Tuesday night saw two special elections in Florida. The main event was HD114, down in Miami-Dade, where Democrats held on to a swingish seat by outperforming historic down-ballot democratic margins while at the same time under-performing Clinton’s win. As I wrote in my write-up on that; such a under-performance isn’t surprising. Meanwhile, HD39, located in Polk and Osceola counties, featured a forgotten special election that for a deep-red seat that Republicans easily held. The margins didn’t change much compared to President, slightly better for the GOP in fact. Many asked the question, why didn’t democrats outperform here? The answer, believe it or not, appears to be Hispanics.
Politics of the District
Before we delve into the results, lets do a quick rundown of this seat. It is a solid GOP district; giving Trump a 19 point win in 2016. The seat is based largely in Polk with a small portion in Osceola. The seat sits around bigger cities. Its wedged between Lakeland and Winter Haven in Polk, and the Osceola portion is just to the west of Kissimmee. The Polk portion is solidly red while Osceola, which is more Hispanic, tends to be blue.
The only Democrat to win the seat in over a decade is Bill Nelson, who still did 5 points worse than his state-wide re-election margin. Nelson won by winning parts of Polk, dominating in Osceola, and and getting decent margins out or rural lands.
Overall though, the district is solid red.
Nelson’s win truly stands out. Most Democrats don’t get past 45%. Due to the GOP lean, and Dem focus on 114, the seat was largely forgotten.
Special Election Results
When the results came in, it was a easy hold for the GOP. Josie Tomkow beat Ricky Shirah by a 19 point margin. Shirah did win Osceola’s portion of the district, but got swamped in Polk.
Turnout was very low, 14%.
Now, look at that turnout map and compare it to the race maps below. One maps each precinct by share of registration that is white, the other Hispanic.
As the maps show, turnout was weaker in Osceola and Hispanic precincts in eastern Polk. Precinct data confirms this. The chart below shows turnout by precincts that are more Hispanic or less so. Note, the district has no precincts that are over 50% Hispanic.
Turnout is nearly twice as high in the less-Hispanic precincts. This is not especially surprising. Hispanic voters, particularly non-Cubans, have weaker turnout compared to white and African-Americans. In special election, this lag is inflated even more. Had the race been heavily contested and Democrats put effort into getting Hispanics out to vote, then turnout would have been better. However, in forgettable race where Polk issues dominated the campaign, Osceola Hispanics just tuned out.
The weaker Hispanic turnout actually led to Shirah doing worse than Clinton in several Hispanic precincts. Meanwhile, she did much better than Clinton in several parts of Polk.
Precincts over 25% Hispanic gave Clinton a 19% margin, but in the special it was only 9%. The lower turnout among Hispanics weakened Democratic performance in these precincts. As a result, these precincts, albeit a small share of the vote cast, were 10% WORSE for Democrats than they had been in 2016. However, at the same time, the heavily white precincts in Polk, where Hispanics were under 10% of the population, Shirah actually improved over Clinton. The margin went from Democrats being down 38% to Democrats down 31%; a 7 point swing.
It appears Democratic margins modestly improved with whites, but low Hispanic turnout cause weaker margins around Osceola. Precincts in the middle of these two classifications came close to even, going up or under improvement depending on what criteria was set.
Overall, for a district not fought over, its hard to look to much into the margins. A democratic campaign with money would have worked to turn out Hispanics, improving their margins. Conversely, Republicans going involved could have boosted GOP numbers as well. When a race is a sleeper, small shifts can have bigger effects. In this case, weak Hispanic turnout in Osceola is likely responsible for Democrats under-performing in the district. Don’t be surprised though when you see major GOTV presence from Democratic campaigns and liberal groups in Hispanic Central Florida in the fall. There is no path to Democratic victory with weak Hispanic turnout.