The Associated Industries of Florida (AIF) bills itself as the “Voice of Florida Business.” But one Republican candidate for Governor would just as soon shut the organization up.
Former House Speaker Paul Renner is critiquing a poll from AIF in the Governor’s race, saying it’s a compromised, flawed product that vastly overstates support for front-runner Byron Donalds.
The survey, released earlier this month, showed Donalds with 54% support and Renner with 2%.
Renner, who has averaged 2.5% support in public polling ahead of the Aug. 18 Republican Primary with Donalds over 50%, says AIF had motivation to rig the results.
“That’s a junk poll. AIF, first of all, has endorsed Byron Donalds. It was a 200-voter sample,” Renner told host Todd Starnes, even though AIF itself claims to have sampled 386 Republican voters.
“We show him in the high 20s, low 30s with undecided leading the field, which is a bad place to be with a Donald Trump endorsement a year and a half in the race and spending a lot of money. This race is wide open.”
This isn’t the first candidate to say their internal polls show the race much different than any public survey.
Lt. Gov. Jay Collins said in April he was between 15% and 18% in polls his campaign conducted and was “closing the gap” with Donalds. No public polling has corroborated those findings, and no methodology was ever shown to media.
Donalds, who says his opponents aren’t viable and aren’t worth debating, is far ahead in fundraising as well as public polls. His campaign and political committee have roughly $65 million to spend, while Collins has less than $6 million, Renner less than $3 million, and James Fishback roughly $200,000.
