Internal poll shows Daniella Levine Cava trouncing challengers in Miami-Dade Mayor re-election bid

Image via Daniella Levine Cava.

Less than a year from Election Day, Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava enjoys high approval and a significant edge in popularity over her current and rumored challengers, internal polling shows.

A new survey by Democratic consultant Christian Ulvert, Levine Cava’s senior adviser and chief strategist, found 85% of respondents in the county know her by name.

Of those, more than 60% approve of the job she’s doing. Just 14% were neutral on the matter.

Asked who they’d vote for in a pair of theoretical matchups between Levine Cava and three Republicans, respondents overwhelmingly said they preferred the Democratic incumbent.

The office of Miami-Dade Mayor is technically a nonpartisan position, as are its elections.

Against Republican Miami Lakes Mayor Manny Cid, who entered the race Friday, she has a roughly 44-percentage-point lead.

If they had to choose between Levine Cava, YouTube influencer Alex Otaola — who is running with support from Republican operative Roger Stone — and U.S. Rep. Carlos Giménez, her immediate predecessor as Mayor and a rumored candidate for the job in 2024, 55% said they’d vote for Levine Cava compared to 19% for Giménez and about 8% for Otaola.

Ulvert randomly queried 1,987 likely voters online between Aug. 29 and Sept. 2. The poll had a 5.2% margin of error.

Results were balanced demographically and assumed a 6-point Democratic turnout advantage on Election Day 2024. Ulvert told Florida Politics he based that figure on past elections and an expectation of voter participation next year.

The poll said Democrats outnumber Republicans by 7.5% in Miami-Dade. However, the most recent numbers on the Miami-Dade Department of Elections website shows there are 99,951 more registered Democrats than Republicans in the county — a 6.7-point lead.

Of Miami-Dade’s 1,478,256 registered voters, 537,430 are Democratic and 437,479 are Republican. No-party voters are the second-largest political voting group, with 478,375 people registered in the county as unaffiliated.

To what should be no one’s surprise, the single largest voting group in Miami-Dade are Hispanics, who make up 60% — 890,111 registrants — of the county’s voter rolls.

Respondents also weighed in on the 2024 presidential race. The results, Ulvert wrote, show Democrats “continue to have a base of support in Miami-Dade County heading into 2024” despite the GOP’s dominating performance statewide in the Midterm Election two years prior.

Regardless of whether Donald Trump or Gov. Ron DeSantis is President Joe Biden’s opponent next year, the poll shows the current White House occupant should easily lock down Florida’s most populous county.

If the election were held today, 51% of respondents said they’d choose Biden compared to 39% who sided with Trump. Ten percent remained undecided.

Biden would perform even better against DeSantis, with about 53% choosing him, 39% picking the Governor and about 8% who said they didn’t know yet.

The race is nonpartisan, meaning that all candidates for Mayor compete against one another regardless of party. if any candidate secures more than 50% of the vote during the Aug. 20, 2024, Primary Election, he or she will secure victory outright.

If none do so, the two candidates with the most Primary votes will compete in a runoff culminating in the General Election on Nov. 5, 2024.