PrintNew poll shows Biden competitive in Florida
In 2016, Donald Trump received 49.0% of Florida’s popular vote, against Hillary’s 47.8%, a 1.2% difference that won Florida for him.
Trump’s victory was better than Obama’s in 2012, when Obama beat Romney by 0.88% of the popular vote. In 2008, before voters knew Obama, he beat McCain by 2.69% of the popular vote.
In 2004, as if to make up for the trouble the state caused in 2000, Florida voters gave George W. Bush a 5.01% advantage over Kerry. And of course, in 2000 Bush won against Gore by a mere 0.01% of votes.
The point of this history is that elections in Florida tend to be close. In the last five presidential elections, only once has a candidate managed to beat his opponent by more than 4% and that, as noted above, was an incumbent Republican facing off against his Democrat rival.
In 2016, FiveThirtyEight, Nate Silver’s vaunted statistical analysis website, predicted that Hillary would win Florida’s 29 electoral votes with 55.1% of the popular votes versus Trump’s 44.9%, a 10.2% difference. Given Florida’s voting history, FiveThirtyEight was doing the statistical equivalent of getting drunk at a Hillary party and throwing darts at a weighted number board.
Given those facts, it’s hard to worry about the latest poll out of Florida, a Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy survey of registered Florida voters. The poll shows that Biden currently has a sort of lead over Trump. Thus, Politico reports (emphasis added):
Joe Biden is the only Democrat who presents “serious competition” to President Donald Trump in Florida, according to a poll released Tuesday.
The Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy survey of registered Florida voters showed Biden with a narrow 47-45 lead over the president, within the 4 percentage-point margin of error.
Biden was the only candidate from either political party with a positive approval rating in the crucial battleground state. Forty-five percent of respondents had a favorable view of the former vice president; 41 percent had a negative view.
Trump had a 46 percent approval rating. Forty-seven percent of respondents disapproved of the president’s job performance, the poll found.
Maybe we’re unduly cynical or just mathematically challenged, but it’s hard to take seriously a poll that has a margin of error greater than the percentage difference between winners and losers in four of the last five Florida elections.
When it comes to the other leading Democrat candidates, they don’t seem to stand a chance:
Among registered voters surveyed, Trump easily bested Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren 51-42 and held comfortable leads over Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont (49-44) and South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg (49-45).
Sanders was the least popular candidate among those surveyed. Just 35 percent of registered voters said they had a favorable opinion of him, while 52 percent had a negative opinion. Warren was also viewed unfavorably (37-48), as was Buttigieg (32-38).
Florida’s lukewarm approval for the three most socialist candidates reflects four trends unique to Florida:
- 29% of Florida’s Hispanic population is Cuban and therefore unlikely to support either open or covert socialists;
- The state has a large group of New York Jews who may be dismayed by rising anti-Semitism in Democrat New York;
- Florida’s retirees may be blue-state Democrats, but they’re also old-fashioned blue-collar Democrats or business owners, i.e., the type of Democrats turning the Rust Belt into Trump country. It’s hard to imagine people who came of working age at a time when American unions were staunchly anti-Communist turning to proto-communist candidates; and
- Florida’s Republican governor, Ron deSantis, is enjoying what the Sun Sentinal calls “sky-high” approval.
As for Biden, he’s dogged by some facts that may render him inoperable in Florida as well as the rest of the U.S.:
- Obama cannot bring himself to endorse his own former Veep;
- Hunter Biden;
- Videos of Biden with little girls;
- Hunter Biden;
- Biden’s chronic foot-in-mouth disease;
- Hunter Biden; and
- Biden’s accelerating confusion and distasteful pandering.
Glenn Reynolds rightly likes to say, “don’t get cocky,” but it’s probably not cocky to say that Trump, while he must remain vigilant, doesn’t yet need to start panicking about Florida.
In 2016, Donald Trump received 49.0% of Florida’s popular vote, against Hillary’s 47.8%, a 1.2% difference that won Florida for him.
Trump’s victory was better than Obama’s in 2012, when Obama beat Romney by 0.88% of the popular vote. In 2008, before voters knew Obama, he beat McCain by 2.69% of the popular vote.
In 2004, as if to make up for the trouble the state caused in 2000, Florida voters gave George W. Bush a 5.01% advantage over Kerry. And of course, in 2000 Bush won against Gore by a mere 0.01% of votes.
The point of this history is that elections in Florida tend to be close. In the last five presidential elections, only once has a candidate managed to beat his opponent by more than 4% and that, as noted above, was an incumbent Republican facing off against his Democrat rival.
In 2016, FiveThirtyEight, Nate Silver’s vaunted statistical analysis website, predicted that Hillary would win Florida’s 29 electoral votes with 55.1% of the popular votes versus Trump’s 44.9%, a 10.2% difference. Given Florida’s voting history, FiveThirtyEight was doing the statistical equivalent of getting drunk at a Hillary party and throwing darts at a weighted number board.
Given those facts, it’s hard to worry about the latest poll out of Florida, a Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy survey of registered Florida voters. The poll shows that Biden currently has a sort of lead over Trump. Thus, Politico reports (emphasis added):
Joe Biden is the only Democrat who presents “serious competition” to President Donald Trump in Florida, according to a poll released Tuesday.
The Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy survey of registered Florida voters showed Biden with a narrow 47-45 lead over the president, within the 4 percentage-point margin of error.
Biden was the only candidate from either political party with a positive approval rating in the crucial battleground state. Forty-five percent of respondents had a favorable view of the former vice president; 41 percent had a negative view.
Trump had a 46 percent approval rating. Forty-seven percent of respondents disapproved of the president’s job performance, the poll found.
Maybe we’re unduly cynical or just mathematically challenged, but it’s hard to take seriously a poll that has a margin of error greater than the percentage difference between winners and losers in four of the last five Florida elections.
When it comes to the other leading Democrat candidates, they don’t seem to stand a chance:
Among registered voters surveyed, Trump easily bested Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren 51-42 and held comfortable leads over Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont (49-44) and South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg (49-45).
Sanders was the least popular candidate among those surveyed. Just 35 percent of registered voters said they had a favorable opinion of him, while 52 percent had a negative opinion. Warren was also viewed unfavorably (37-48), as was Buttigieg (32-38).
Florida’s lukewarm approval for the three most socialist candidates reflects four trends unique to Florida:
- 29% of Florida’s Hispanic population is Cuban and therefore unlikely to support either open or covert socialists;
- The state has a large group of New York Jews who may be dismayed by rising anti-Semitism in Democrat New York;
- Florida’s retirees may be blue-state Democrats, but they’re also old-fashioned blue-collar Democrats or business owners, i.e., the type of Democrats turning the Rust Belt into Trump country. It’s hard to imagine people who came of working age at a time when American unions were staunchly anti-Communist turning to proto-communist candidates; and
- Florida’s Republican governor, Ron deSantis, is enjoying what the Sun Sentinal calls “sky-high” approval.
As for Biden, he’s dogged by some facts that may render him inoperable in Florida as well as the rest of the U.S.:
- Obama cannot bring himself to endorse his own former Veep;
- Hunter Biden;
- Videos of Biden with little girls;
- Hunter Biden;
- Biden’s chronic foot-in-mouth disease;
- Hunter Biden; and
- Biden’s accelerating confusion and distasteful pandering.
Glenn Reynolds rightly likes to say, “don’t get cocky,” but it’s probably not cocky to say that Trump, while he must remain vigilant, doesn’t yet need to start panicking about Florida.
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