Jacob Ogles
Strong turnout among Florida Democrats predictably would produce good news for Joe Biden on Election Day. And a new poll suggests even if Republicans slightly outperform Democrats getting their voters to polls, the former Vice President will comfortably win the Sunshine State’s 29 electoral votes.
A Clearview Research poll, shared exclusively to Florida Politics, shows Biden leading in Florida using three different turnout models.
The first survey results show 47% of likely voters plan to vote for Biden and just 40% favor Donald Trump. Another 2% will vote for another candidate and 9% remain undecided. But that’s based on a “neutral” turnout model, one predicting Republicans and Democrats will each make up an even 39% of voters who cast ballots this November. Clearview Research President Steve Vancore also wanted to know where things stand if one side or the other outperforms in terms of get-out-the-vote efforts. So he ran the model using Democrat- and Republican-friendly assumptions.
If Democrats make up 2% more of the electorate than Republicans, Biden’s lead grows to 48% to 39%. That’s no shock.
More important, Biden also leads Trump 46% to 41% even if Republicans make up 2% more of the voting pool. That’s an especially vital finding since that’s exactly what happened in Florida both in 2016, when Trump beat Hillary Clinton here 49% to 48%, and in 2018 when Gov. Ron DeSantis and Sen. Rick Scott won statewide by recount–tight margins.
All results derive from 550 survey responses collected Oct. 7-12; the pollsters report a 4.18% margin of error.
Of course, it’s 2020, the year of impeachment, coronavirus, Black Lives Matter protests, a Supreme Court Justice death and a White House COVID-19 outbreak— short story is, anything that takes over the news cycle can change outcomes. But thus far, Biden holds the lead.
“This is not a prediction and is not me saying Biden is going to win this state,” Vancore said. “This is me saying, right now, Biden is winning the state, that he’s leading at this moment in time.”
Vancore said a look at the crosstabs shows little shift in the models because both Biden and Trump hold solid, unwavering support from most voters in their own party. It’s no-party-affiliation voters breaking for Biden that grant him such an edge.
That in and of itself undercuts one line of hope Trump supporters cling to — that there’s some batch of “shy” Trump voters unwilling to tell pollsters they plan to back the President.
While many credit Trump defying polls four years ago to such poll-wary voters, Vancore said there’s little evidence that’s what’s happening now. For one thing, roughly the same number of Democrats and Republicans hung up on the pollsters. In other words, there’s likely as many Republicans shy about casting Biden votes as Democrats crossing the aisle for Trump.
“There is very scant data to suggest large numbers of Republicans or Democrats are shy or lie to the degree it would impact a poll,” Vancore said.
Of course, the data lines up with an array of other polling in the field for this battleground state. The RealClearPolitics RCP index shows Biden leading in Florida by an average of 2.7 percentage points.
Vancore also noted Democrats have outperformed tremendously in returned vote-by-mail ballots. Polls show more Republicans plan to vote in person, but the margins now obviously count as good news for the Biden campaign. Still, Vancore can make an argument Republican enthusiasm will grow as the election draws near.
“Something big can happen and is likely to happen,” he said. “This is the year big things happen with ridiculous frequency.”
But based on results, Trump needs more to happen than just an uptick in GOP voter participation.
SW Poll Memo v2[9326] by Jacob Ogles on Scribd
6 comments
James Robert Miles
October 15, 2020 at 6:08 am
As usual, you are a lying POS! Get your cry baby pants on as your going to lose you Fascist Pig!!
Ocean Joe
October 15, 2020 at 7:30 am
This is the year of “shy” Biden voters. Voters who supported Trump now quietly hold their noses and vote for the Democrat to remove IL Duce. Voters who will vote on election day by secret ballot one at a time.
Marco Rubio, as Florida’s senior GOP officeholder, a guy who didn’t win his race by a whisker like the morally void Rick Scott or Trump’s hand-picked Mini-me DeSantis, must get ready to rebuild the Republican party post-Trump. Get back to balanced budgets, free trade, true law and order, American leadership abroad, end the reliance on grievance voters, and we might end up with a fairly decent two party system again.
If you want to win again, let go of the climate denier/profits first mentality and the willingness to wink at racists in order to get their vote. Expel the Dixiecrats.
James Robert Miles
October 15, 2020 at 8:47 pm
I see that the first comment who identified himself as “Trump” has been removed. He also accused the writer of this story of being a “socialist” for daring to say that Biden was winning the pole. Typical right-wing idiot who hasn’t got a clue!
Patrick Henry
October 16, 2020 at 9:30 am
Yeah and they said Hilary Clinton was up to 4 in FL the week of the election and we saw what happened. Trump by 113K plus.
Wait til more of the Hunter Biden emails selling access to his father (The Big guy) for millions of dollars to CHINA are revealed to Americans. China who brought us the Wuhan virus. Thirty…$30 million for Hunter plus 50K a month. For what? The Clinton’s, Bushes, Obama’s and Biden’s were all sell outs to NAFTA and China flatlining American jobs and salaries from 2000-2016. The establishment R’s, D’s, and Wall Street want Biden because they don’t give a rip about Main Street Americans or the middle class from any party.
VOTE TRUMP to preserve America as a Republic, Protect the unborn, the U.S. Constitution Liberty and protect American jobs and manufacturing.
PeterH
October 16, 2020 at 11:12 am
In Florida the election will be close….. but all indicators show that Biden will win the 2020 election in Florida.
Trump had one single National Emergency in the past three years and he failed miserably. Early in the pandemic…..Trump and Republicans placed a bet on the stupid idea that this virus would magically disappear. They knew
Covid was highly contagious ….. they could see the results in China, Asia, cruise ships and the EU. They did little ….. and sold Americans on a false promise of a vaccine will be available in weeks…… pretending that a vaccine is somehow a CURE!
The latest administration mantra is ‘herd immunity’ without a vaccine! How stupid is that?
Meanwhile, American manufacturing entered into a recession in January 2020 …..and economist simultaneously reported that Trump’s irrational tax cuts added $3.4 trillion to the national debt……. months before the pandemic.
Today….. Trump’s addition to the debt is $7 trillion in less than four years. By the time Trump is booted from office in January….. the debt could easily be $10 trillion.
This administration will certainly go down in history as the most incompetent, divisive and racist. Let Floridians teach Republicans a lesson up and down ballot and fire them all.
Patrick Henry
October 16, 2020 at 10:24 pm
So you forgot that Obama-Biden in 8 years added more debt to the US taxpayers than all the Presidents collectively spent since Pres. George Washington forward.
You are either deliberately ignoring the facts or are an idiot.
FL’s 29 electoral votes are not going to Joe Biden He is in the early stages of dementia and Floridians will not be manipulated by the MSM.
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