UNF Pollster: Blowouts are a rare sight in Florida politics

With under two weeks until Election Day, a poll shows Governor Ron DeSantis holding a large lead over challenger Charlie Crist. The poll by the University of North Florida Public Opinion Research Lab has DeSantis with 55% support of likely registered voters. Crist registers 41%. Less than one percent said they would vote for someone else, and 4% did not know or refused to answer.

“This is Florida. Blowouts are a rare sight. We’re much more likely to see a recount than a blowout.”, said Mike Binder, Faculty Director of the Public Opinion Research Lab.

The same poll also has incumbent Marco Rubio leading challenger Val Demings 54-43% in the race for U.S. Senate.

“Demings has raised a lot of money and has been on the attack for months, but Rubio is up double digits,” Binder said. “Florida has become a red state, it will likely take an exceptionally weak Republican candidate for Democrats to win statewide – and Rubio is not a weak candidate.”

Binder says he expects Republicans will outpace Democrats in Florida once the election data is processed.

In addition to vote choice, respondents were asked about their perceptions surrounding the prevalence of voter fraud. When asked how often there is an election with enough fraudulent voting to affect the outcome, 34% said less than 1% of races, with 54% saying it happens more frequently.

In a related question, respondents were asked who they think won the 2020 election between Donald Trump and Joe Biden, based on receiving the most votes cast by eligible voters in enough states to win. Fifty percent of respondents said Joe Biden definitely won the election, and 19% said Trump definitely won.

The UNF PORL Florida Statewide Poll was conducted from October 17 through October 24. It consisted of a random sample of 622 registered, likely Florida voters.

The margin of sampling error for the total sample is +/- 4.7 percentage points.