Florida voter registration by party
Bottom Line: We’re under eight weeks away from Election Day with the voter registration deadline right around the corner for November’s elections. The deadline is October 5th. Voter registration efforts have been different, just like campaigning, due to the pandemic but have been and are in full force by political parties. Yesterday Florida’s Division of Elections provided the most recent update on voter registration by party. The current update includes all Floridians registered through July.
Here are the takeaways:
- Republicans gained ground on Democrats for a fourth consecutive month
- Voters have been more likely to register in a political party than in past years (NPA’s had been the fastest growing voting block prior to 2020)
- New voter registrations gained speed in July, after light activity due to the pandemic earlier in the year
After two years of gains by Republicans, Democrats have outpaced Republicans in overall registrations in 2020. This appears to have been driven by the Democrat’s Presidential Primary in March. Since April, Republicans have once again begun to outpace Democrats in voter registrations. Here’s the year over year change in voter registration by party in Florida through June:
- DEM: +190,370
- GOP: +177,028
- Minor: +27,733
- NPA: -6,430
Democrats have added 13,342 more voters than Republicans over the past 12 months. However, Republicans registered 11,750 more voters than Democrats in July alone and are on pace to eliminate the Democrats gains prior to the election if the trend continues. The current breakout of registered voters looks like this...
- DEM: 37.2%
- GOP: 35.5%
- Minor: 1.3%
- NPA: 26.1%
The longer-term trend is also favorable for Republicans due to gains made since the 2016 cycle. Democrats held a 2.5% advantage on Election Day 2016 when Donald Trump won Florida. Democrat’s hold a 1.7% advantage currently. Now clearly not all registered Democrats or Republicans vote for all candidates in their party, but most do. Given that more than a quarter of Florida’s voters are NPA’s, how they mostly break determines close elections. It’ll be interesting to watch the future/final updates to see where momentum lies heading into Election Day in our state. As of the most recent info, there’s room for Republicans to feel cautiously optimistic.
To be continued...