Romney Wins Decisively in Florida     Permalink

As predicted by the polls, Mitt Romney won a double-digit victory in the Florida primary yesterday, beating Newt Gingrich by 14%. Because Florida decided to make its primary winner-take-all, Romney gets all 50 delegates. Originally the state was supposed to get 99 delegates, but lost 49 of them for jumping the gun and holding its primary in January. It also violated the RNC rule saying that early primaries must allocate delegates proportionally, but it did not incur an additional penalty for breaking a second rule. However, if Romney fails to get a clear majority of the delegates, there could be a challenge to the Florida delegation at the convention. Here are the results of the primary:

While Romney clearly scored a solid victory, Gingrich said he will continue fighting until the convention. Such idle boasts generally don't mean much, but he will probably continue at least until Super Tuesday (March 6) when some Southern states vote. A county-by-county map of yesterday's results shows why.

As can be seen on the map, Gingrich did well in the northern part of the state, which is more like Georgia than it is like the Miami area. On Super Tuesday, Gingrich could actually win a number of Southern states and get new momentum. His argument will no doubt be some variant of "the South is the heart of the Republican party and Romney can't win there." Of course, that argument is specious since in the general election, any Republican will carry the South, but logic has not played much of a role in the Republican primary so far and is unlikely to make a surge now.

Also noteworthy is that half of Romney's margin came from only five counties: Miami-Dade (38,000), Broward (13,000), Pinellas (26,000), Palm Beach (21,000), and Hillsborough (17,000). Together they gave him a margin of about 115,000 votes. Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach are the three southernmost mainland counties on the Atlantic coast. Hillsborough and Pinellas are part of the Tampa metropolitan area. Romney also did well in Orange and Lake Counties, around Orlando, and in Leon County (Tallahassee). He did win two panhandle counties, Okaloosa and Bay, but only by 205 and 56 votes, respectively. So Basically, Romney won the big cities and Gingrich swept the rural areas.

The implications for the general election are that Romney might give Obama a fight for the big cities, where Democrats are normally much stronger, but that advantage might be offset in rural areas where people who don't like Romney might stay home or vote for the Libertarian candidate. Gingrich, in contrast, would have no chance in the big cities but could energize the base in rural areas.

Two key lessons from the Florida primary are: (1) negative ads work and (2) money matters. Right after the South Carolina primary, Gingrich took a big lead in Florida, but then the Romney money machine went to work carpet bombing the state with negative ads about Gingrich and he sunk like a stone. These facts are lost on no one and the general election is going to be the most brutal and negative one in history, funded largely by unaccountable money spent by outside groups.

Despite having no chance at the nomination and a critically ill daughter who needs his help, Rick Santorum hasn't indicated that he will give up now and will continue campaigning for family values. If he really does continue, he could deny Gingrich crucial support and ensure that the candidate he least approves of (Romney), wins. Never underestimate the ego of a politician.

If you like this Website, tell your friends. You can also share by clicking this button  

Previous headlines