Which Florida Amendments are positioned to pass?
Bottom Line: As part of the Florida Amendment Series I’ve addressed each of the six proposed constitutional amendments. What I’ve yet to dive into is how they’ve polled with Floridians and which ones are potentially positioned to pass. As a reminder each must achieve 60% of the vote to pass, however simply making it onto the ballot has proven to be a winning proposition far more often than not. In 2016 three of the four Floridians voted on passed and that grew to eleven out of twelve in 2018. We know polls are anything but perfect, but they can provide insight into how each of these proposals appears to be pacing heading towards Election Day. For the purpose of this breakdown I’m using the University of North Florida’s Public Opinion Research polling which was recently released. Here’s what they found:
No. 1 Constitutional Amendment
BALLOT TITLE: Citizenship Requirement to Vote in Florida Elections
- Polling percentage: 78%
No. 2 Constitutional Amendment
BALLOT TITLE: Raising Florida’s Minimum Wage
- Polling percentage: 60%
No. 3 Constitutional Amendment
BALLOT TITLE: All Voters Vote in Primary Elections for State Legislature, Governor, and Cabinet
- Polling percentage: 58%
No. 4 Constitutional Amendment
BALLOT TITLE: Voter Approval of Constitutional Amendments
- Polling percentage: 41%
No. 5 Constitutional Amendment
BALLOT TITLE: Limitations on Homestead Property Tax Assessments; increased portability period to transfer accrued benefit
- Polling percentage: 68%
No. 6 Constitutional Amendment
BALLOT TITLE: Ad Valorem Tax Discount for Spouses of Certain Deceased Veterans Who Had Permanent, Combat-Related Disabilities
- Polling percentage: 88%
We can draw some pretty meaningful deductions from this polling. It’s pretty clear Amendments 1, 5 and 6 are positioned to pass. Even if the polling is off by several points, they’d still pass. Conversely, it’s clear Amendment 4 is set to fall short. And then there are the two tossups. Amendments 2 and 3, which arguably are the most effectual proposals on the ballet, in terms of the impact to Floridians. Interestingly, all of the Amendments positioned to pass mirror my recommendations, as does the one positioned to fail currently. It’s also my hope that the two tossups fall short.