Winner and Loser of the Week in Florida politics — Week of 8.18.24

They say every vote counts. Of course, that’s usually just a bromide to encourage you to vote. It’s not like a few more people going to vote actually impact the results of an election with thousands or millions voting.

Except when they do, and we got a twofer to show it in Central Florida this week.

The race for Kissimmee Mayor is heading to a runoff in November between top vote-getter Jackie Espinosa and, well, it was unclear who as of Tuesday. That’s because just four votes separated former state Rep. John Cortes and businesswoman Olga Cariño.

Osceola County election officials met Friday, confirming that a recount was needed to determine who would fill that second slot.

But that pales in comparison to the drama in the Orange County Commission contest for the District 1 seat. Results Tuesday showed challenger Austin Arthur ahead of incumbent Nicole Wilson by just 24 votes. As votes continued to be counted, Wilson then took the lead, by a slim five-vote margin.

That put her at 50.01% support to Arthur’s 49.99%, with a write-in Stephen Davis a nonfactor. That margin would have allowed Wilson to secure a win outright.

Of course, such a slim margin triggered a mandatory recount. The final result? A mere two-vote lead for Wilson with more than 28,000 cast.

And stunningly, the final tally showed the write-in with 15 votes total, good enough for a 0.05% vote share. Why is that relevant? Because per the recount tally, Wilson led Arthur 49.98% to 49.97%. So not only do we have a razor-thin two-vote margin, this race is now heading to a runoff in November.

Every vote counts.

Now, it’s onto our weekly game of winners and losers.

Winners

Honorable mention: Daniella Levine Cava. Levine Cava was seeking re-election to another four-year term Tuesday four years after the Democrat first won the Miami-Dade County Mayor position in the technically nonpartisan race.

That 2020 contest featured millions spent in a fractured Primary, with Levine Cava and Miami-Dade County Commissioner Esteban “Steve” Bovo emerging, before Levine Cava went on to win in November of that year.

Fast forward four years and the county is turning more red. Gov. Ron DeSantis won it outright in 2022, and polls have shown Hispanic voters — a powerful voting bloc in the county — more open to voting for Donald Trump than in the past. Faced with a crowded seven-person Primary again this cycle, this race seemed primed for a runoff between Levine Cava and a Republican once again.

Except, Levine Cava Tuesday hauled in nearly 58% of the vote, avoiding a runoff entirely and securing four more years leading the county.

That is, if she doesn’t run for Governor in 2026.

And putting in this kind of performance just one cycle after Republicans started designs on keeping Miami-Dade red permanently gives her a good case to make should she decide to run.

Now, this race was nonpartisan and took place during the Primary, rather than the General Election, where turnout will soar. It’s possible that Republicans will still outperform historical trends here, and maybe Levine Cava’s win is just a blip.

But in some ways, that could even strengthen her case that she stood above that trend and delivered a win for progressive Democrats. No matter how you slice it, it was an impressive performance.

Almost (but not quite) the biggest winner: Educated We Stand. EWS, which backs more left-leaning School Board candidates in an effort to combat conservative efforts to take over those bodies, had a strong night Tuesday just two years after the conservative group Moms for Liberty gained a stranglehold on several seats across the state.

Overall, EWS endorsed 17 candidates. Just two lost their races, while 10 won outright and another five advanced to a November runoff.

The group notched wins in Hillsborough (Jessica Vaughn in District 3), Miami-Dade (Luisa Santos in District 9), Sarasota (Liz Barker in District 2 and Tom Edwards in District 3), Broward (Maura McCarthy Bulman in District 1, Rebecca Thompson in District 2, Sarah Leonardi in District 3, Jeff Holness in District 5 and Debbi Hixon in District 9), and Orange (Stephanie Vanos in District 6).

“I am incredibly proud of the success our endorsed candidates have achieved,” said EWS founder and Chair Jennifer Jenkins.

“In a time where our public education system faces immense challenges from well-funded far-right efforts to impose conservative ideology on our schools, these victories affirm the public’s support for leaders committed to diversity of thought, inclusivity, and fact-based education. Our mission to protect and empower our students with the knowledge they need to lead informed, successful lives remains more important than ever.”

The group performed well Tuesday, and added another argument that conservative influence on the state is waning from its high point in 2022. As for Moms for Liberty and DeSantis? We’ll have more on them later.

The biggest winner: Maxwell Frost. Frost is already a rising start. That tends to happen when you break barriers, which Frost did as the first member of Generation Z to be elected to Congress.

It’s even more notable that Frost serves as a stark contrast to his home state’s politics. The progressive Frost has represented Florida as it has slowly shifted rightward, out of swing state status in the eyes of many.

So Frost stood out before this week. But if he is destined for a more prominent role in politics, then the steps he takes along the way are notable too. And earning a speaking slot on the last day of the Democratic National Convention is certainly a major step.

The New York Times’ Frank Bruni gave Frost a shout-out during the outlet’s recap of the event.

Bruni did acknowledge that Frost’s speech may have been lost in the shuffle amid all the other big speakers on the convention’s fourth and final night.

But, Bruni said, Frost “exhibited incredible poise, polish and charisma,” noting that Frost is the youngest member of Congress at 27 years old. “He makes Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Pete Buttigieg look like late-blooming laggards.”

Frost has almost a decade before he could even entertain a presidential run, and likely longer than that until he would have the stature to do so. But he has, more deftly than most, carved out a status on the progressive flank without ruffling the feathers of his own party too much in the process.

And if he’s navigating the national scene this well at 27, his future is bright in the Democratic Party. Thursday’s speech was just another sign that his star is shining bright.

Losers

Dishonorable mention: Election deniers. Turns out voters don’t want people who constantly call into question the validity of elections leading the offices in charge of running those elections. Shocking!

Several such candidates were on the ballot Tuesday, mostly in Central and Southwest Florida counties. They all lost.

“This is an overwhelming expression of appreciation on the part of the voters on how we have conducted the office,” Lake County Supervisor of Elections Alan Hays told the Orlando Sentinel after defeating Primary opponent Tom Vail.

“It was a rough and nasty campaign and I am happy to put it behind me,” Collier County Supervisor of Elections Melissa Blazier added after her win.

We’re sure the voters were happy too. We saw in 2020 what happens when these fantasy-induced conspiracies start spinning out of control.

It’s bad in an overall sense, as it is slowly eroding overall confidence in elections and the political system itself. But from a self-interested perspective for Republicans, it’s also bad. Look at what happened in Georgia, where Trump went on a war path against Republican officials there, cost the party two U.S. Senate seats and largely saw voters stick with the local officials they know and Trump continued the attacks for years.

(For what it’s worth, Trump finally seems to be doing the sensible thing and making nice with Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp. We’ll see how long that lasts.)

So all of these wackos challenging well-respected local Republican officials because they are LARPing as election integrity crusaders are only hurting their own side. Turn off the Right Side Broadcasting Network, unfollow Mike Lindell and come back to reality. It’ll be okay.

Until then, good riddance.

Almost (but not quite) the biggest loser: Moms for Liberty. As we mentioned above, this was a different result than the culture war-obsessed group saw in 2022.

M4L didn’t fare so well on Tuesday, with candidates losing in Pinellas, Orange and elsewhere.

We have said before that there are definitely reasonable restrictions for the types of material that should be available in classrooms for younger students. We are not reflexively lining up behind the Left in the culture war. But the anger and hysteria perpetuated by M4L and its supporters at times is just overwhelming and is dragging what should be important policy discussions down into the muck.

Apparently, voters are starting to agree. Plenty more M4L candidates will be on the ballot in November, so we’ll get a better sense of just how fatigued the electorate is when turnout shoots up fourfold.

But this week was bad news for the group, as well as one of its biggest supporters among elected Republican officials.

The biggest loser: DeSantis. Yes, DeSantis also takes an L here due to the School Board results. Remember EWS’ success rate? They saw 10 wins out of 17 endorsements, with another five moving to a runoff.

DeSantis, meanwhile, saw 11 of his 23 preferred candidates go down. Just six won, and another six are moving to November. But that’s almost a 50% failure rate already, without even knowing the results of the General Election.

But the Governor doesn’t just belong here because of Tuesday. His administration also tried to muscle through an ill-conceived plan to start building pickleball courts, golf courses, lodging and other amenities on several state parks across the state.

Surely his Department of Environmental Protection was hoping to sneak these meetings through without word catching on. But as soon as the public became aware, the opposition began.

And not just from DeSantis’ political rivals. His own Cabinet started questioning the plans. Then Republican members of Congress. Other Republicans in state government spoke out. And within days, DEP was forced to delay the meetings until at least September.

Their laughably worded statement read, “Due to the overwhelming interest with the 2024-25 Great Outdoors Initiative, DEP is looking for new venues to accommodate the public.”

“Due to overwhelming interest” there is code for, “Shit, they found out.”

“We want to ensure everyone has the opportunity to participate. Public input is vital to DEP decision-making,” the statement continued.

Then why were some of these meetings scheduled at tiny venues hours away from the parks in question? Why not be transparent and host these meetings at large venues near the community being affected from the get-go?

Corrupting the parks in one of the most tourist-rich states in the country isn’t how we would build our brand ahead of a 2028 presidential run. But we of course defer to DeSantis here on how to best line up a winning campaign years in advance.