Florida voters went to the polls on Sunday– the last day of early voting– in the highest recorded turnout in three of the state’s most heavily Democratic counties.
In order to win the election, Donald Trump must win Florida. This weekend’s Democratic turnout certainly favors Hillary and likely gives her a clearer path to victory tomorrow, but in politics– as in basketball– it ain’t over ’til its over.
Black voters suddenly showed up. Up until Sunday, while a record high number of votes had been cast– about 6.5 million– Latinos and whites were primarily responsible, and the whites were largely seen as being in support of Trump. Black churches, joined by a number of civic and civil rights groups, launched their hard-hitting Souls to the Polls effort and black voter turnout ramped up substantially.
David Johnson, a well-known Republican consultant in Florida, is reported to have said he believed Clinton could win by as much as three points.
“We used to have a great statewide operation,” Johnson told the Naples Daily News. “Now I’m not convinced that’s going on, because I don’t see the evidence.
The 6.5 millions votes already cast will likely make up about two-thirds of the final vote, experts said. President Obama won the state in 2012 by just 74,000 votes. Black voter turnout in Florida will end up higher than in 2012, experts say.
Florida’s Latino turnout was even more dramatic. The number of Latinos who voted in person through Saturday was up 100 percent from 2012. Couple that with Sunday’s turnout and it may be that more Latinos in Florida will have voted early in this election than voted all together in 2012.
The numbers seem to indicate that almost 37 percent of the 900,000 Latinos who have voted this year didn’t vote at all in 2012– 12 points higher than whites. If turnout numbers remain high, and if Democrats receive the projected boost from independent voters who are expected to make up one-fifth of total votes, Florida may effectively shut down Trump’s bid for the presidency
