Staff Reports
Democrat Nancy Soderberg is touting another strong quarter of fundraising in her bid to succeed Ron DeSantis in the United States Congress.
The campaign announced Thursday afternoon that it had raised over $1 million in the latest quarter of fundraising, pushing it over $2.5 million raised.
This time period includes August, September, and October receipts.
Soderberg had over $500,000 on hand as of the filing.
“The support and energy we’re seeing for our campaign is incredibly inspiring,” Soderberg said. “What’s clear, now more than ever, is that Floridians are ready to elect a leader who listens to them, and who will stand up for them in Washington. A leader they can be proud of. I’m proud to fight to protect pre-existing conditions for families here and I’m proud of the movement we’re building together.”
The race between Soderberg and Republican nominee Mike Waltz has increasingly looked like a play for the center in recent weeks, and the most recent poll of the race shows Soderberg in a dead heat with Waltz.
The Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research survey, conducted Oct. 1 through Oct. 4, found the candidates locked in a 45-45 dead heat.
The money quote from the polling memo: “Waltz is failing to motivate his own base, earning just 75 percent of the vote among registered Republicans. Soderberg receives 82 percent of the vote among registered Democrats. Soderberg also leads Waltz among self-ascribed independents by 20 percentage points and voters who are undecided more closely resemble Soderberg supporters than Waltz supporters.”
More detailed numbers will be posted by both campaigns by Oct. 15. We reached out to Waltz for an indication of what we could expect, but response was not forthcoming by press time.
The district includes parts of St. Johns, Putnam, Flagler and Volusia counties on Florida’s Atlantic coast, and has had a GOP lean. President Donald Trump won CD 6 by 17 points in 2016; DeSantis likewise won re-election that year by 17 points.
The pollsters and pollwatchers don’t expect a flip.
The Cook Political Report and Larry Sabato both see the district as “likely Republican,” while Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight puts the odds of a flip at less than 25 percent. Their forecasting model currently expects Waltz to win 52-48 in November.
