Florida Congressman Byron Donalds, who's bidding to become the next governor of the state, celebrated the news Saturday that the GOP is under 20,000 registrations from flipping Miami-Dade County red.
"Hey bots! We’re under 20k registrations away from flipping Miami-Dade County RED," Donalds said. "As Governor, I look forward to working with @JuanPorrasFL, @MiamiDadeGOP & @FloridaGOP to make this happen!"
According to the Florida Division of Elections, Republicans have 496,421 registered voters to Democrats' 515,761 in Miami-Dade as of March 31. The exact difference between the two parties stands at 19,520.
No party affiliation (NPA) also makes up 492,317 registrations. In addition, Miami-Dade has 32,719 minor party registrations for a total of 1,537,038.
Miami-Dade is about 70% Hispanic.
While not fully flipped, Miami-Dade went for Donald Trump by 11.5 points over Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election. In the process, Trump became the first Republican presidential candidate to win Miami-Dade since George H.W. Bush in 1988.
Trump went on to win Florida by 13 points over Harris, partly due to his strong showing in the state's most populous county. The Republican Party also had a strong showing locally in Miami-Dade on election night.
For context, Trump lost Miami-Dade to former President Joe Biden by 7 points in 2020 and by 30 points to Hillary Clinton in 2016. Trump won Florida both times overall, but by much smaller margins than in 2024.
Things have also worked out for Republicans at the state level.
In the 2022 Florida gubernatorial election, Gov. Ron DeSantis defeated Democrat Charlie Crist by over 11 points in Miami-Dade. Notably, DeSantis lost Miami-Dade in his first gubernatorial race against Democrat Andrew Gillum by almost 21 points in 2018.
While DeSantis won both races, his margin in Miami-Dade helped him crush Crist by 19 points overall, while Gillum's blowout victory saw DeSantis win Florida by a mere 32,000 votes and change.
Is this a sign of things to come for Congressman Donalds? It certainly appears so.
On the flipside, the Florida Democratic Party appears to be imploding. Whoever decides to enter the gubernatorial race, possibly Senate Democratic Leader Jason Pizzo, is going to have a tall hill to climb.
And if they can't win Miami-Dade, they can't win much of anything.
