It's been a banner year so far for the Pinellas County GOP, but the biggest contests are yet to play out. The Nov. 5 General Election may well be the final indicator of whether Pinellas County indeed shifted from purple to red.
The local party's leader, Adam Ross, predicts it will again be a GOP sweep and sees the trends of the last several years continuing through the 2024 ballot and beyond.
To understand the importance of this year's election to both Republicans and Democrats, let's look at the trajectory that has led to this point.
As of May, Republicans have a more than 33,000-voter registration advantage in the county, with nearly 236,000 voters compared to less than 203,000 Democrats. In percentages, Republicans represent 38% of the total electorate, with just under 33% registered as Democrats.
The party hasn't always been so dominant in Pinellas County. In fact, Republicans have only enjoyed a voter registration advantage since 2022 (when looking at Midterm and Presidential Election years). Before that, Democrats had a slight consistent edge. Going back to 2012, Democrats led Republicans in voter registration by a percentage point, give or take. In 2008, Democrats led Republicans in voter registration by 2 percentage points.
But the trend has been going the way of the GOP since at least 2016 in Pinellas County, with both major parties being statistically tied in voter registration that year. Democrats still led slightly, with about 1,400 more registered votes than Republicans. That was the year former President Donald Trump pulled off an upset win over front-runner Hillary Clinton.
In 2018 and 2020, in what many believed was a reaction to a divisive Trump presidency, Democrats earned back a bit of the party's voter registration edge before seeing it evaporate entirely in 2022.
And for the most part, voting outcomes in the county matched voter registration advantages. Former President Barack Obama won Pinellas County in 2008 and 2012. He earned about 53% of the vote over Republican John McCain in 2008, when voter registration favored Democrats the most out of the years analyzed. Obama then won with 52% of the vote over U.S. Sen. Mitt Romney in 2012, a dip in support that aligned with a slight tip in Democrats' voter registration advantage.
In 2016, when Democrats and Republicans were statistically tied, Trump won the county over Clinton by a slim margin of less than 6,000 votes out of nearly a half million cast. While the differences are slim, Trump pulled off a narrow victory in the county despite Democrats having a similarly narrow voter registration advantage.
Former U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson beat now-U.S. Sen. Rick Scott in Pinellas County in 2018, despite losing the race statewide. Nelson earned about 52% of the vote in a year Democrats enjoyed a 1-percentage-point voter registration advantage.
The story is similar in 2020, when Biden eked out a victory over Trump in Pinellas County (he lost statewide) by just 1,200 votes out of more than 561,000 cast. Democrats again had a just 1-percentage-point voter advantage.
Now, it looks like that was the end of a winning era for Democrats in the county, with the GOP capturing the voter registration advantage in 2022, leading to a big re-election win for Gov. Ron DeSantis and a win for Republican Anna Paulina Luna, who captured Florida's 13th Congressional District in Pinellas County, though her victory was largely attributable to redistricting that shifted district boundaries in Republicans' favor.
Today, the GOP enjoys a 5-percentage-point voter registration advantage — larger than Democrats have enjoyed this century.
And that brings us back to the man leading the local GOP, Ross.
"Quite simply this is the best cycle ever for a Republican to be running," Ross said, adding that the advantage is only growing.
Numbers are a crucial part of the calculus, Ross knows. But he also believes Republicans are benefitting this year from negative economic sentiments that can easily be tied to Democrats.
Whether one agrees with the argument or not, there is no denying that the party in power in the White House — at this time it's Democrats with President Joe Biden leading the top of the ticket — who takes the brunt of criticism when folks aren't feeling so great in the wallet.
"I think there's an affordability issue that's going on, particularly here where you have a lot of retired individuals on fixed incomes and everything is more expensive these days," Ross said.
It's a strategy that works. Ask James Carville, a strategist in former President Bill Clinton's campaign in 1992 who famously coined the phrase, "It's the economy, stupid." Clinton successfully campaigned on pain Americans were feeling at home amid an economic recession to ultimately defeat then-President George H. W. Bush.
Ross sees that same strategy playing out this year, with costs on just about everything causing financial hardship for residents across the nation, including at home in Pinellas County. Ross expects it to be so effective that it could attract Democrats to cross the aisle to support Republican candidates.
Of course, no one has a crystal ball (not even Larry Sabato) and there are multiple factors to consider. But Ross is confident the GOP will win and win big this round, not just at the top of the ticket, but right on down to Luna, who is one of the only Republican congressional incumbents Democrats think they have a chance of defeating this year; Ed Montanari, who is challenging incumbent Democratic Rep. Lindsay Cross for a state House seat; and a pair of County Commission contests that features an incumbent Democrat fighting for re-election and two Republicans vying for their party's nomination to take on Cookie Kennedy in an open race.
Ross predicts victories in all of them.
He called Montanari's race in House District 60 "the most exciting race for Florida House this year." He doesn't expect a blowout, conceding that it will be a "within the margin of error" nail-biter.
"But Ed's going to win because the trends are that Republicans are going to the polls more in that district," Ross said. He added that Montanari might actually have a name ID advantage, despite challenging a popular incumbent. Montanari, by the end of his term on St. Petersburg City Council representing the city that anchors HD 60, will have served nine years.
Indeed, Florida Politics Publisher Peter Schorsch recently penned a column declaring HD 60 as officially in the battleground column, citing voter registration trends that show a diminishing advantage for Democrats in the St. Pete-based district. In 2020, Democrats outnumbered Republicans by 7 percentage points. As of May 1, that advantage has shrunk to just under 3 percentage points. If trends continue through Election Day, that advantage may shrink to as little as just a 1-percentage-point advantage.
In Luna's congressional race, Ross said he wouldn't be surprised at all if the incumbent improved upon her first victory two years ago.
"I think she's got probably the safest seat in the country," Ross quipped, noting that Democrats are not only at a disadvantage in the R+6 district, but they are facing a crowded Primary that will force them to expend resources before they even get to the General Election.
"Anna has more cash on hand than any of the Democrats that are trying to run against her," he reminded, adding that her work in Congress on securing funding for beach renourishment could also be a difference-maker in the race.
And then there are the two County Commission races. Republicans, buoyed by their new countywide voter registration advantage and enjoying what turned out to be a red wave throughout Florida that year, regained control of the Commission in 2022 when Brian Scott defeated then-incumbent Pat Gerard to tip the scales.
Now the GOP is eyeing two more seats — the open District 1 seat Scherer is seeking and Justice's District 3 seat. Those into local political punditry expect that if the GOP wins even one of those seats, it could take Democrats at least a decade to recover.
"Voter registrations are going to make the difference," Ross said.
He points to the recently concluded Clearwater municipal races as what he describes as "a litmus test."
While races for Clearwater City Council and Mayor were statutorily nonpartisan, Republicans swept the races. At the top of the ticket, now-Mayor Bruce Rector bested Kathleen Beckman, while Mike Mannino won Beckman's vacated City Council seat and Ryan Cotton defeated incumbent Mark Bunker, whom Democrats were supporting.
"The party helped out a lot with those three races in getting information out to Republicans and it worked," Ross said, adding that turnout was better than expected as a result. "We're going to do the same thing in November."
The trick was hitting the simple issues facing Clearwater voters, Ross said, things like improvements to Drew Street, proposed spending on a new City Hall many believed was too high, and millage rates in the city.
"Those issues all go down to affordability," he said, harkening back to the power of the economy in campaigning.
Ross further rejected the notion that Democrats may see a pendulum swing after dismal losses in 2022 because of a pair of constitutional amendments on the ballot — one to enshrine abortion protections in the constitution and the other to legalize cannabis for recreational adult use.
The amendments will impact turnout, he said. But it'll be on both sides.
"I think there's a big flaw in the abortion amendment," Ross said.
Ross, like other Republicans, argues the amendment, if successful, could trigger a reversal of the parental notification requirement lawmakers passed in 2020 that requires minors to have consent from a parent to receive an abortion. DeSantis has claimed the amendment would "eliminate parental consent" and Ross said that's a big issue for nonpartisan voters.
But the ballot language itself specifically states that the amendment "does not change the Legislature's constitutional authority to require notification to a parent or guardian before a minor has an abortion."
Still, DeSantis argues additional language in the amendment could trigger legal challenges to the existing notification law. A section also lays out that "no law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient's health." The argument goes that requiring parental consent could constitute a delay, or in the event a parent does not provide consent, a restriction.
The language, which Ross describes as flawed, will lead to the effort ultimately failing, Ross said. And even with the question on the ballot, he doesn't "see it making a complete and total impact on the total results."
Ross, who was just elected without opposition to Pinellas County Tax Collector, plans to continue leading the County GOP, including seeking re-election for another two-year term in December.
"When I ran for Chair I had a plan and a vision that I promised for my constituents," he said. "So I'll keep going until I get that accomplished and the right person steps up."
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