Kamala Harris has a chance to achieve a “surprise victory” in Florida during the presidential election
US: A well-known political scientist believes that Kamala Harris has an opportunity to pull off a “surprise victory” in Florida during the presidential election in November in response to Governor Ron DeSantis’s socially conservative agenda, particularly his ban on abortions that last six weeks.
Under DeSantis’ leadership, Florida, which Barack Obama won in 2008 and 2012, has shifted over the last three years from being largely seen as a crucial swing state to more dependably Republican territory. In 2020, despite losing the national election, Donald Trump retained the state after defeating Hillary Clinton by a larger margin of 3.4 percent in 2016. In 2016, Trump had won the state by 1.2 percent.
The Democrats’ nationwide “Fighting for Reproductive Rights” bus tour got underway in Palm Beach, Florida, on Tuesday. Democratic National Committee Chair Jamie Harrison told reporters that Harris “has a shot” in the state. “People are going to be surprised on election night about what happens in the state, that you can’t give up on Florida,” Harrison said.
Expert on US elections, Cassidy Reller of the University of Florida, concurred with this assessment in an interview with media, stating that Harris would benefit from the presidential election falling around Florida’s votes on abortion rights and legalizing marijuana for recreational use.
“I think DeSantis’s overperformance in 2022 overshadows the fact that Biden only lost by 3.4 percent,” Reller said. It’s possible that DeSantis pushed too hard to pass unpopular laws on social issues like six-week abortion bans, LGBTQ+ policies, and contentious education policies, and that voters will turn away from the Republicans once more. Since 2022, DeSantis has enacted a number of contentious salient culture war issues.
“Some cited Donna Deegan’s unexpected victory in Jacksonville’s mayoral contest last year as proof of this. Popular subjects like legalizing marijuana and abortion rights, on which more people support Democrats than Republicans, might demonstrate how diametrically opposed the present Republican Party is to these positions, encouraging some voters to support Kamala Harris, he added.
Reller said that DeSantis’s resounding victory with approximately 60% of the vote in the 2022 midterm elections was more of a testament to his coronavirus policies than to social conservatism.
“I’ve always seen the Republican win in 2022 as an economic response to a lack of COVID shutdowns, not a call to action to enact the social policies DeSantis enacted,” Reller said.
“I think many Floridians do not like the negative attention all these controversial policies have brought to the state, and there is a chance voters react negatively to it in 2024, giving Democrats a surprise victory and potentially a chance to pick up a senate seat.”
The GOP’s Director of Regional Communications, Rachel Reisner, said in a statement sent to media that “Florida is Trump country.” Thousands of Republicans, angered by Harris’s and the Democrats’ shortcomings, are leaving blue areas. Voters in Florida will send a loud and obvious message in November: President Donald J. Trump is the only candidate with a track record of bringing prosperity and affordability to our country. Here in Florida, the grassroots movement to “Make America Great Again” is thriving and expanding.”
According to a study conducted in August by Florida Atlantic University and Mainstreet USA, 56% of Floridians are in favor of the state’s proposed abortion amendment, which would provide a constitutional right up to fetal viability. This falls shy of the 60 percent necessary for it to become law, however.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat, said in an interview with media on Tuesday that Florida is “in play” for Harris in November, in part because the election falls around the state’s referendum on abortion.
According to media report, Thomas Gift, the director of University College London’s Centre on US Politics and an authority on American politics, even if Harris loses in Florida, the Trump campaign may be obliged to allocate resources there, which might affect it other swing states.
“The mere fact that Trump may have to campaign vigorously in Florida could divert resources from true swing states like Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan,” Gift added. “Even if Harris loses Florida, which certainly looks likely, this could cost Trump elsewhere if he’s forced to devote scarce time, resources, and energy into shoring up his lead in the Sunshine State.”
In Miami-Dade, the biggest county in Florida, a survey of 500 potential voters conducted between August 22 and August 25 revealed that Trump and Harris were deadlocked with 47% of the vote, with an additional 6% of respondents still undecided.
But according to the most current polling analysis by election website 538, which was released on Tuesday, Trump is leading by 4.6 points in Florida, with 48.2 percent of the vote to Harris’s 43.6 percent.
