Republicans have nearly one million more registered voters in a key state

by Alex Caldwell

Photo: Adobe Stock

For the first time in history, Florida’s Republican Party is projected to have over one million more voters than Democrats by the time of the presidential election.

Republicans in the Sunshine State have almost 940,000 more residents affiliated with their party as of June 18, according to data posted to X (formerly Twitter) by Florida’s Voice on Tuesday.

Florida Republicans must now register an additional 60,000 voters to reach the one million-voter lead. However, recent trends suggest that the party will likely hit this number prior to the election.

At the conclusion of March, Republicans dominated registrations with an advantage of 892,034 over the Democrats. The party added 14,517 more registrations during April and an additional 24,120 from then until May 31, according to a report by Florida Voice News.

Thus, if Florida’s GOP continues to gain this rough average of 20,000 more voters every two months, their advantage will surpass one million more members over Democrats on Election Day.

Whether Republicans even meet this quota, however, is indifferent to the fact that this presidential race will be the first in history for which Democrats do not hold a registration advantage over their conservative counterparts.

Since Florida’s State Department began collecting party affiliation data in 1972, the state’s Democrat Party led with voter registrations every year.

In fact, Republicans only recently gained this registration advantage in 2021—possibly attributed to Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis’ COVID-19 era policies, compared to the harsh pandemic restrictions across other states and dissatisfaction with Joe Biden’s leadership during this tumultuous time period.

Although the state previously determined the fate of many close elections (most famously in 2000), voter registration trends show that Florida has not been considered competitive since 2020.

Since 2021, Republican registrations grew nearly 110,000 to present, and Democrats’ dropped by almost 800,000 during this same period in Florida.

The state also shifted from narrowly electing candidates on either side in races decided by one point to overwhelmingly voting for Republicans.

DeSantis transitioned from winning the governorship by just 0.4 percent in 2018 to a resounding 19.4-point victory only four years later—increasing Republican margins in the state House and Senate—along with another landslide win for the incumbent GOP Sen. Marco Rubio by a similar margin.

As Republicans’ leads grow statewide, so does their standing in previous Democrat-heavy counties that were previously carried in 2020 by Joe Biden against President Trump.

Hillsborough County, where the city of Tampa resides, shows Democrats with a one percent lead in registrations over the Republicans. In 2020, Biden previously carried this county by nearly seven points (52.71 to 45.85 percent) over Trump.

Miami-Dade County, which supported Biden by more than seven points four years ago (53.31 to 45.98 percent), is now a 4.5 percent lead for the Democrats, or roughly 65,000 voters, as of June 18.

In Palm Beach County, home to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home, Democrats now lead by 5.85 percent. This lead is shockingly low for Democrats, who won the county by nearly 13 points (55.97 to 43.21 percent) in 2020.

Florida is also likely to hold a conservative identity on a presidential level, with FiveThirtyEight’s elections forecast, as of Wednesday, giving President Trump a 75 percent chance of taking the state during the election.

According to the Real Clear Politics polling averages, if the election were held today, Trump is very likely to expand his three-point win from 2020 to now 7.6 points against Biden.

Should President Trump carry Florida by this margin, it would be the largest margin of victory for a presidential candidate in the state since 1988.

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