{"id":509366,"date":"2022-11-12T19:47:00","date_gmt":"2022-11-12T16:47:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/florida-democrats-grapple-with-uncertain-future-after-midterm-wipeout\/"},"modified":"2022-11-12T19:47:00","modified_gmt":"2022-11-12T16:47:00","slug":"florida-democrats-grapple-with-uncertain-future-after-midterm-wipeout","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/florida-democrats-grapple-with-uncertain-future-after-midterm-wipeout\/","title":{"rendered":"#Florida Democrats grapple with uncertain future after midterm wipeout"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_84 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-custom ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title\" style=\"cursor:inherit\">Table of Contents<\/p>\n<label for=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a25b52a0c222\" class=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-label\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/label><input type=\"checkbox\"  id=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a25b52a0c222\" checked aria-label=\"Toggle\" \/><nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/florida-democrats-grapple-with-uncertain-future-after-midterm-wipeout\/#Florida_Democrats_grapple_with_uncertain_future_after_midterm_wipeout\" >Florida Democrats grapple with uncertain future after midterm wipeout<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<h1><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Florida_Democrats_grapple_with_uncertain_future_after_midterm_wipeout\"><\/span>Florida Democrats grapple with uncertain future after midterm wipeout<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/thehill.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/11\/rubiomarco_110822ap-lynne-sladky_florida.jpeg?w=900\" \/><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Democrats are facing an existential crisis in Florida after a red wave engulfed the nation\u2019s once-premier battleground state.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The scale of the Democratic wipeout in Florida is hard to understate. Tuesday\u2019s elections saw Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R) win landslide victories and Republicans clinch supermajorities in both chambers of the state legislature. For the first time since Reconstruction, no Democrat will hold statewide office in Florida.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr1_ab\"><\/aside>\n<p>The election results have only intensified the infighting and soul-searching that have long roiled the state Democratic Party. The question on many Democrats\u2019 minds now isn\u2019t whether they can mount a comeback in the next few years, but whether they can even remain a viable political force.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe need to get our s\u2014 together,\u201d one Florida Democratic operative said. \u201cBut that involves an element of bringing in new faces and proving that we can be competitive \u2014 that at least we\u2019re building sustainable infrastructure. That just didn\u2019t h<a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/download-scripts-themes-apps\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"9\" title=\"Download Scripts &amp; Themes &amp; Apps\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">app<\/a>en this cycle. We need a 10-to-15-year plan.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Florida\u2019s transformation into a red state has been in the making for years. Democrats have been locked out of the governor\u2019s mansion since former President Clinton was in the White House, and the party\u2019s once-yawning voter registration had been eroding for years.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In 2008, when former President Obama carried Florida for the first time, there were about 700,000 more registered Democrats than Republicans. As of Sept. 30, 2022, there were roughly 300,000 more registered Republican voters than Democratic voters.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Even before Tuesday, Democrats were already pointing fingers in anticipation of a tough election night. Several party members had called on Manny Diaz, the chairman of the state Democratic Party, to resign after the midterms. Diaz has reportedly signaled that he has no plans to leave his post.<\/p>\n<p>Diaz, meanwhile, released a memo on Tuesday in which he called out national Democratic groups for spending so little in Florida this year \u2014 about $1.35 million in 2022 compared to nearly $59 million in 2018.\u00a0<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr2_ab\"><\/aside>\n<p>But party members and operatives say that Democrats\u2019 political woes in Florida are the result of a complex and longstanding web of factors.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In conversations with The Hill, half a dozen Florida Democrats pointed to vulnerabilities ranging from the incompetence of party consultants and apathy of national Democratic groups to the party\u2019s aging and underfunded political infrastructure.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think the party needs new leadership, but the right leadership,\u201d said Thomas Kennedy, a Democratic National Committee member from Florida, who has called on Diaz to resign.\u00a0<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr3_ab\"><\/aside>\n<p>\u201cReflexively, including myself, our instinct is to go after the party chair because the party chair is the leader and the buck does stop with them,\u201d he continued. \u201cBut what also needs to be addressed is there is a whole underclass of consultants that basically use the party as their own personal ATM.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Kennedy also pointed to what he said was Democrats\u2019 lack of a long-term strategy in Florida. Republicans, by contrast, had spent years building a permanent political presence in key communities, especially in heavily Hispanic parts of the state.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe need to have more presence in the community. We need to have field offices. We need to have permanent offices in our core areas where we\u2019re not just organizing a few months before an election. The Republicans have been doing this for years.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr4_ab\"><\/aside>\n<p>State Sen. Annette Taddeo (D), who lost a bid this week for Florida\u2019s Miami-based 27th Congressional District, offered a similar diagnosis of her party\u2019s challenges, telling The Hill that Democrats had failed to do the \u201cgrunt work\u201d necessary to build a winning coalition.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe know what needs to be done, because we did it in \u201808 and \u201812 with Obama,\u201d she said. \u201cIt takes grunt work. And the grunt work is registering voters. The grunt work is being present in minority communities all the time, not just during an election. The grunt work is building infrastructure, the party from the ground up.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Republicans copied the playbook of Obama in Florida: Be present all the time, register voters, do things to help them,\u201d Taddeo added.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Indeed, that strategy appeared to pay dividends for Republicans on Tuesday. DeSantis and Rubio both managed to carry Miami-Dade and Osceola Counties, two heavily Hispanic areas that have in the past been sources of Democratic strength in the state.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>DeSantis also won another Democratic-leaning county, Palm Beach County, while Rubio came within 2,100 votes of scoring a victory there.<\/p>\n<p>Ultimately, DeSantis defeated his Democratic rival, former Rep. Charlie Crist, by a staggering 19-point margin, while Rubio vanquished his opponent, Rep. Val Demings (D), by more than 16 percentage points. By comparison, Rubio won his last election by fewer than 8 points. DeSantis barely eked out a win in 2018 when he beat Democrat Andrew Gillum by less than half a percentage point.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI knew the margins were going to be big,\u201d one Florida Democratic strategist said. \u201cI was expecting maybe a 6-or-7-point win for DeSantis. Maybe 5 points for Rubio. But 19? I think everybody was surprised by that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The election results offered a stunning split screen to other battleground states. While Democrats headed into the midterms facing a brutal political environment and the threat of losing their House and Senate majorities, the party largely outperformed expectations. Several tight races remain too close to call, but what\u2019s clear is that the so-called red wave that Republicans long predicted failed to materialize across most of the country.<\/p>\n<p>There were also more im<a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/social-mediaa\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"1\" title=\"Social Media\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">media<\/a>te challenges for Florida Democrats. DeSantis, a star among conservatives nationally and prospective Republican presidential candidate, drastically outraised Crist throughout the campaign, pulling in more than $200 million for his reelection bid. Crist, on the other hand, raised about $31 million.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr5_ab\"><\/aside>\n<p>At the same time, Democrats struggled to effectively counter Republicans\u2019 messaging on high-profile issues like the COVID-19 pandemic. DeSantis\u2019s laissez-faire approach to the outbreak and defiance of federal health officials was a major factor in political rise in the first place.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere was no Democratic campaign at all,\u201d said Fernand Amandi, a Democratic pollster whose firm advised Obama\u2019s successful Hispanic outreach efforts in his two presidential campaigns. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t that they started six months before the election. They weren\u2019t campaigning six weeks before the election.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Recalling the past decade in Florida politics, Amandi said that Democrats have become increasingly complacent following Obama\u2019s 2012 win in the state, saying the party \u201cwent to celebrate Obama\u2019s second inauguration and never came back.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But it was the 2018 midterm elections that \u201cbroke the Democrats\u2019 backs.\u201d While Democrats made some modest gains in Florida that year, they fell short in the contest for governor and saw former Sen. Bill Nelson, a three-term incumbent, ousted by Rick Scott, the state\u2019s Republican governor at the time.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr6_ab\"><\/aside>\n<p>Meanwhile, Democrats swept elections nationwide, picking up 41 House seats and recapturing the majority in the lower chamber.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFlorida was the only state in 2018 that didn\u2019t succumb to the blue wave,\u201d Amandi said. \u201cAnd I think for a lot of national donors and national Democrats, it was a bitter defeat that led to pulling up the stakes in the state for bluer pastures.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The 2022 midterms, he said, solidified Florida\u2019s status as a red state.<\/p>\n<p>Some Democrats, however, said there\u2019s at least some reason to be optimistic, even as they conceded that it would take years to fully rebuild their political operations in Florida.\u00a0<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr7_ab\"><\/aside>\n<p>With former President Trump expected to announce a 2024 White House bid early next week and DeSantis seen as a potential \u2014 if not likely \u2014 Republican challenger, Democrats say there\u2019s an opportunity to break through in Florida amid possible GOP infighting.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cChaos is a ladder,\u201d Kennedy said. \u201cBetween Trump and DeSantis fighting, DeSantis maybe running for president, a lot can happen.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Taddeo also said that there\u2019s interest from top Democrats in helping the party reassert itself in the wake of the midterms. She fielded a call on Friday from Bill Clinton, who offered his help in rebuilding Democrats\u2019 crumbling political infrastructure in Florida. Still, she noted, there are years of work ahead.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s got to be a long-term plan,\u201d Taddeo said. \u201cWhat do we think we can do in two years? What do we think we can do in four? We need goals for two, four, six, eight, 10 years. This isn\u2019t going to turn around overnight.\u201d\n<\/p><\/div>\n<blockquote><p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff6600;\">If you liked the article, do not forget to share it with your friends. Follow us on\u00a0<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><a style=\"color: #ff0000;\" href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/publications\/CAAqBwgKMLG0nwswvr63Aw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\">Google News<\/a><\/span>\u00a0too, click on the star and choose us from your favorites.<\/span><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">For forums sites go to <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/forum.buradabiliyorum.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Forum.BuradaBiliyorum.Com<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>If you want to read more <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/news\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"2\" title=\"News\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">News<\/a> articles, you can visit our <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/news\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">News category.<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"color: black;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/thehill.com\/homenews\/campaign\/3731548-florida-democrats-grapple-with-uncertain-future-after-midterm-wipeout\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Florida Democrats grapple with uncertain future after midterm wipeout Democrats are facing an existential crisis in Florida after a red wave engulfed the nation\u2019s once-premier battleground state.\u00a0 The scale of the Democratic wipeout in Florida is hard to understate. Tuesday\u2019s elections saw Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R) win landslide victories and&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":509367,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thehill.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/11\/rubiomarco_110822ap-lynne-sladky_florida.jpeg?w=1280","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[70897],"tags":[135069,135472,134343,134553,135189,135473,80445,133498,135474,91187,125973,29102,134952,42873],"class_list":["post-509366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-2022-midterms-house","tag-annette-taddeo","tag-campaign","tag-charlie-crist","tag-clinton","tag-florida-democrats","tag-healthcare","tag-in-the-know","tag-manny-diaz","tag-marco-rubio","tag-obama","tag-ron-desantis","tag-val-demings","tag-white-house"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=509366"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509366\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/509367"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=509366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=509366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=509366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}