‘Number 1 is money:’ Can Florida Democrats raise the cash to compete this year?

ORLANDO, Fla. — The day after Tuesday’s municipal elections, Florida Democratic chair Nikki Fried said the party had a “tremendous night … showing that Florida continues to be in play.”

Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis had another description of Florida Democrats: “the best opposition party we could ever ask for.”

The state Democratic party has been reeling over the past few years, with narrow losses in 2018 for governor and U.S. Senate turning into a massive landslide for Republicans in 2022. The registration advantage for Republicans over Democrats has steadily grown to exceed 850,000 voters as of March.

The party’s decision to cancel its presidential primary also led to an overwhelming advantage in turnout for Republicans on Tuesday, which might help the GOP win a registration and mail ballot boost for the fall.

Although this year’s presidential and U.S. Senate races will be major challenges for Democrats, party leaders have cited special election victories earlier this year in Jacksonville and Central Florida as signs of a competitive playing field that could lead to winning back some legislative seats in November.

Whether the party will raise enough money to contend, however, is another question.

“Number one is money, and number two is money,” said Democratic consultant Dick Batchelor about his party’s needs this year. “Number three is Democratic registration, and number four is get-out-the-vote…. But to do that, Democrats need to have the money on hand.”

It also will be expensive to reach out to the 1 in 5 GOP voters who cast ballots for someone other than former President Donald Trump on Tuesday, he said.

“The national Democratic committee is going to have to spend a lot of money in Florida that the state Democratic Party does not have,” Batchelor said.

President Joe Biden’s campaign, sitting on $71 million cash on hand as of March, is signaling it may invest in Florida, or at least force the Trump campaign to spend money here. The Trump camp had less than half of that in the bank and is having major issues with small donors.

Despite Trump increasing his margin of victory in Florida from 2016 to 2020, Biden campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez wrote in a memo this week that there were “multiple clear paths to victory” in 2024, including potentially Florida, according to The Hill.

DeSantis, though, sidestepped a question on whether he would campaign with his former rival Trump by saying the GOP advantage in the state was so overwhelming there was unlikely to be a real race here.

“I don’t think Florida is going to be a place where you’re going to see a lot of activity,” the governor said. “That’ll be the first time in probably most of our lifetimes where that’s been the case, maybe since Ronald Reagan.”

There aren’t many recent polls of Florida, but a St. Pete Polls survey from earlier this month showed Trump with a 6-point lead over Biden. That could be close enough for Democrats to try to make Republicans play defense, said Michael McDonald, a professor of political science at the University of Florida.

“I think this has always been part of the Biden campaign plan to play in Florida,” McDonald said. “Clearly, some outside groups invested in Florida in advance of this decision. And those investments were to put the abortion amendment and marijuana amendment on the ballot for the November election.”

While the conservative-leaning state Supreme Court has yet to decide if the measures to protect abortion rights and legalize recreational marijuana will make the ballot, even decisions against them could be put to use by Democrats, McDonald said.

“It’s kind of a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t situation because if the Supreme Court kept it off the ballot, you can actually envision that generating more outrage than if it’s on the ballot and it draws people out to the polls.”

Fried cited Democratic wins in the state since 2022 as evidence the party is winning over non-affiliated voters, or NPAs. Democrat Donna Deegan won the Jacksonville mayor’s race in May 2023 and state Rep. Tom Keen won a closely watched special election in Orange and Osceola counties in January.

“We continue seeing these trends of Democrats showing up and independents breaking for Democrats,” Fried said.

General elections have extremely different turnout numbers from special or mid-year elections, however, and the nearly 70% of NPAs who voted for Keen will be hard to recreate in November.

But it’s not out of the question that Democrats could win the battle for independents, said Democratic elections analyst Matt Isbell.

“I think the limited data we have says Democrats definitely have a chance to do well with NPAs,” Isbell said. “Every homeowner’s talking about their insurance rates. So there’s definitely a lot of anger. And that always bodes well for the party that’s out of power within the state.”

NPA voters in November, he cautioned, will likely resemble the greater partisan breakdown and could benefit Republicans. But, he added, “special elections can be a barometer for how things look in a regular election. A special election can also gauge enthusiasm. An overperformance in a suburban district is very indicative of what might happen in November.”

The Senate race, where former Democratic U.S. Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell will likely challenge Republican U.S. Sen. Rick Scott, will get attention because of Scott’s history of razor-thin victories. but the result will probably fall in line with the presidential race, Isbell said.

“There’s no scenario where Donald Trump wins Florida by 7 points and Rick Scott loses,” he said. “That’s not happening.”

Batchelor said national donors, as well as the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, want to see competitive polls from Mucarsel-Powell before they open their wallets. The only major recent poll had her trailing Scott by 3, though it was conducted by the Democratic group PPP for the abortion rights group Emily’s List.

“We can say all the pleasant things we want, that she’s a strong candidate, that Scott’s in trouble, all of that stuff,” Batchelor said. “But the bottom line is it’s all numbers in the end. If you’re not moving in the polls, they need this money for other states that have close races. … That’s just the way it works.”

In the end, Isbell said, what Florida Democrats consider a victory for them in November may be modest.

“I think it still would be considered a good night as long as there’s some pickups in some state House seats, maybe some county commission races,” Isbell said. “There just needs to be some life showing.”

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