Trump leads DeSantis among Florida voters, polls show. Does it matter?

This month the Trump campaign and its surrogates chirped about the results of a Big Data Poll taken of Florida voters, showing their guy ahead of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis 53% to 33%.

"Trump Crushes DeSantis in Florida," read a meme on a tweet by MAGA War Room. Surrogates of former President Donald Trump followed with all manner of victory declarations.

The only problem: The March 19, 2024, Florida presidential primary isn't for another nine months. And 19 other states will have voted by mid-March, a time when parties' nominees have usually sewn up a victory.

The Big Data Poll, based on 1,271 person-to-person cellphone interviews, including 507 with likely Republican voters, was done before former president Donald Trump was indicted for a second time.

Trump's numbers against GOP rivals only grew after he went to court in New York to face felony charges of falsifying business records.

Rich Baris, the director of Big Data Poll, tweeted: "Last month in Florida it was Trump 47, DeSantis 38, and we heard 'I love him as a governor, just not as president.' Now, Trump 53, DeSantis 33, and we heard, 'I don't like him at all anymore. He's disloyal and playing the role of stooge.'"

And of those voters who favored DeSantis, 21% of them would choose Biden over DeSantis, Baris tweeted, calling it a "significant finding." He also wrote: "Trump has a significant 'Trump OR Won't Vote' bloc, DeSantis has a 'DeSantis OR Biden Vote' bloc."

A Florida Atlantic University poll completed in April showed Trump ahead 59% to 31%. Even before that, in February, the University of North Florida sampled voters, asking about 10 potential candidates. DeSantis came out on top with 52%, compared with Trump's 27%.

Pollsters say Florida is worth watching

Baris defends the utility of surveying Floridians so far ahead of a primary, saying the Sunshine State is likely DeSantis' "last stand."

The governor has been campaigning in earlier states, particularly Iowa, where he made his first appearance outside of Twitter Spaces.

In an emailed response to questions, Baris pointed to a delegate strategy that makes Florida worth watching. For starters, the first three primaries and caucuses in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina amount to 112 delegates.

Then comes Super Tuesday, March 5, with 11 states voting, including California and Texas. In all, an estimated 712 delegates will be on the line.

"The non-Trump coalition certainly hopes to change the narrative in the delegate race in California, but as of now, Trump is favored or currently ahead there and in nearly every single state before Florida on March 19," Baris wrote, noting that Trump is above 50% in most of those states.

"For me, Florida is not only DeSantis' home state but also a microcosm of the nation overall," he said. "If the trends don't favor the governor in Florida, it's unlikely we'll see any real momentum for him in Texas and/or California."

Baris contends a presidential nominee "has got to win their own home state." Both Trump and DeSantis make Florida their home, and only one can win.

Michael Binder, a professor of political science at the University of North Florida and a pollster, concurs.

"If you’re a Ron DeSantis, you’d have to think that winning Florida is mandatory. But if you’re a, say, Chris Christie or maybe a Mike Pence, it’s a little bit less important," Binder said. "That being said, for the litany of contenders … you need to make it to March 19."

Sunshine State has sunk some contenders

History supports Florida as a "last stand" primary, Binder said, pointing to the 2012 and 2016 GOP primaries.

In 2012, when Mitt Romney became the nominee, another onetime frontrunner, Rudolph Giuliani had "put all his eggs in the Florida basket, but flopped spectacularly," Binder said.

"In 2016, Marco Rubio was hoping for his last stand to happen in Florida and it didn't, and that really hurt him and finished him off in a lot of ways," Binder said.

Kelly Smith, an assistant professor of political science at Stetson University, said Florida can be a harbinger for a candidate's performance in a national election.

"I would not ever advise a presidential candidate to write off Florida," she said. "It's not the most important primary state. It's not one that candidates forget or don't pay attention to. Particularly, in this race it's especially important because of DeSantis and Trump being in the state."

Binder recognizes polls taken so far in advance of the primary have only so much use.

"I think the value of a poll for any primary voters taken now is limited to entertainment value. That’s the range I'd put it in," he said.

Voters don't yet have a lot of information on some of the candidates, and things can change.

"In one big media cycle, you can certainly get more movement," Binder said. "Eight years ago there was a lot of movement underneath Trump, who had a steady build. ... I can picture something similar happening this year."

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Binder said he will likely conduct the next UNF poll in the fall.

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Binder said he doesn't believe the latest Trump indictment will make much of an immediate impact on public opinion.

“I think it means as much as the previous one. It helped him in the previous one. I don’t know that this impacts anything one way or another in the primary," he said. "I don’t know that him in an orange jumpsuit would impact the primary that much.”

Smith, the Stetson professor, said the Trump indictments are unprecedented and therefore difficult to predict. And while primary frontrunners have typically shown the kind of momentum to win after just a few early races, it's not "completely out of the realm of possibility" that a race could be undecided by the Florida primary, she said.

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Polls show Trump ahead of DeSantis in Florida. Why does this matter?