A conservative shift and Democratic decline brought opportunity and burden to Florida’s primary races.
The results were clarifying about the directions each party is headed. The GOP nominated a Black conservative for governor while handing a clear share of its vote to a man who campaigned against him in explicitly racist terms. President Donald Trump’s endorsement couldn’t carry a safe red seat. And the favorite to win a Democratic Senate nomination raised $16 million and lost to a democratic socialist few saw coming.
The Sunshine State used to have bitterly close statewide elections. Now it’s reliably red terrain.
But Tuesday’s elections still offered several key takeaways.
Florida’s new congressional map is being tested at the polls after Republicans’ aggressive mid-decade redistricting push gave the party four new House pickup opportunities. Read more.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio leads on U.S. policy in Latin America but leaves the ongoing wars in Ukraine and the Middle East to Trump’s envoys. Read more.
In Alaska, high gas prices stick around for rural communities much longer than anywhere else in the United States — and Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan may have trouble convincing his voters he's doing enough. Read more.
As another carrier replaces the Lincoln in the Iran war, the destroyers alongside it — facing the same long deployment and supply shortages — still don’t know if they will be heading home, too. Read more.
