, Amanda Makki and Matt Tito, had formed an alliance with him to stop Luna.

Both Makki and Tito denied the claims of an alliance with Braddock and each of them criticized Luna for mentioning their names in the injunction she filed against Braddock.

In the call, Braddock mentioned that he offered Tito a job on his campaign to keep him on the sidelines, but Tito said he had no intention to work for Braddock

James Blair, a spokesperson for Luna, said she wouldn’t comment on the ongoing investigation

“Don’t be on the f---ing wrong side of supporting Luna because if you're near her when the time comes, I just don't want that to happen to you because you've got kids,” Braddock said on the call