Sunburn — The morning read of what’s hot in Florida politics — 11.4.22

 Good Friday morning.

Since the last time Floridians cast ballots in a statewide election in November 2020, nearly 1.2 million new voters have registered to take part in this civic act. That means that about one in 12 Florida voters today weren’t on the rolls two years ago.

Who are these newly registered voters, and how do they compare with the universe of voters already on the rolls?

The research division at Sachs Media conducted an analysis to identify demographic differences between then and “new,” with some stark findings — particularly relating to party affiliation.

Among voters who have registered since November 2020 the share identifying as Democrats declined 13 points to 23%, while the portion affiliating with neither party jumped 11 points to 40%. Meanwhile, Republican registration is about equal, with 37% of new voters checking that box.

This means that Florida’s growing Republican registration advantage is due largely to the share of voters consistently held by the GOP, combined with significant movement away from Democrats and toward nonpartisans.

The portion of new voters who register as Democrats is down among every demographic group. Take voters younger than 35, for example. Two years ago, four in 10 were registered Democrats. And yet, since then, barely more than a quarter of new voters (26%) in this age group affiliate this way — a significant drop-off. Meanwhile, nearly half of young new voters (47%) are unaffiliated with either party and 27% are Republicans.

Read more takeaways from Sachs Media’s research on Florida Politics.

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Nearly three-quarters of U.S. voters say the country is on the “wrong track,” according to a new poll from the Conservative Energy Network.

The annual national survey from CEN, a coalition of 24 state-based conservative clean energy organizations, asked 1,000 registered voters about clean energy, climate change solutions, market competition and other related policy issues.

Four in five voters told CEN that they think candidates should clearly state their views on clean energy and climate change issues.

But the results of a non-climate related question were front and center: 72% said that the country is on the “wrong track.” CEN said that is an all-time high for the seven years it has conducted the survey and that voters’ pessimism will likely drive voters to the polls in droves.

Notably, CEN found that Democrats and Republicans showed equally elevated levels of voter intensity, putting the battle for control of Congress and state legislatures in the hands of third- and no-party voters. Among independents, men are leaning toward Republican candidates and women are more likely to support Democrat candidates.

The poll also found, for the first time ever, that a majority of voters (51%) support Republicans’ efforts to address climate change. That number is up 10% from the 2020 survey and CEN noted that it followed the release of the House Republican Energy, Climate, and Conservation Task Force’s policy recommendations.

Further, 78% of those polled support passage of the Growing Climate Solutions Act, a bill that passed the U.S. Senate with the support of 47 Republicans.

Public Opinion Strategies conducted the poll on Oct. 24-27 via an online survey. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.53 percentage points.

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A few other items crossing my radar:

— Record-setting cash: Spending on the Midterm Election is expected to reach $16.7 billion, according to Bloomberg. That’s a record. The most ever spent before was $13.7 billion. This year’s spending includes $8.9 billion from federal candidates and committees. Florida races are not among the most expensive. That superlative goes to Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona, Nevada and Wisconsin where tossup races dominate and spending reached $1.8 billion. OpenSecrets estimates Democrats raised more for federal offices, but the GOP has spent more. Read more here.

— Election likely to be red ‘ripple,’ but could be a red wave: FiveThirtyEight’s most recent Deluxe forecasts play out exactly as predicted; Republicans would walk away on Election Day with 51 seats in the Senate and 225 in the House, a victory on both fronts, but far from the red waves seen in 2010 or 2014. A “normal polling error” could mean anything from a landslide or a walloping. FiveThirtyEight’s analysis of its own data finds that if Republicans were to perform an average margin of error better than expected, the GOP would claim 54 seats in the Senate and 259 in the House. If Democrats performed an average margin of error better than expected, an unlikely scenario, they would have 54 seats in the Senate and 227 in the House. Of note, in that Democratic dream scenario, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio would still beat Val Demings.

— How Dems are losing Hispanic voters: “The party doesn’t care about us.” If you read no further into The Atlantic’s feature on Democrats bleeding support from Hispanic and Latino voters, read that. It’s a quote from a Phoenix woman and restaurant owner. The party only cares every two years, she lamented. Her husband called the party’s platitudes, “bullshit.” What makes their testimonial even more damning for Democrats is that it’s coming from a state with some of the harshest policies targeting the Hispanic population, which have come almost exclusively from Republicans. The bottom line, maybe the left shouldn’t take their voters for granted.

— Foreshadowing a Republican Congress: If Republicans do as well as they are expected to on Tuesday, they may not only retake the majority in the House but the Senate too. Georgetown law professor Josh Chafetz, in a guest column for The New York Times, speculates less productivity, unwinding previous progress and political posturing as a conservative legislative branch becomes at odds with a liberal executive branch. That includes a robust oversight, such as making “as big a stink as possible” if the Joe Biden administration displays any perceived wasteful spending in the Inflation Reduction Act, among other things. Some may read this as a caution, others as a utopian outcome.

— SITUATIONAL AWARENESS —

Tweet, tweet:

3,581,580 Floridians have voted.

DEM: 1,339,957
GOP: 1,556,259
NPA/O: 685,364

GOP is +216,302.

At this point in 2020:
DEM + 161,362

At this point in 2018:
GOP + 58,531

— Kevin Cate (@KevinCate) November 3, 2022

Tweet, tweet:

Where turnout stands in Florida. Republicans have a near 6 point lead in share of votes cast thanks to 3% higher turnout. #flapol #sayfie pic.twitter.com/MDR9SYorem

— Florida Data Geek ✝️???????? (@MappingFL) November 3, 2022

—@Mdixon55: 2018, Republicans won most statewide races here, but it was real tight and there were three recounts. But GOP won everything but @NikkiFried race. Their advantage currently is nearly 4x greater than their lead that year.

—@davetrotter101: To give you an idea of how bad Orange County (870k voters) is for Democrats, Democrat only have a net gain of 330 votes in Orange so far today. But in Columbia County (43k voters), Democrats have a net loss of 384 votes. #flapol

—@NateMonroeTU: A reminder that the Jacksonville sheriff has still not brought himself to publicly affirm that Nazis are bad and that Jacksonville Jewish residents should feel safe under JSO’s protection.

Tweet, tweet:

List of GOP candidates and public officials who will speak at rally Sunday afternoon in Miami featuring former President Trump: pic.twitter.com/mifKxysqX8

— Mitch Perry (@MitchPerry18) November 3, 2022

—@learyreports: (Donald) Trump doesn’t mention you know who but asserts his role as the Florida king. Expect to hear more of this Sunday.

—@fineout: Right before @GovRonDeSantis comes up there’s a bit of mix-up with the music. When DeSantis is walking up “Peace Frog” by the Doors starts playing. Song opens with “there’s blood in the streets, it’s up to my ankles.” Song is cut off & switched to “Sweet Florida.”

—@oneunderscore__: The issue with leaving Twitter is there’s no other app yet where you can search “earthquake” to know instantly if it’s an earthquake and get war updates from Ukrainian civilians while some guy gets 80k retweets for posting “is dandruff vegan.” That’s three apps; needs to be one.

— DAYS UNTIL —

2022 General Election — 4; ‘The Crown’ Season 5 returns — 5; ‘Black Panther: Wakanda Forever’ premieres — 7; FITCon 2022 begins — 13; ‘The Flash’ premieres — 13; The World Cup kicks off in Qatar — 17; The U.S. World Cup Soccer Team begins play — 20; Florida TaxWatch’s Annual Meeting begins — 29; ‘Willow’ premieres on Disney+ — 29; 2022 Florida Chamber Annual Insurance Summit — 31; Cormac McCarthy’s ‘Stella Maris’ releases — 32; ‘Avatar 2’ premieres — 42; final Broadway performance of ‘The Music Man’ with Hugh Jackman — 58; Bruce Springsteen launches his 2023 tour in Tampa — 89; ‘Ant Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’ premieres — 105; final performance of ‘Phantom of the Opera’ on Broadway — 106; 2023 Legislative Session convenes — 123; ‘John Wick: Chapter 4′ premieres — 141; Taylor Swift ‘Eras’ Tour in Tampa — 162; American Association of Political Consultants Pollies ’23 conference begins — 165; 2023 Session Sine Die — 182; ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3’ premieres — 182; ‘Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse’ premieres — 210; Christopher Nolan’s ‘Oppenheimer’ premieres — 259; ‘‘Captain Marvel 2′ premieres — 266; Dune: Part Two’ premieres — 364; ‘Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse’ Part 2 premieres — 511; ‘Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes’ premieres — 567; Opening Ceremony of the 2024 Olympic Games — 630; ‘Thunderbolts’ premieres — 630; ‘Blade’ reboot premieres — 672; ‘Deadpool 3’ premieres — 735; ‘Fantastic Four’ reboot premieres — 833; ‘Avengers: The Kang Dynasty’ premieres — 910. ‘Avengers: Secret Wars’ premieres — 1,099.

Sunburn is authored and assembled by Peter Schorsch, Phil Ammann, Daniel Dean, Renzo Downey, Jacob Ogles, and Drew Wilson.

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