Opinion Column by Barney Bishop
Florida Democrats are realistically looking at a 20-year plan to get their candidates elected statewide, according to a panel of Democratic consultants at a recent Capital Tiger Bay Club forum in Tallahassee.
The consultants stressed the most basic tenet for winning any campaign – registering voters and then getting them to the polls to vote.
Democrats who completely controlled Florida politics for almost 120 years after Reconstruction have been in a funk since the Governor Lawton Chiles’ administration and have only been able to mount a couple of close gubernatorial elections since.
And that was before the Republican Party started a massive assault on voter registration, going from about 1.5 million registered voters behind the Dems in 2012 to more than a million voters ahead in 2025, a remarkable turnaround in a highly mobile state that is still growing strongly.
The state Party chair, Nikki Fried, who won the race for Agriculture Commissioner on a lark by supporting medical marijuana, has since become a joke when she was not even able to win the primary race for Governor in 2022.
Fundraising has been dismal over the last couple of cycles because statewide candidates have been relatively weak, and out-of-state donors have realized that the opportunity for winning the Governor’s Mansion is as remote as Florida State Seminoles winning the national football championship.
Beyond lackadaisical and incompetent leadership, the Party is still relying on issues that are out of step with voters on the significant issues.
Even on critical issues like abortion and legalized marijuana, the Party has been unable to convince enough Democratic and other voters to go to the polls to claim a victory.
When one turns to salient issues that strike a responsive chord with Florida voters, like promoting public safety as Job #1, parental rights in education, common-sensical environmental stewardship of the Everglades and other sensitive lands, balancing the state budget, protecting minors from unhealthy social media influences, and keeping taxes in check, Florida voters have supported the Republicans.
No doubt, there are key issues that need addressing, such as ever-increasing property taxes and the cost of homeowners and automobile insurance, but the Democrats fail to advance any solid ideas to fix these ills.
It is not enough for Democrats to simply blame the Republicans for high homeowners and car insurance rates unless they have a solution that will bring immediate relief, which the minority Party has to date been unable to communicate.
For Democrats, every answer is to either throw more money at the problem (i.e., education) or regulate it to death.
We know that more money is not the answer in public education because Florida clearly does not spend as much money per student as other states, yet our state is ranked #1 by US News & World Report in overall education, and is also ranked #1, for the ninth consecutive year, in higher education.
By watching other states like California, we also know that onerous regulation of insurance companies is not the correct solution either. State Farm and Allstate, two of the largest insurance companies in America, have stopped writing or have significantly reduced the writing of new policies in California.
And while California has wildfires, earthquakes, and other natural disasters, Florida also has its share of natural disasters, such as devastating hurricanes and tornadoes.
The difference is that Florida, back in 1993, after Hurricane Andrew, created the Florida Hurricane Catastrophic Fund to provide reinsurance to help keep companies writing in the state.
Citizens Insurance Company, Florida’s insurer of last resort, is being depopulated and is instituting new policy guidelines, such as requiring all policyholders to have flood insurance and requiring policies to be more expensive than what is available in the marketplace.
Consequently, five major auto insurers in Florida have announced decreases in their new filings, and tort reform in homeowners’ insurance is starting to stabilize rates and bring them down as well.
The actual concern for Florida Democrats is the abyss they are staring at over the dearth of solid candidates seeking statewide office.
For now, let us just concentrate on the Governor’s race.
The leading candidate, former Congressman David Jolly, was originally a Democrat who changed parties to become a Republican, and then, for good measure, recently became a Democrat again.
Democrats have already tried this game when they mistakenly nominated former GOP Governor Charlie Crist, who ran, then changed parties during the legislative session, becoming an Independent, and then ran for the US Senate against Marco Rubio and promptly lost.
Then they welcomed him back to the Democratic Party as their standard bearer in 2022, and he lost again to Republican Governor Ron DeSantis in a historic shellacking.
Crist’s principal problem was that voters could not ascertain which position on many issues he really believed, because he had consistently flip-flopped to satisfy each Party’s primary voters.
And this same problem will beset Jolly.
However, he could overcome this obstacle if it were not for former Democratic Senator Jason Pizzo, who also switched parties during the 2025 legislative session and is now running for Governor as an Independent.
No problem, you say, as no Independent candidate has ever won state office.
And you would be correct.
But Broward County politician Pizzo, with plenty of family money to finance his campaign, will pull Democratic votes from Jolly, which will severely weaken him in the general election.
And God forbid, if ubiquitous trial lawyer John Morgan decides to get into the general election at the last minute, as he has temptingly suggested, because he will splinter off the Left and Center-Left voters even more, ensuring the election for the Republican nominee.
The icing on the cake that utterly destroys Florida Democrats is if Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani, the Mayoral candidate in New York City, runs a strong campaign, and AOC and Jasmine Crockett continue to be the most vocal spokespersons for the national Democratic Party, you can just simply write off our state.
Since 1999, Republicans have successfully elected Governors repeatedly and over the last quarter of a century have only lost two Cabinet offices, and then only for one term in each case.
A 20-year Plan?
Maybe the Democrats should assemble a 50-year Plan instead, as the abyss is getting deeper and wider.
Barney Bishop III is a former executive director for the Florida Democratic Party and is a former CEO of Associated Industries of Florida, known as ”The Voice of Florida Business.” He is currently the CEO of Barney Bishop Consulting, a strategic public affairs firm based in Tallahassee, and he can be reached at Barney@BarneyBishop.com.
