Politics
If Republicans aren’t scared after Special Election upsets, they should be
Browse just about any publication across the nation that covers politics and you’ll find headlines about Tuesday night’s jaw-dropping Special Election outcomes in South Florida and the Tampa Bay area.
Democrats delivered upset victories — one in President Donald Trump’s backyard and the other in the district previously held by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ now-No. 2 guy.
In House District 87, Democrat Emily Gregory defeated Republican Jon Maples with more than 51% of the vote, despite Trump winning the district just two years ago by about 9 percentage points and the district’s previous officeholder, Mike Caruso, winning it the same year by an overwhelming 19 percentage points.
In Hillsborough County-based Senate District 14, Democrat Brian Nathan defeated Republican Josie Tomkow, a state Representative facing term limits, by just 408 votes and only just narrowly outside the half-percentage-point recount margin. There, former Sen. Jay Collins won the district four years ago by nearly 10 percentage points.
Both Democrats won despite a significant voter turnout advantage for Republicans. That suggests, by the numbers, that some Republicans — let’s say one-in-five — cast a ballot for the Democrat. Independents also broke for the Democratic candidates by something like a 3-to-1 ratio.
We can hear Tim Russert in our ear, chanting, “Florida! Florida! Florida!”
Why? Because despite claims to the contrary given Florida’s fading presidential race relevance, the Sunshine State still matters.
When there is an upset election in Georgia or North Carolina or Wisconsin, it’s simply not the same as when the same thing happens in Florida.
That’s not to say that more upsets are coming, or that Florida has returned to its swing state status. It’s just that it matters more when Ron DeSantis’ red wall in Florida is offering tea leaves into the current political climate.
Think of it this way: Florida delivering political upsets is akin to the L.A, Lakers enjoying a winning streak. Having the team from a top media market winning games is a delight to ESPN, the same way political intrigue in Florida just hits differently than in other states.
Heading into Election Day, voter turnout data from early and mail voting signaled Republican victories. So too did Election Day turnout throughout Tuesday. So what happened?
The first person Republicans should blame is the Governor for not only delaying the scheduling of the Special Elections in SD 14 and HD 87, but also for the poorly planned scheduling.
I’ve spoken with operatives who absolutely hated the timetable that was forced upon them. Had DeSantis scheduled the SD 14 Special Election in, say, January, Democrats likely wouldn’t have had much time to rally and prop up a successful candidate. And Tomkow’s machine would have already had their foot on the gas.
But scheduling the election for just after the 2026 Session forced Tomkow to straddle her responsibilities as a Representative — among leadership in the House nonetheless — and as a candidate. And I’m not just talking about fundraising, which she was barred from doing during Session under House rules. DeSantis could have also just not scheduled a Special Election and waited for November.
In HD 87, a Special Election that aligned with Palm Beach County municipal elections earlier this month also could have given Republicans a better shot at keeping Mar-a-Lago in red hands. Turnout would have been better, because as it played out, some voters had to be confused about the Special Election because they had just voted.
While DeSantis had no way of knowing it at the time, the Special Elections also came at a time when Republicans writ large are suffering blowback from unpopular Trump policies, and an even more unpopular war in Iran causing surging prices for gas and other goods.
And the DeSantis blame train doesn’t end there. These defeats are a GOP problem of DeSantis’ own making. He picked Collins as his Lieutenant Governor, creating the Senate vacancy now filled by a Democrat. He picked Caruso to be Palm Beach County Clerk and Comptroller, creating the House vacancy now filled by a Democrat. He knew, or at least should have known, that this was a possibility. But he didn’t care because it didn’t affect him.
What’s perhaps worse — and this is a question I heard most often at Tomkow’s Election Night party — where was DeSantis in these races?
I, and plenty of others in The Process, understand that DeSantis wasn’t going to be eager to campaign for a member of House Speaker Danny Perez’s leadership team. But that grudge ignores the fact that Tomkow is a Republican; she’s on the same team. And that reminds about the point above, that DeSantis doesn’t care because it doesn’t affect him.
Of course, it wasn’t only DeSantis who stood on the sidelines. Tomkow supporters were also asking where Collins was. And where was Senate President Ben Albritton, whose majority caucus just got ever-so-slightly smaller?
The silence from executive and legislative leadership also ignores that this isn’t just a House or Senate problem. In fact, the top winners Wednesday morning are neither Nathan nor Gregory, they are David Jolly and Alex Vindman. If either of them have a campaign apparatus worth its weight in salt, they should be able to raise $1 million in the next week just on momentum alone.
Add in how these Special Election results validate what might have otherwise been considered outlier polls showing both Jolly and Vindman within single digits of their GOP opponents despite an R+12 turnout model — which, it’s important to note, is a better advantage for Republicans than they had Tuesday night — and Republicans should be shaking in their Florsheims.
DeSantis made that momentum possible.
And he should have seen it coming, especially in SD 14, which is arguably the swingiest Senate district in the state. Readers will likely remember the district’s recent history. Collins flipped it red, defeating former Sen. Janet Cruz, who flipped it blue before that by defeating former Sen. Dana Young.
But even before that, it was swinging. Part of the seat is where then-Republican Charlie Crist defeated incumbent Democratic Sen. Helen Gordon Davis in 1992. Part of the district is where Democrat Charlie Justice upset Republican Kim Berfield in 2006. The point is, the district, in its various configurations, has exchanged political party hands over and over for decades.
That’s because it has a large composition of the ideal swing voter: suburban White women.
So let’s look at this more broadly, setting aside any individual candidates’ flaws and taking five on the DeSantis blame game. Let’s lay the blame even higher for not just these losses, but any others here and elsewhere that constitute GOP upsets: the Trump administration.
Our nation is currently embroiled in the most unpopular war in modern American history, according to early opinions going back to World War II. We have camouflage wearing, gun-toting Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in
The mood in the country is as sour as it has been since the 1970’s, and voters are going to take that out on the incumbent party, which is the GOP both in the federal government and in Florida state government.
The bottom line is, no Republican is safe in anything less than an R+15 district — which, sidebar, makes plans to redistrict the state a fool’s errand.
It’s hard to imagine any scenario where things get better for the GOP before November. Unless Trump fires Pete Hegseth, releases ALL of the Jeffrey Epstein files, ends the war, backs off on tariffs, and completely changes the way he governs, it’s not going to get better for Republicans before the Midterms.
A word of advice to people like Anna Paulina Luna in an R+5 district: You need to, right now, stop obsessing over UFOs and nonexistent voter fraud and any number of other things the general public does not care about and instead look back home, where your constituents are struggling to pay the bills. They want relief, not alien stories.
The same goes for scandal-plagued Cory Mills in Central Florida and at-risk Maria Elvira Salazar in South Florida.
And one final note — for now — let’s go ahead and dispense with this idea that there is going to be a repeat of the Erika Booth vs. Tom Keen Special Election, when Keen pulled off a nationally reported upset (which was largely also DeSantis’ bad) only to lose less than a year later. This is not that.
There are plenty of reasons why, but the most important of them is simple: Keen was elected because Republicans didn’t turn out, and then was defeated when they did, along with those in the forgotten middle who were frustrated with an aging and ailing President Joe Biden. This time around, Republican turnout was comparatively through the roof, and the unpopular President is Trump.
Guys and gals, this is not Chicken Little; the sky has already fallen.