2008 Election Forecast: All Eyes on Florida, Again

Florida has been hotly contested in each of the past four elections. Bill Clinton finished 100,000 votes behind President George Bush in 1992, but four years later he carried the state by 303,000 votes. George W. Bush , after his virtual tie — just 537 votes — with Al Gore in 2000, won the most decisive victory of the four in 2004 — by 381,000 votes over John Kerry .

John McCain got off to something of a head start this year in Florida as a result of the asymmetrical ways in which the parties handled the state’s decision to hold a Jan. 29 presidential primary that violated both national parties’ scheduling rules. The Democratic National Committee prevailed upon its candidates to not campaign for primary votes and initially stripped the state of all its Democratic convention delegates (waiting until nearly the end of the nominating process to restore half of the delegate votes). The Republican National Committee, by contrast, took just half the state’s convention delegates away at the start and did not dissuade GOP candidates from campaigning for Florida primary votes.

As a result, McCain had a high profile en route to his pivotal primary victory by 5 percentage points over Mitt Romney. That primary was open only to registered Republicans and helped McCain dispel suggestions he could only win in states that allowed independents and even Democrats to participate in GOP contests.

“Under normal circumstances John McCain — with his background, with his persona, his high level of public and generally positive awareness — would carry Florida,” Bob Graham, the former Democratic senator and 2004 presidential hopeful, says. “But 2008 is not going to be an average year.”

Florida voters have been hit hard by the real estate downturn and the overall economic slump, creating what Graham describes as an “anxious” political climate that he thinks will be receptive to Obama’s “change” message.

Harnessing Florida’s vastly expanded and diverse population of more than 18 million people is a challenge for any candidate.

To win back the state, many strategists say, Obama would have to rally one or more segments of its diverse population, including Hispanics, African-Americans, Jews and registered independents.

For example, if Obama carries the Hispanic vote by 10 percentage points, which no Democratic nominee has accomplished, that would “almost single-handedly wipe out” Bush’s 2004 margin of victory, according to Fernand Amandi, executive director of Bendixen & Associates, a Miami consulting firm.

Hispanics trend solidly Democratic in other states, but in Florida, where they make up 20 percent of the population, many are Cuban-Americans who have traditionally supported the GOP because of its hard-line opposition to Fidel Castro’s regime in their homeland.

Democrats are banking on a big African-American surge at the polls for Obama. The state is 16 percent African-American, and black voters helped Obama trump Clinton in Duval County, home to Jacksonville, in the primary.

Republican strategist Brett Doster sees McCain’s vocal support for Israel as helping him make inroads with the state’s Jewish population.

Susan MacManus, a University of South Florida politics professor, said McCain should draw well among the state’s ample population from the upper age brackets, a demographic that was not a great strength for Obama in his quest for the nomination. “The Boomers and older are looking for somebody that’s experienced,” she says. She thinks that McCain’s background as a Navy pilot, Vietnam prisoner of war and “strong defense” senator will appeal not only to the many Floridians tied to the military but also to conservative voters who support an assertive use of U.S. might. READ MORE

By Rachel Kapochunas, CQ Politics