Crist’s appeal for cash was perhaps as creative as it was downright desperate. After blowing through most of the $14 million his campaign and political committee raised to defeat Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried in the primary, Crist started the 11-week sprint to the general election almost from scratch. Meanwhile, DeSantis was waiting for Crist with $132 million on hand, a record amount for the governor’s race. But Crist’s pitch was also born out of a difficult reality facing Democrats in Florida. After 20-plus years of watching devastating and narrow losses in the Sunshine State, many Democratic donors this cycle are taking a break from Florida by now. The dominant narrative heading into the fall is that Florida has gotten too red and DeSantis too powerful for donors to make an investment here. It doesn’t help Florida’s case that 50-50 control of the Senate hangs in the balance these midterms, and that there are incumbent Democratic governors in states like Wisconsin and Michigan that the party has prioritized to date over the House. of the governor of Florida. Donors also have more incentive to help Democrat Stacey Abrams challenge Republican Gov. Brian Kemp in neighboring Georgia, a Florida-based Democratic fundraiser told CNN. “Charlie has a better chance of getting a big check from the tooth fairy under his pillow than from national donors,” the fundraiser said. “I just don’t think they’re focused on the Florida governor’s race. I think they’re focused on winnable seats in states where Democrats already have the governor’s mansion or it’s an open seat.” Democratic Party officials are quick to insist they remain focused on Florida. Sam Newton, a spokesman for the Democratic Governors Association, called Florida a “competitive battleground in 2022” and noted the investments the organization has already made in the state party to help build the infrastructure needed to orchestrate a turnaround here. “This is the same strategy we used to defeat Republican incumbents in tough states like Scott Walker (of Wisconsin), Pat McCrory (of North Carolina) and Matt Bevin (of Kentucky) — and we look forward to working hand-in-hand hand with Crist’s campaign. continue to aggressively hold Ron DeSantis accountable,” Newton said. However, the DGA has not responded to the $1 million it filed with the political committee for Andrew Gillum a day after he won the Democratic nomination for Florida governor in 2018. From Gillum’s nomination until Election Day that year, the DGA dropped $7.5 million in Florida. Few expect that kind of investment in 2022, though Newton didn’t rule it out. “We are constantly evaluating the best ways to ensure we use resources when they have the greatest impact,” he said. Rick Wilson, a former Republican strategist now with the Lincoln Project, said Democrats will regret it in 2024 if they don’t see the Florida gubernatorial election as an opportunity to slow DeSantis’ rise. DeSantis is the only Republican who polls consistently show would be competitive in a GOP primary against former President Donald Trump. And while Democrats know how to beat Trump, Wilson said, DeSantis could present a new and tougher challenge. “They’re definitely going to wonder, ‘What did we do?’ Wilson said. “Why didn’t we bleed him? Why didn’t we shoot him? Why didn’t we make him spend $50 million?” They don’t know how to fight.” That can be a tough sell for donors who typically don’t think that far ahead, the Florida fundraiser said. “I think voters care more about pocketbook issues and whether they can decide what to do with their bodies or whether they can afford gas than whether Ron DeSantis is going to run for president in 2024,” they said.
Big donors haven’t shown up this year
Other major donors in 2018 have not yet said whether they have made a financial commitment to Florida this cycle. National labor unions that contributed seven-figure sums to Gillum’s effort declined to share their plans for the fall. “While we don’t comment on dollars, you better believe we’re going to support candidates who put workers first as opposed to the political extremists who opposed the president’s agenda to lower prescription drug prices and take away people’s rights and freedoms. said Nikos Voutsinos, representative of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. AFSCME donated $1.5 million to Gillum’s effort. The American Federation of Teachers donated $500,000 to Crist’s political committee earlier this month — half of what the union gave Gillum in his race. A spokesman for the organization would not say whether it would deploy another half million dollars here. West Palm Beach businessman Daniel Abraham, a frequent Democratic donor who contributed $1 million to Gillum’s political committee, would not discuss his political giving, a spokesman said. Efforts to reach Donald Sussman, a major Clinton donor who gave Gillum $1.5 million, were unsuccessful, but he has yet to contribute to Florida Democrats this cycle. Orlando attorney John Morgan, a longtime Democratic donor, said he believes Crist has “$100 million worth of name recognition” and therefore won’t need the resources that other candidates might to mount a serious challenge to DeSantis. Crist was first elected to the state legislature in the 1990s and is a former Republican governor who was the Democratic nominee for governor in 2014 before winning three terms in the U.S. House. Morgan gave Gillum $250,000 four years ago, but he doesn’t know if he’ll cut a check for Crist, who he once employed at his law firm. “I don’t know what I’m going to do,” Morgan said. “I think Charlie has a very, very hard road to climb. And I’ve pissed off money before.” A major donor is definitely on the fringes of this cycle. NextGen America, the progressive organization funded by billionaire Tom Steyer, donated $2.8 million to Gillum in 2018. But NextGen has since stopped donating to individual candidates, said President and CEO Cristina Tzintzún Ramirez. The organization also does not intend to help with voter registration and mobilization in Florida, as it did four years ago. “It’s more just a matter of resources,” he said. “We would like to be in every state, but we knew we had done a good job in Florida and needed to invest in other critical Senate races in other states.” Among all the other headwinds facing Democrats here is the reality that Florida — a state of 21 million people divided into 10 media markets, some of which require advertising in Spanish — is a notoriously difficult state to run a statewide campaign. the state. A particularly brutal redistricting process also left Florida with few competitive House and state legislative races that can spur donor interest in helping flip a state, said Alexandra Acker-Lyons, a political consultant who advises Democratic donors. “Games are won and lost by 1 percent in Florida, but sometimes it takes $100 million to get that 1 percent,” Acker-Lyons said. “But we can’t write Florida off. This is a party-suicide mission.”
Can the DeSantis name raise money for Democrats, too?
By framing the race around bruising DeSantis ahead of a possible run for president in 2024, the Crist campaign is hoping to get donors to jump back into Florida. DeSantis has become one of the most recognizable political figures in the country, and few Republicans seem to get under the skin of Democrats more than the Florida incumbent. After Crist secured the nomination, the DGA sent a mass message to its donor list focusing on DeSantis’ defeat. It raised more money than any post-primary fundraising email this cycle, according to a source with knowledge of the party’s finances. The Crist campaign believes their first step worked. More than $1 million in donations flooded his campaign within 24 hours of his primary victory. California Gov. Gavin Newsom also pledged $100,000 on Thursday to “make Ron DeSandis a one-term governor” and encouraged his supporters to join the fight. Crist’s team also notes that DeSantis defeated Gillum in 2018 alone by 32,000 votes out of 8.2 million ballots cast. They don’t think the state has shifted dramatically to the right in the four years since then, even as registered Republicans now outnumber Democrats here by about 200,000, an overall reversal from the past decade. “For the last 22 years, the governor’s mansion has been won in the low single digits,” Crist strategist Joshua Karp told CNN. “That doesn’t mean we don’t have a burden to prove we have a game plan to win. That’s what we’re trying to do and we think it’s working.” But while the razor-thin race seemed to cement Florida’s status as a perennial swing state, it also suggests that Democrats here lack the killer instinct to push a competitive race to the top. Indeed, some Democratic donors are feeling stung by Gillum’s narrow defeat after helping him raise $53 million, Acker-Lyons said. “Florida was the red dot in our happy blue dance it was hard for people,” he said.
