- Incumbent Sen. Marco Rubio maintains a steady lead over challenger Val Demings in the race for one of Florida’s Senate seats
- Recent polling shows Rubio holding a seven-point lead in the race, a slight increase from polls conducted in late October
- Demings, once considered a dark horse candidate to unseat Rubio, seems unlikely to pull the upset based on early voting numbers
Less than a week before voting closes in Florida, incumbent Sen. Marco Rubio maintains a slightly growing lead over challenger Val Demings in the race for one of the state’s seats in the U.S. Senate
The latest poll from Civiqs, released yesterday, shows the Republican Rubio leading the Democrat Demings by a margin of 52 percent to 45 percent.
The new numbers reflect a one-percent increase from the two most recent polls conducted on Oct. 31st by Insider Advantage and Victory Insights, which showed Rubio with a 6 and 4-point lead, respectively.
“Every crisis we face right now as a country – every single problem hurting working-class families nationwide – is driven by a dangerous agenda pushed by a far-left party that is completely detached from the lives of most Americans,” said Rubio’s campaign on Thursday. “We need to stop the Democrats in their tracks. We do that by flipping the House and the Senate so that the radical left doesn’t have the votes they need to get their legislation to Biden’s desk.”
Despite Rubio’s lead, he is viewed unfavorably by 48 percent of likely voters in Florida. Demings receives a 40 percent favorable rating, with 51 percent of respondents holding an unfavorable view.
Demings made headlines after raising an eye-popping $8.4 million on 3rd quarter campaign finance reports. Rubio, over the same period, reported hauling in $6 million.
Demings later surpassed $10 million raised in the first quarter of 2022, reporting upwards of $13 million on hand at the time, amounting to the most ever for a Senate challenger.
“We’re building the most robust campaign Rubio has ever faced, one that will let Floridians know that they have a choice between a 27-year law enforcement officer and a career politician who doesn’t show up for work,” Demings’ campaign manager Zack Carroll said in a statement.
Demings, once viewed as a dark horse to take down Rubio faces a number of challenges, including one that is out of her control: a national political undertow that could sweep Democrats out of control of Congress and cement the GOP’s stranglehold on power in Florida.
Rubio, who was first elected to the Senate in 2010, holds an advantage as an incumbent and also “cuts into the Democratic vote in two different ways,” according to Democrat party consultant Steve Schale.
However, with vote-by-mail ballots coming in throughout the state, insiders predict that Rubio, a former state House speaker, will coast to victory.