The leading Democratic candidates for Florida governor, David Jolly and Jerry Demings, are within striking distance of Republican frontrunner Byron Donalds, a statewide poll released Wednesday found.
In hypothetical head-to-head matchups in the marquee contest in Florida this year, Donalds was 6 percentage points ahead of Jolly and 7 points ahead of Demings.
The University of North Florida poll found Donalds ahead of Jolly, 42% to 36%. Donalds led Demings, 43% to 36%.
The survey from UNF’s Public Opinion Research Lab found a similar lead in the U.S. Senate race, with the appointed Republican senator Ashley Moody 8 percentage points ahead of Democrat Alex Vindman and 7 points against Democrat Angie Nixon.
There are several caveats. It’s still relatively early, and some of the candidates for top statewide office aren’t especially well known. There’s plenty of time for candidates to improve or worsen their standings.
In a hypothetical Donalds-Jolly contest, 17% said they didn’t know who they’d vote for and in a hypothetical Donalds-Demings contest, 16% said they did not know.
Florida hasn’t elected a Democratic governor in more than 30 years. The party hasn’t won a statewide election since 2018. And Florida has 1.5 million more active registered Republican voters than Democrats; less than five years ago, the state had more Democrats than Republicans.
Still, given the blowout results in 2022 — when Gov. Ron DeSantis won reelection by 19.4 percentage points and then-U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio won by 16.3 percentage points — the poll results are certain to buoy the spirits of Democrats.
Democrats will undoubtedly use the matchups to try to convince donors that money contributed to their Florida candidates won’t be going to lost causes. At the same time, Republicans can cite the potential threat from Democratic candidates to fire up their voters and donors.
“At least at this stage in these races, vote choice is much more about partisanship than candidate identity,” Sean Freeder, director of UNF’s Public Opinion Research Lab and political science professor, said in a statement about the findings.
“Republicans still enjoy a clear advantage with Florida voters, but it doesn’t yet appear as strong as in previous years, perhaps unsurprising given that the party of the president usually struggles more in midterm elections,” Freeder said.
Jolly was a Republican member of Congress from Pinellas County from March 2014 to January 2017. He split with Trump early, and called on him to drop out of his first presidential race. He lost his bid for reelection in 2016, later becoming a no party affiliation/independent voter and then a Democrat.
Demings is the Orange County mayor and former sheriff. His spouse, former U.S. Rep. Val Demings, was the unsuccessful Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in 2022.
Donalds is serving his third term in the U.S. House. Among Republican candidates, he’s far ahead of the other declared candidates in fundraising and polling.
Donalds has Trump’s endorsement, something that a poll a week ago showed is a significant advantage in the Republican primary for governor. The survey released Wednesday showed it’s not as big a plus in November.
President Donald Trump, who won 56.1% of the Florida vote in 2024, which was 13 percentage points ahead of Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, is slightly underwater in the poll.
The University of North Florida survey found Trump was rated favorably by 45% of Florida voters and unfavorably by 48%, a net negative of 3 points.
Partisan feelings were clear, with just 6% of Democrats giving Trump a favorable rating and 87% of Republicans assessing the president favorably.
Among no party affiliation/independent voters, Trump was rated favorably by 31% and unfavorably by 57%, a net negative 26 percentage points, the poll found.
Voters’ views of Trump are a potential problem for Republicans. “Given presidential approval strongly predicts House and Senate outcomes, this constitutes early evidence that congressional Republicans may struggle in November,” Freeder said.
In each of the four potential matchups, the Democratic candidate did better among women and the Republican candidate did better among men. The Democratic candidate also did better among younger voters, and the Republican did better among older voters.
In a Moody-Vindman Senate contest, 45% said they would vote for her and 38% for Vindman. Another 15% said they didn’t know who they’d vote for.
In a Moody-Nixon contest, Moody led 46% to 38% with 14% undecided.
Moody was the state’s attorney general until she was appointed last year by DeSantis to fill the Senate vacancy created when Rubio became Trump’s secretary of state.
Nixon is a progressive Democratic state representative from Jacksonville.
Vindman is a retired Army lieutenant colonel who provided critical evidence for the first impeachment of Trump during his first term in office. Vindman lives in Broward.
The poll found 66% of respondents had never heard of Vindman and 74% had never heard of Nixon. That provides an opportunity for whoever becomes the nominee to introduce themselves to more voters and possibly improve their standings in a November contest with Moody.
Freeder said Vindman’s higher name recognition was expected, but added that given his involvement in Trump’s first impeachment, “the familiarity advantage is much smaller than one would expect, and it doesn’t translate to better general election performance.”
Fine print
The poll of 786 likely Florida midterm election voters was conducted by the University of North Florida’s Public Opinion Research Lab.
The poll, which used live callers for interviews by phone and online surveys distributed by text message, was conducted Feb. 21 through March 2.
The margin of error was plus or minus 4 percentage points for the full survey.
However, the margin of error for smaller groups, such as Republicans or Democrats or men and women, would be higher because the sample sizes are smaller.
Political writer Anthony Man can be reached at aman@sunsentinel.com and can be found @browardpolitics on Bluesky, Threads, Facebook and Mastodon.
