General Discussion

dalton99a

(94,093 posts) Tue Mar 24, 2026, 08:45 PM Tuesday

Democrat scores upset win in Trump's backyard for Florida state house seat

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2026/03/24/emily-gregory-trump-district-win/

Democrat scores upset win in Trump’s backyard for Florida state house seat
Emily Gregory’s victory in the special election is a stunning upset that signals Democratic momentum ahead of the 2026 midterms.
March 24, 2026 at 8:31 p.m. EDT
By Dan Merica

Democrat Emily Gregory won the special election to represent a Florida state house district that includes President Donald Trump’s Mar-A-Lago home on Tuesday, according to Associated Press projections, a stunning upset that signals Democratic momentum ahead of the 2026 midterms.

Gregory, a first-time candidate, defeated Jon Maples, a Republican endorsed by Trump and aligned with his policies. Mike Caruso, the Republican who vacated the seat to become Palm Beach County clerk and comptroller, won the district by 19 percentage points in 2024.

“Tonight’s result sends a clear message that people want Florida to move in a new direction, one where leaders focus on lowering costs and standing up for working families,” Gregory said in a statement to The Washington Post.

Gregory’s campaign tried to focus more on local issues than the national political atmosphere despite running to represent the president’s home.

The Democrat’s victory is a coup for the party, which has struggled for years in Florida as the state moved to the right since Trump’s first presidential win in 2016. The win is also the latest in a string of overperformances by Democrats in elections since the start of Trump’s second term in 2025.

...

2 replies

= new reply since forum marked as read

Highlight:

Democrat scores upset win in Trump's backyard for Florida state house seat (Original Post) dalton99a Tuesday OP

Democrats will be the Party that has to deal with decades of Republican governance. OAITW r.2.0 Tuesday #1

MaddowBlog-Special elections in Florida, including Mar-a-Lago's district, spell trouble for GOP LetMyPeopleVote Yesterday #2

OAITW r.2.0

(32,103 posts)

1. Democrats will be the Party that has to deal with decades of Republican governance.

Reply to dalton99a (Original post)

Tue Mar 24, 2026, 09:27 PM

Tuesday

Sems like this has been - rinse and repeat - since the 70's. Republicans fucks things up, Democrats fix, and voters return Republicans back to the governing majority. Rinse and repeat.

LetMyPeopleVote

(179,565 posts)

2. MaddowBlog-Special elections in Florida, including Mar-a-Lago's district, spell trouble for GOP

Reply to dalton99a (Original post)

Wed Mar 25, 2026, 11:06 AM

Yesterday

The more Democrats win closely watched races and flip seats from red to blue, the more Republicans should be concerned about the 2026 midterms.

The fact that Dems flipped the Mar-a-Lago district is amazing, the broader pattern is even more important:

The more Democrats win closely watched races, and flip seats from red to blue, the more Republicans should be terrified about the 2026 midterms.
www.ms.now/rachel-maddo...
— Steve Benen (@stevebenen.com) 2026-03-25T12:45:12.698Z

https://www.ms.now/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/special-elections-in-florida-including-mar-a-lagos-district-spell-trouble-for-gop

Heading into Tuesday’s state legislative special election in Florida, Republicans had reason to be cautiously optimistic. The race was in a Palm Beach district that Donald Trump won by 11 points in 2024 (it’s the same district where Mar-a-Lago is located), and only about a third of local voters are registered Democrats.

And yet, the contest turned into the latest in a series of red-to-blue flips. MS NOW reported:

Democrats flipped a Republican-held seat in the Florida state House, with Emily Gregory winning a closely watched special election Tuesday night in a district that includes President Donald Trump’s home of Mar-a-Lago, according to The Associated Press.

Gregory beat Trump-endorsed Republican Jon Maples in the 87th District, which includes Palm Beach. With almost all votes counted, Gregory narrowly led by 2.4 percentage points, or 797 votes, according to the AP.

The president may try to downplay the results, but it was earlier this week when Trump not only voted for the Republican candidate but also described the contest as “a very important Special Election” while endorsing the GOP nominee.....

The Downballot noted in its latest analysis that if the vote tallies in the Tampa area hold, Democrats will have flipped 30 seats from red to blue in special elections since Trump returned to the White House. Over that same period, the number of seats flipped from blue to red remains zero.

Some will no doubt argue that it’s best not to read too much into a special election held in the winter, several months before November’s races. It’s a fair point. But what matters is how the results fit into the broader political landscape. Republicans are tied to an unpopular president, a growing number of their congressional members are retiring, key elements of the GOP agenda are facing an intensifying public backlash, and they keep losing special elections, including in contests they expected to win.

If party insiders aren’t concerned about their standing ahead of this year’s midterm elections, they’re not paying close enough attention.

Reply to this discussion