Jacob Ogles
U.S. Rep. Charlie Crist has opened a significant lead over Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried in Florida’s Democratic Primary for Governor. That’s according to St. Pete Polls’ latest survey of likely primary voters, commissioned by Florida Politics.
Perhaps most important, more than half those Democrats surveyed would vote for Crist if the Primary were held today.
More than 52% of those surveyed support Crist, a St. Petersburg Democrat and former Republican Governor. Comparatively, about 19% prefer Fried, right now the only Democrat holding statewide office in Florida. State Sen. Annette Taddeo rings in with just over 5% support.
Another 24% of the electorate remains undecided. But even if all swung to Fried, that still puts her about 9 percentage points behind Crist.
With a sample size of 1,859 likely Democratic voters, pollsters report a 2.3% margin of error.
The survey was taken on May 2 and 3, a time frame that spanned a leak of a U.S. Supreme Court draft opinion that would reverse Roe v. Wade.
The Aug. 23 Democratic Primary remains months away, but these results show little path forward for Fried unless a substantial number of voters can be swayed to reconsider support for the frontrunner. Th winner of the primary will face incumbent Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis in the November general election.
Crist just passed the one-year mark since announcing his campaign for Governor. Fried, by comparison, jumped in the race last June.
A look at cross tabs provided by St. Pete Polls shows Crist dominating in every demographic.
That includes women. While Crist is the only major male candidate in the primary, nearly 53% of female respondents support Crist while just 17% back Fried and 5% prefer Taddeo.
By comparison, Crist performs slightly better among women than he does with men, just 54% of whom support him. Fried, meanwhile, performs worse with women than men, with 20% of likely male primary voters supporting her. More female voters are undecided, 25% compared to under 23% of male respondents. But again, a majority of those surveyed regardless of gender appear baked in for Crist.
The Congressman also boasts majorities in every racial demographic. Among White voters, 52% support Crist and 21% pick Fried. Among Blacks, 54% prefer Crist while just over 14% prefer Fried. Taddeo scored under 5% support with both groups.
Among Hispanics, Crist still holds a plurality, with 48% support to Fried’s 18%. Taddeo, the only major Hispanic candidate for Governor this year, rings in with 7% support among Hispanics. Taddeo performs better with Asian voters, winning 9% of that demographic, but remains a small factor there with Crist talking 50% support and Fried winning 19%.
Younger voters are more divided on the race. Still, Crist leads among those ages 18 to 29 with 46% of the vote to Fried’s 23% and Taddeo’s 6%. Pollsters also found this demographic to be the least likely to follow through and participate in the August primary.
Crist’s strongest support within age groups comes in older voters, those age 70 and up. Within that group, 55% plan to vote for Crist, while only 13% want Fried and under 6% plan to vote Taddeo.
The former Governor also holds a lead in every media market. Fried’s strongest performance comes in Tallahassee, but still, she wins over 29% support there compared to Crist’s near 53%. In Tampa Bay, where Crist launched his political career, nearly 64% of likely Democratic voters support him in the race.
StPetePolls 2022 State DEM May3 H3VM6 by Jacob Ogles on Scribd
11 comments
Snidely Whiplash
May 4, 2022 at 8:43 am
Its quite amazing that Florida’s left leaning polled voters have made their classical selection of feces over vomit so early out from the election. Amazing.
Anon
May 4, 2022 at 8:47 am
Wont most democrats vote for whichever candidate (crist or fried) over the republican candidate? If so, who cares what the opinion of their own party is? Put up the candidate who will get more votes from republicans, get all the democrat default votes, and win instead of losing with the “more popular” candidate.
Impeach Biden
May 4, 2022 at 8:50 am
Nikki who? Won’t matter DeSantis defeats either one.
TomTom
May 5, 2022 at 7:50 am
I hope so for DeSantis sake, because Tallahassee is as far as he goes.
Trump/Noem 2024
Hottest ticket evah
Harry kamalatoe
May 5, 2022 at 2:39 pm
I really do wish people would stop with the Trump 2024 sketch. He did us all a good thing by exposing the corruption and how deep it actually goes but he needs to be a back seat funder. His team has done a great job of finding and funding good politicians who have done well in the areas where they ran. IMO Trump “The king maker” is much better for us all moving forward than as President. Also he gettin old af.
Chet Suggs
May 5, 2022 at 7:47 am
DoneSantis will have his hat handed to him by Crist who was wildly popular with both republicans (feces) and democrats (vomit). Floridians are suffering from severe DeSantis Fatigue. We’re ready for government, not DeSantis theatre.
Harry kamalatoe
May 5, 2022 at 2:41 pm
dunno what Florida you live in but in the Florida that I live in we can’t get enough of Ron.
Rosaloo Hernandez
May 5, 2022 at 9:18 am
I’m Puerto Rican just like DeSantis but am not sure I can vote for republicans with all this abortion stuff. My body my right cholo.
Harry kamalatoe
May 5, 2022 at 2:46 pm
Wanna talk about it? Seems a lot like you are getting you information from ignorant sources.
Also, don’t vote for someone based on what they look like or where they are from. You vote for them because you believe they represent you and your beliefs. That goes for party as well… As a “republican” conservative I wouldn’t vote for a republican if they believed in something that I deeply opposed but I would vote for a democrat if they supported something I deeply supported.
Voting for someone for any reason other than they represent your beliefs is unhealthy for democracy and defeats the entire purpose of our representative republic.
Lexia
May 15, 2022 at 8:32 pm
DeSantis IS NOT PUERTO RICAN I hardly think they want to claim him..try Italian…
Person
May 5, 2022 at 7:52 pm
Really hoping Taddeo pulls an upset. Crist and Fried seem like they’re just gonna do a standard democratic campaign that only talks about “Trump/DeSantis bad” that puts the whole election narrative on Republicans instead of actually engaging people with the issues. Not to mention I have a hard time believing that they’ll be able to get the crucial Miami-Dade vote by letting Republicans control the narrative and also bad Hispanic outreach in general.
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