Gov. DeSantis faces voters in a changing Florida

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis offered voters with a clear alternative on Tuesday: do they need extra of his brash brand of culture war politics or Democratic challenger Charlie Crist’s attraction to moderates.

A decisive Election Day victory over Crist, himself a former Republican governor of the state, would bolster DeSantis’ standing as a GOP rising star with potential White House aspirations. The race may even be the newest take a look at of the state’s political drift to the fitting.

DeSantis has vastly out-fundraised Crist and carried out higher in polls in the lead-up to an election the place he hardly ever talked about his opponent by identify and as an alternative characterised the race as a battle towards the “woke agenda” of liberals.

Crist, then again, centered his marketing campaign on DeSantis, framing the Republican as a bully fixated on angling towards the presidency on the expense of the on a regular basis issues of Floridians. At the candidates’ only debate, Crist repeatedly pressed the governor to decide to serving a full second time period if election. DeSantis skirted the query.

Election Day comes as Florida continues to get better from the Category 4 Hurricane Ian, which slammed into the state in late September and killed greater than 100 individuals and brought about widespread harm.

Politically, the storm briefly muted a lot of the bitter marketing campaign rhetoric and offered DeSantis a platform to venture a unifying tone as a competent disaster supervisor capable of put aside the tradition warrior and work with rivals such as Democratic President Joe Biden on response efforts.

A possible victory for DeSantis would serve to advance hypothesis of a 2024 presidential run, a query DeSantis has to this point dodged as former President Donald Trump’s subsequent transfer stays unclear. Trump, who credit himself for propelling DeSantis to a first time period in the governor’s workplace, has grown pissed off with DeSantis’ refusal to rule out a 2024 run, in response to individuals accustomed to Trump’s considering.

Crist, who served as a Republican governor of Florida from 2007 to 2011 and resigned a congressional seat to run this yr, has been compelled to fend off barbs about varied stances held over his a long time in Florida politics.

Crist’s Democratic main challenger, Nikki Fried, continuously hammered him over his earlier anti-abortion stance. Crist has pledged to guard abortion rights in Florida if elected, although the duty could also be troublesome in a state authorities dominated by Republicans who lately handed a 15-week abortion ban anticipated to be upheld by the state Supreme Court.

Democrats, the minority occasion in the state authorities, face appreciable challenges in a state lately thought-about to be a perennial political battleground however that has drifted to the fitting. Trump gained the state twice and Republicans have been aggressive in organizing at the local level and made a sustained push on voter registration.

In a telling sign, GOP voters cast a greater number of ballots than Democrats in Miami-Dade County in the course of the early voting interval, rising confidence that Republicans might take the county for the primary time in twenty years.

Last yr, the GOP notched extra registered voters in the state than Democrats for the primary time in fashionable historical past, after which continued to widen the hole into November. Still, the state’s giant variety of voters not affiliated with any occasion have the power to swing an election.

Some Democrats have admitted that their earlier organizing and registration efforts in Florida had principally centered round presidential races, and there have been considerations that massive donors and the nationwide wing of the occasion may cede the state after current losses and DeSantis’ rising recognition.

The Democratic Governors Association has bristled at that characterization and stated it considers Florida a aggressive battleground. The group has spent $685,000 to assist elect Crist, a spokesperson stated.

The election may even unfold beneath the state’s controversial new Office of Election Crimes and Security, created on the request of DeSantis to handle considerations in the GOP about voter fraud. The workplace notified county election supervisors in October of sure voters who might be ineligible to forged ballots resulting from prior felony convictions and requested counties forestall them from voting.

The transfer follows the workplace’s arrest of 20 people for illegally voting in 2020, the primary main election since a state constitutional modification allowed many felons to have voting rights routinely restored, aside from these convicted of homicide or felony sexual assault or those that still owe fines or restitution. One of these 20 individuals had his case lately dismissed by a Miami choose, although the governor is anticipated to attraction the ruling.

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Learn extra concerning the points and elements at play in the midterms at https://apnews.com/hub/explaining-the-elections.

And comply with the AP’s election protection of the 2022 elections at https://apnews.com/hub/2022-midterm-elections.

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