{"id":12316,"date":"2025-08-11T14:52:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-11T06:52:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tingchao.xyz\/?p=12316"},"modified":"2025-08-11T14:52:15","modified_gmt":"2025-08-11T06:52:15","slug":"miami-dade-is-red-but-democrats-arent-giving-up-on-florida","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tingchao.xyz\/?p=12316","title":{"rendered":"Miami-Dade is red, but Democrats aren\u2019t giving up on Florida"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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MIAMI \u2014 When Miami-Dade County helped elect President Trump in November, effectively taking on a conservative bent after nearly three decades of being solid blue, political operatives here had their worst fears realized: Florida was in fact a red state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The signs of a big political change in southern Florida had been seen for several cycles, including Gov. Ron DeSantis\u2019s (R) 2022 win, when he flipped the metropolitan county for the first time in more than 20 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere is nothing more maddening to me than the self-inflicted wounds in Dade,\u201d said Democratic strategist Steve Schale, who is based in Florida and ran former President Obama\u2019s 2008 operation in the state. \u201cToo many in my party \u2014 particularly those outside of Florida \u2014 thought the Obama \u201912 and [Hillary] Clinton \u201916 numbers in Miami were signs the county had become a progressive bastion.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut we are talking about a place where most people came here to escape socialist authoritarian governments and crime \u2014 so when people on the extreme left tried to justify things like \u2018Democratic socialism,\u2019 imagine how that sounds to the ears of a family that left everything behind \u2014 or a family who came here seeking safety to hear things like \u2018defund the police,\u2019 Schale added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another longtime Democratic operative in Florida said losing Miami-Dade was a \u201cgut punch\u201d for Democrats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe could see the trainwreck coming before the crash happened, but that was a particularly painful moment for any Democrat who cares about this state,\u201d the operative said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Florida Democrats see their problems in Florida as the result of years of neglect following Obama\u2019s win in 2012. But they say they haven\u2019t given up on trying to move the Sunshine State back into purple state territory. In fact, they say, they\u2019re doubling down on their efforts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re still rebuilding, but we\u2019ve had a lot of success,\u201d said Nikki Fried, chair of the Florida Democratic Party, in an interview with The Hill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fried pointed to an 8 percent increase in Democratic voter turnout from the 2020 election to the 2024 election. She also credited work the state party has done to generate gains on school boards and county commissions. Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava (D) was also able to win reelection by a wide margin even as the county went in the other direction in 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, Fried acknowledged there is \u201ca lot of work to be done and resources we\u2019ve brought into the state to do that work.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Democrats\u2019 voter affiliation in Florida has declined rapidly since 2020. Republican affiliation in the state has also increased, surpassing Democrats by a hair in 2021 and booming to almost 1,500,000 more as of late June.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Political observers attribute the drastic changes in party affiliation to a number of factors, including a massive migration of Republican voters to the state during the COVID-19 pandemic. President Trump \u2014 who lives in Palm Beach \u2014 also has attracted top Republican operatives and donors during his rise to party stardom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some Democrats don\u2019t seem convinced that there\u2019s been much movement in their direction at all. \u201cOn the organizational, operational side of things, I don\u2019t think things are any better or any worse,\u201d Schale said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He added there\u2019s \u201cstill a lot of donor skepticism and donor fatigue\u201d about the most recent cycles in the state. But Democrats can move incrementally with key wins in the next cycle, Schale said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSuccess in 2026 is showing gains and showing improvement, and if you do that you can make the case to donors that there\u2019s a trajectory you can invest in,\u201d he said, pointing to David Jolly, the gubernatorial candidate and former Republican congressman who switched parties, and Jose Javier Rodriguez, a former state senator who is a Democratic candidate for Florida attorney general.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou build back by fixing what you can fix and getting success,\u201d he added, referencing work that Democrats can do to improve their standing with Hispanic voters, among other efforts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And as Trump has stumbled recently in polls and messaging, strategists say now is a good time for Democrats to pounce and try to regain momentum in the state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf [Republicans] continue to push for these policies that now have Trump at the lowest approval rating of any president at this point in his second term, I think it would create an environment where, for the first time in decades, Florida voters may say, \u2018Look, it\u2019s time for a change, and the only change now is to give the Democrats a shot at governing,\u201d said Democratic strategist Fernand Amandi, who is based in Miami.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He added that the desire for change in Florida is exacerbated by an \u201cunprecedented affordability crisis that is the sole responsibility\u201d of Republicans, who have had \u201ctotal control of state government for almost three decades.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite the ripe moment, strategists say it will still be a heavy lift for Democrats to recapture voters \u2014 at least right away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI live here. I have to be an optimist \u2026 but I\u2019m also a realist. It\u2019s f\u2011\u2011\u2011ing hard, and there\u2019s a lot of work to be done,\u201d Schale said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the efforts are underway, including the Florida Democratic Party\u2019s Pendulum initiative, a year-round organizing program that Fried said has already contributed to significant gains in two deep-red congressional districts where there were off-cycle elections. Fried also pointed to the party\u2019s Front Porch Swing initiative, which aims to listen to voters in rural Florida and meet them where they are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even with small wins in 2024, Fried said there were lessons to be learned from the overall loss in 2024, including how to best connect with voters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Democrats had more than $1 billion of earned media nationally, \u201cAt the end of the cycle, most voters said, \u2018What is the message?\u2019 from the party,\u201d Fried said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe missed the mark on breaking through to everyday Floridians that aren\u2019t watching us on the traditional news stations,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strategists say connecting with voters is especially key right now as Democrats have struggled with getting their base to the ballot boxes in recent election cycles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c[Democrats] have got to field candidates and rally around a disciplined, focused message of where the voters are, and where the voters are right now is they want solutions to this Republican politician-created affordability crisis,\u201d Amandi said. \u201cIf they can do those two things, then they can position themselves to surprise a lot of people next November.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strategists say that Democrats \u2014 from operatives to donors \u2014 will have to invest time and money back into Florida if they want to see their party in power once again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDemocrats don\u2019t have the luxury of writing off Florida because Florida is only going to continue to play a critically important role in the Electoral College math as they\u2019re only going to gain electoral seats going forward,\u201d Amandi said. \u201cIf you cede states like Florida and Texas, you\u2019re in essence saying you\u2019re ceding any pathway to win the White House as a Democrat.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MIAMI \u2014 When Miami-Dade County helped elect President Trump in November, effectively taking on a conservative bent after nearly three decades of being solid blue, political operatives here had their worst fears realized: Florida was in fact a red state. The signs of a big political change in southern Florida had been seen for several […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":12317,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[3562,1924,3561],"class_list":["post-12316","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","tag-dade","tag-florida","tag-miami"],"yoast_head":"\nMiami-Dade is red, but Democrats aren\u2019t giving up on Florida - LISTEN WORLD<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/tingchao.xyz\/?p=12316\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Miami-Dade is red, but Democrats aren\u2019t giving up on Florida - LISTEN WORLD\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"MIAMI \u2014 When Miami-Dade County helped elect President Trump in November, effectively taking on a conservative bent after nearly three decades of being solid blue, political operatives here had their worst fears realized: Florida was in fact a red state. 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