FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — A Republican attempting to become Florida’s first Black governor faces a crowded field Tuesday while Democrats wage primary battles for a reduced pool of left-leaning seats under redrawn congressional maps.
U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds is banking on President Donald Trump’s endorsement in hopes of securing the Republican nomination and advancing to the fall election. His opponents include Lt. Gov. Jay Collins and political newcomer James Fishback.
Democrats’ leading candidate for governor is David Jolly, a former Republican congressman who switched parties last year.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a leading conservative figure who has clashed and collaborated with Trump over the years, is barred from running for a third consecutive term.
The first polls closed at 7 p.m. in Tuesday’s primaries, which are giving final form to a November ballot whose races will test Trump’s grip on his adopted state and Democrats’ ability to resurrect Florida as a national political battleground. Florida has moved notably to the right since Trump won his first election in 2016, though Democrats hope to regain ground from his slumping popularity ratings.
Two Democrats are battling for nomination in a U.S. Senate special election to complete Marco Rubio’s term after he became Trump’s secretary of state last year. Progressive state lawmaker Angie Nixon matches up against retired Army Lt. Col. Alex Vindman, a former National Security Council official who testified in Trump’s first impeachment case in 2019.
PHOTOS: Florida holds primaries for governor and Congress, testing Trump’s grip on adopted state
Meanwhile, Sen. Ashley Moody, the DeSantis appointee currently holding the seat, appears in a strong position as she seeks the Republican nomination with Trump’s endorsement for the term’s final two years.
For Congress, Tuesday’s biggest nominating fight involves longtime Democratic U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, former U.S. Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick and others in a redrawn south Florida district.
Wasserman Schultz, who is white, wants voters in the new, plurality Black district to grant her a 12th term. Cherfilus-McCormick is seeking a comeback after resigning earlier this year under a pending federal indictment and threat of House ethics sanctions.
Donalds is trying to make history – and Jolly, too
There have been three elected Black governors in U.S. history. Yet the 47-year-old Donalds is more likely to tout his conservative credentials than the possibility of joining that select group.
He promises to push tax cuts, overhaul Florida’s insurance regulations to lower consumer costs and seek greater price transparency from health care providers.
“The people of Florida want to make sure that the Florida dream is alive and well into the future,” he said recently. “Affordability is a problem for all Floridians. It doesn’t matter what your politics are. It doesn’t matter what the color of your skin is.”
Trump has had an inconsistent record on picks for governor in primaries this year, and a strong showing by Donalds would leave him, and Republicans in general, in a more commanding position for November. Though DeSantis coasted to reelection in 2022, he squeaked into office in 2018 by little more of 32,000 ballots out of 8.1 million cast.
Jolly is hoping ultimately to prove a party-switching former Republican can actually carry the Democratic banner in a state where that’s failed before. Democrats nominated former Republican Gov. Charlie Crist in 2022 only to see him lose by nearly 20 percentage points to DeSantis.
Can Democrats make the Senate race interesting?
Moody, a former state attorney general tapped for Rubio’s seat in 2025, is in a strong position seeking the GOP nomination. DeSantis, when he appointed her, praised her as a law-and-order prosecutor ready to help Trump “shut the border,” tame inflation, and overhaul a federal bureaucracy “run amok.”
Democrats face a familiar theme of 2026 primaries, with the progressive Nixon confronting Vindman from the party’s center-left establishment. Vindman’s testimony in 2019 was notable in the Democrat-led House impeachment case that led to Trump’s acquittal in the Republican-led Senate. Trump ousted Vindman afterward.
Floridians haven’t sent a Democrat to the Senate since 2012.
Wasserman Schultz runs in a new plurality Black district
Serving in Congress since 2005 , she faces a new district – thanks to DeSantis’ successful push for new congressional maps amid the national redistricting battle intended to boost Trump’s midterm election prospects.
It’s not the first time Wasserman Schultz has had to convince new voters after Republicans tinkered with boundaries. But this time she’s the only white candidate in a plurality Black district. The redrawn Florida 20th is concentrated in the most Democratic and diverse parts of Broward County, and doesn’t include her hometown of Weston, west of Fort Lauderdale.
Her four Black primary opponents – including Cherfilus-McCormick – have argued the district requires a Black representative. Wasserman Schultz disagrees.
“Representation matters and lived experience matters. But experience and making sure that you have someone who has the seniority and the seasoning to be able to deliver for a district, it matters as well,” she said.
Cherfilus-McCormick, meanwhile, wants to return to Congress despite a pending federal indictment that accuses her of stealing $5 million in federal disaster aid. She has plead not guilty and disputed alleged violations of House rules.
Republican Rep. Cory Mills faces primary challenges
DeSantis and other Republicans have bailed on Republican Rep. Cory Mills as he seeks a third term in Florida’s 7th Congressional District at the same time he’s denying domestic violence allegations. He faces three primary opponents.
“I have not endorsed Cory Mills, and I do not support Cory Mills,” DeSantis said recently in Mills’ district.
Turnout could offer clues to November
Registered Republicans now outnumber Democrats in Florida, a relatively recent flip. That puts the burden on Republicans to outperform Democrats comfortably in overall primary turnout. If it’s close – with Democrats coaxing a clearly larger percentage of their voters to the polls – then the party would be more optimistic heading into November, as Democrats witnessed with primary turnout in other states this year. If Republicans buck national trends and dominate, then Democrats could be facing another rough fall campaign.
Miami-Dade will be especially notable. Democrats carried the county comfortably through 2016, when Trump lost it to Hillary Clinton by 30 percentage points. Four years later, Trump closed the gap to 7 points before carrying it in 2024 by more than 11 points.
