Donald Trump’s Impact on Palm Beach County’s Municipal Elections
Bottom Line: While Florida’s Presidential Preference Primaries won’t impact the outcome of the Democrat and Republican Party nominations for president, with both having already been decided, the name at the top of the ticket for registered Republicans appears to have the potential to have a profound effect on local elections. Also, a decision made by the Florida Democratic Party last year could cost them local elections this year. Here’s the story.
Last fall Florida’s Democratic Party, led by former Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, made the decision to only allow Joe Biden to appear on Florida’s presidential primary ballot. Under Florida law if there’s not a challenger in a political race then the election is canceled. Thus, Florida’s Democrats don’t have a presidential candidate to vote for this year. Meanwhile, for Republicans, the Presidential preference primary provides the first opportunity to vote for their president of choice this year. What’s clear based on early and vote by mail ballots thus far is that the ability to vote at the top of ballot is likely to impact candidates down ballot.
Palm Beach County’s current registered voter breakout looks like this:
- Democrat: 38%
- Republican: 31%
- NPA/Minor Party: 31%
As of midday Wednesday in Palm Beach County for those who had either voted early or via vote by mail ballots the partisan breakout looked like this:
- Democrat: 32%
- Republican: 56%
- NPA/Minor Party: 12%
In the leadup to Election Day Palm Beach County’s Democrats are underperforming their voter registration levels by 6% while Republicans are outperforming by 25%. Municipal elections are nonpartisan elections. With that said, where there are races and candidates that are primarily favored by Republican voters, there’s reason to believe they’re positioned well to outperform in Tuesday’s elections. And they likely have Donald Trump at the top of the Republican ballot to thank for it.