Here James Antle reports on the newest polling data for the Florida Senate race. Independent Charlie Crists retains his lead, and Antle analyzes the factors that could lead to a Crist victory.
I’ve been skeptical of the idea that Charlie Crist could pull a Joe Lieberman this year. But the latest Quinnipiac poll in the Florida Senate race shows Crist close to meeting one of the prerequisites for doing so: he’s within striking distance of becoming the de facto Democratic candidate, just as Lieberman was the de facto Republican candidate in Connecticut when he was reelected as an independent in 2006.
Crist narrowly leads with 37 percent of the vote while Republican Marco Rubio is at 32 percent and Democrat Jeff Greene at 17 percent. Kendrick Meek, the onetime Democratic frontrunner, would take just 13 percent. Crist’s lead is based on getting about half the independent vote, 40 percent of Democrats, and 20 percent of Republicans.
Lieberman had better numbers in just about every category. He won 54 percent of independents, 70 percent of Republicans, and held onto 33 percent of voters who identified with his old party. Here’s the key question: Do Florida Democrats basically concede the race to Crist the way Connecticut Republicans conceded to Lieberman? And whatever the party as a whole decides to do, will Jeff Greene or Kendrick Meek run as low-key a campaign as Republican Alan Schlesinger did in Connecticut?…
5 responses so far ↓
1 RedPhillips // Aug 2, 2010 at 2:54 pm
Antle makes the point I was trying to make in one of the Tancredo threads below. For Crist to win he has to essentially become the de facto Democrat nominee and the Democrat nominee has to fade away. Likewise, for Tancredo to win he has to essentially become the de facto Republican nominee and the Republican nominee has to fade away. The coalitions and ideologies are different, but the numbers game is the same.
2 Daniel Surman // Aug 2, 2010 at 3:05 pm
Not necessarily though. An independent can also win by dominating the indepenedent vote and retaining enough support from the major parties.
3 RedPhillips // Aug 2, 2010 at 3:26 pm
Can you win with a plurality vote in Florida or would there be a run-off? That makes a difference. But you are correct that a centrist candidate like Crist (or Lieberman) has an easier task than does a more ideological candidate like Tancredo.
4 Robert Capozzi // Aug 2, 2010 at 3:49 pm
rp, I’m not so sure the numbers game IS the same. It depends on the mix of R, D or Is among the electorate in that state, and which constituencies in those broad categories the I peels off.
If Crist wins with his poll numbers today, he mix is a lot different than Lieberman’s was.
Crist: 50I 40R 20D
Lieberman: 54I 70R 33D
In both cases, it’s a 3 way race. What we don’t know from this article is what the voter mix is. The most important factor I see in these number is that both got 50% of the independents. The second factor I see is that both kept a third of their old party.
I seem to recall both Lieberman’s competitors were fairly weak, as are Crist’s. Weak competitors make for unlikely winners…just ask Scott Brown.
We’d also want to see how much cross-over voting happens in the state. I would like to see, for ex., how FL Ds vote for federal offices, esp. south FL, and near military bases. Hawk Ds are hard to fathom, but they’re out there.
CT is also a bit of an anomaly state, in that I seem to recall Lowell Weiker being an independent, former R during much of his career.
Maybe this “de facto” assumption is correct, but I suspect that it could instead be that Is can do very well if they are credible and centrist, at least in their positioning. That can establish a 50% base among Is. Then moderate Rs and Ds can also provide needed support to win a 3 way.
5 Green Party Conservative // Aug 2, 2010 at 5:00 pm
Would like to see Florida Green Party get on board with the Crist Campaign.
The Green Party needs Charlie Crist.
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