Though Democrats in Florida came up short in winning the gubernatorial and Senate races, the state’s Democratic Party is pointing to several promising signs for the future direction of Florida.
While Democrats David Jolly and Angie Nixon lost their races for the governor’s mansion and one of Florida’s Senate seats, they didn’t lose by nearly as large a margin as many forecasts predicted. That, along with several Democratic flips in the Florida Legislature, has the state’s Democratic Party seeing a potential opening for the future.
The end result was not shocking. Governor-Elect Byron Donalds celebrated the results, crediting President Donald Trump for providing help in keeping Florida under control of the GOP.
“Mr. President, I want you to hear from Florida that we are still red,” said Donalds.
He narrowly secured the win, receiving just more than 107,000 votes to beat out Jolly. It’s a stark difference to Gov. Ron DeSantis’ 2022 victory over Charlie Crist by more than 1.5 million votes.
GOP Sen. Ashley Moody didn’t fare all that much better, just eking out ahead of Nixon by around 240,000 votes.
Both gubernatorial candidates acknowledged the near-even split amongst the electorate on election night.
“And so the people that voted for David Jolly, I want them to understand very clearly that we’re not here to represent 51% of Florida. I’m gonna govern effectively for all of Florida,” said Donalds.
“To come up with 48 or 49% in a state where our own party only has 29% of the voters means that we have a coalition,” said Jolly.
The morning after Election Day, DeSantis believes his 2022 landslide is not likely to happen again for some time.
“If you think you’re gonna waltz in and win by 13 points, forget about what we did in ’22, we told them that wasn’t viable, you’re not gonna do that, but you’re not gonna win by 13 under these circumstances,” said DeSantis.
Though Florida ultimately held the line for Republicans, intense voter dissatisfaction over soaring prices for gas and groceries energized Democrats across the country, including in drastically changing the makeup of the state legislature.
“We netted 15 seats in the Florida House, shattering the Republican supermajority,” Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried.
Despite her loss in the Senate race, Nixon has vowed to continue fighting and organizing across the state on social media.
“We broke state super majorities because we drove turnout while everyone wrote us off,” Nixon wrote in a post made on Threads.
State Democrats are also optimistic that the performance in this cycle, which was largely done with minimal financial support from the national party, convinces the Democratic Party to consider throwing more weight, in the form of money and resources, into challenging future races in Florida.
