Countdown to Year-End – Last Stop Florida for 2022 Midterms

Our work in the 2022 midterm primaries will culminate in Florida.  We will make stops for primaries throughout the spring and summer in Texas, Ohio, and North Carolina, Georgia, and Virginia on our way to the Sunshine State.  Dems will face an uphill battle in Florida, as Republicans recently overtook Democrats in voter registration numbers for the first time in centuries. 

Rideshare2Vote ran on a limited basis in Florida in 2021, entering the state for the first time in the Orlando area municipal elections this fall.  We are looking forward to the challenge of expanding statewide in 2022, where 28 US House seats, 1 Senate seat, the state legislature, and the entire executive branch will be contested.  We will be creating the infrastructure to call and drive Democratic voters to the polls, but need the support of our donors and volunteers to make it happen.  Although the GOP may have more registered voters, actual turn-out at the polls is the key, and we are dedicated to seeking out low-propensity Democratic voters, and enabling them to turn out for Democratic candidates statewide with free rides to the polls. 

Florida primaries are late in the year with Election Day landing on August 23, just 2 months before early voting starts for the November 8th general election.  The marquee contests are the races for the governor and for US Senate.  Democrats US Rep. Charlie Crist, state Sen. Annette Taddeo, and Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried will face off in the primary to take on Gov. Ron DeSantis, whose authoritarian administration is reminiscent of Trump’s.  DeSantis has outlawed Covid vaccination and mask mandates, he has crusaded against CRT, he has denounced Planned Parenthood, and recently DeSantis has proposed the creation of a Florida State Militia answering only to him and “not encumbered by the federal government.”  Hopefully, Floridians will rally around a strong Democratic candidate to remove DeSantis from office and restore some common sense and respect for science to the governor’s mansion.

Marco Rubio’s defense of his Senate seat could be Florida Dems’ best chance at success.  Rubio has avoided a primary challenge from a Trump-endorsed candidate by dutifully towing the GOP party line.  He called for “a serious examination of the events leading up to, occurring, and in the aftermath” of January 6, yet Rubio voted against the creation of a bi-partisan commission.  In 2016 he supported the doctrine that replacing a Supreme Court justice in a presidential election year must be left to the election’s winner, yet in 2020, he fell into party line on the question of replacing Ruth Bader Ginsburg just weeks before the 2020 election. 

Fortunately, the Democrats have an outstanding candidate poised to defeat Rubio.  Democrat frontrunner Val Demings has a compelling back story: she is a dynamic public speaker who grew up in segregated Jacksonville and became the first African American woman to serve as Orlando’s police chief.  Demings is polling well and raising significant amounts of money that she’ll need to sustain a campaign against Rubio. 

In both races, Republican politicians comfortable with playing to the worst tendencies of their base are up for re-election, and we are committed to doing everything in our power to whip up enthusiasm for Democratic turnout in both August and November.  We are supporting Florida’s Democrats as they seek to escape the anti-science culture war that has gripped their state in recent years.  While August seems like a long way off, we cannot start our outreach too early in this pivotal state.

Please donate today to help us support Florida’s Democrats in the 2022 election cycle.

by Sarah Kovich