What signs in the early returns in FL on Election Night will indicate Biden or Trump will win it?

[MARGINS6729]

Look at Pasco County an exurban/suburban county in Central Florida on the I-75 coastline. They report first consistently. Steve Schale, Democratic strategist in Florida, knew that Pasco was a bad sign for Hillary as Trump killed her there by nearly 52,000 votes. It's only gotten more GOP which makes it an unreliable bellwether to a certain extent  and there are much more Democratic areas that report afterwards that could balance it out plus Biden is probably a better fit for the county overall. Basically, Democrats have to be ahead by a big margin statewide before the Panhandle counties come in.

[MARGINS6729]

As a lifelong Pasco County resident, I can attest to the accuracy of these statements too



Edit: however Trump is going to absolutely dominate Pasco. Look for him to win by no less than 50,000 votes. He is a ing G.O.D to these people here

Why has the county become so red since 2012? It's been Republican for a long time but used to be more purple. A lot of Midwestern retirees moving there who fit the same political box as those in The Villages and Southwest Florida?

[MARGINS6729]

Watch the swing counties. Counties like Pinellas, Duval and Hillsborough to a lesser extent might give some early clues as to who will win the state. Biden will probably win the state if he wins Duval and Trump will almost certainly win the state if he wins Pinellas and/or Hillsborough.

Trump will not win Hillsborough- the county has moved from being a swing county into a reliably Democratic one. It's population has exploded with demographics that are favoring Democrats. In a bad year for Florida Dems, all of the statewide candidates won the county handily besides Sean Shaw who lost the Attorney General race to Ashley Moody by a big margin but in Hillsborough he only lost by 6,000 votes. It's not Orange County yet but in a few cycles it will be.

I agree with you on Pinellas though.

[MARGINS6729]

Watch the swing counties. Counties like Pinellas, Duval and Hillsborough to a lesser extent might give some early clues as to who will win the state. Biden will probably win the state if he wins Duval and Trump will almost certainly win the state if he wins Pinellas and/or Hillsborough.

Trump will not win Hillsborough- the county has moved from being a swing county into a reliably Democratic one. It's population has exploded with demographics that are favoring Democrats. In a bad year for Florida Dems, all of the statewide candidates won the county handily besides Sean Shaw who lost the Attorney General race to Ashley Moody by a big margin but in Hillsborough he only lost by 6,000 votes. It's not Orange County yet but in a few cycles it will be.

I agree with you on Pinellas though.

Yeah. I said "to a lesser extent" as it assumes Trump could win it if he does really good statewide.

No, Trump isn't going to sweep in Florida at this point. And even if he did Hillsborough wouldn't be one of the counties he would take. Ask GOP operatives/supporters who know what they are talking about and they will tell you that Trump will not outright win Hillsborough. It's still filled with ticket splitters/swing voters as well as a GOP base (hence Ashley Moody and Marco Rubio's extremely narrow wins there) but the county is moving away from the GOP to the point where the GOP's goal is to keep Democrats from winning the county handily.

[MARGINS6729]

Watch the swing counties. Counties like Pinellas, Duval and Hillsborough to a lesser extent might give some early clues as to who will win the state. Biden will probably win the state if he wins Duval and Trump will almost certainly win the state if he wins Pinellas and/or Hillsborough.

Trump will not win Hillsborough- the county has moved from being a swing county into a reliably Democratic one. It's population has exploded with demographics that are favoring Democrats. In a bad year for Florida Dems, all of the statewide candidates won the county handily besides Sean Shaw who lost the Attorney General race to Ashley Moody by a big margin but in Hillsborough he only lost by 6,000 votes. It's not Orange County yet but in a few cycles it will be.

I agree with you on Pinellas though.

Why is Pinellas more swingy than Hillsborough anyway?

It's whiter and older and is filled with non college educated whites. It has black and hispanic populations but not as much as Hillsborough.

[MARGINS6729]

As a lifelong Pasco County resident, I can attest to the accuracy of these statements too



Edit: however Trump is going to absolutely dominate Pasco. Look for him to win by no less than 50,000 votes. He is a ing G.O.D to these people here

Why has the county become so red since 2012? It's been Republican for a long time but used to be more purple. A lot of Midwestern retirees moving there who fit the same political box as those in The Villages and Southwest Florida?

Forgive me for starting off this post this way (insert ACKCHEWALLY meme here) but Pasco stopped being purple/competitive around 2000 and was full-fledged red in suburban areas by 2004. It's less about midwest retirees moving in and more like the local suburban populous that's grown up there or moved there for the last 20 years just exploded in the stereotypical "MERICA!!" department that favors conservatives after 9/11. Once that happened, your average middle-class person in a place like Land O' Lakes or Wesley Chapel is a "faith, guns, family, country" person with the white picket fence and 2 dogs in their yard and a "W '04" sticker on both their cars it just never stopped being that way and growing that way. The same applies to other areas like the Port Richey and Hudson. Although generally lower in income, those who would qualify as "blue-collar" are disproportionately Republican. Like at least 80% of them.

If you say anything remotely negative about Trump above a whisper any of these people would bust through the wall like the freaking Kool-Aid man with some sh**t they heard on Fox News. They DO NOT want to hear it.

I've heard the same thing about it getting redder from 2000 on but we saw Nelson win it in 2006 and 2012 by large margins while Obama lost it by respectable amounts in 2008 and 2012. Sink only lost it by 11,000 votes and Crist only lost it by 3,000 votes though Crist was obviously really popular in the Tampa Bay area. Were swing voters who resemble the types of voters you describe  who may have pulled the lever for the past democratic candidates I mentioned just swept up by Trump's brand or is it the new Midwestern retirees who are just cementing what was already there and  pushing it into solid GOP territory?

[MARGINS6729]

As a lifelong Pasco County resident, I can attest to the accuracy of these statements too



Edit: however Trump is going to absolutely dominate Pasco. Look for him to win by no less than 50,000 votes. He is a ing G.O.D to these people here

Why has the county become so red since 2012? It's been Republican for a long time but used to be more purple. A lot of Midwestern retirees moving there who fit the same political box as those in The Villages and Southwest Florida?

Forgive me for starting off this post this way (insert ACKCHEWALLY meme here) but Pasco stopped being purple/competitive around 2000 and was full-fledged red in suburban areas by 2004. It's less about midwest retirees moving in and more like the local suburban populous that's grown up there or moved there for the last 20 years just exploded in the stereotypical "MERICA!!" department that favors conservatives after 9/11. Once that happened, your average middle-class person in a place like Land O' Lakes or Wesley Chapel is a "faith, guns, family, country" person with the white picket fence and 2 dogs in their yard and a "W '04" sticker on both their cars it just never stopped being that way and growing that way. The same applies to other areas like the Port Richey and Hudson. Although generally lower in income, those who would qualify as "blue-collar" are disproportionately Republican. Like at least 80% of them.

If you say anything remotely negative about Trump above a whisper any of these people would bust through the wall like the freaking Kool-Aid man with some sh**t they heard on Fox News. They DO NOT want to hear it.

I've heard the same thing about it getting redder from 2000 on but we saw Nelson win it in 2006 and 2012 by large margins while Obama lost it by respectable amounts in 2008 and 2012. Sink only lost it by 11,000 votes and Crist only lost it by 3,000 votes though Crist was obviously really popular in the Tampa Bay area. Were swing voters who resemble the types of voters you describe  who may have pulled the lever for the past democratic candidates I mentioned just swept up by Trump's brand or is it the new Midwestern retirees who are just cementing what was already there and  pushing it into solid GOP territory?

[MARGINS6729]

Watch the swing counties. Counties like Pinellas, Duval and Hillsborough to a lesser extent might give some early clues as to who will win the state. Biden will probably win the state if he wins Duval and Trump will almost certainly win the state if he wins Pinellas and/or Hillsborough.

I think whoever wins Pinellas wins Florida.

No- ask Bill Clinton in 92, Al Gore, Alex Sink, Charlie Crist, Andrew Gillum, and Bill Nelson. Pinellas is a swingy county but it isn't a bellwether county in the way people think it is. The truth is is Florida has no bellwether counties; it's how the raw vote margins pile up across the state that determine who will win.

[MARGINS6729]

As a lifelong Pasco County resident, I can attest to the accuracy of these statements too



Edit: however Trump is going to absolutely dominate Pasco. Look for him to win by no less than 50,000 votes. He is a ing G.O.D to these people here

I'm sorry but as another lifelong Pasco resident, I don't think this is true. Pasco saw one of the largest swings toward Democrats of any FL county in 2018. As the state swung only 1% to Dems, Pasco swung several points.

Florida statewide:
2016-PRES: R+1.2

2018-GOV: R+0.4
2018-SEN: R+0.1
2018-AG COM: D+0.1

Pasco County:
2016-PRES: R+21

2018-GOV: R+16
2018-SEN: R+15
2018-AG COM: R+14

Obviously Trump will easily win it again, but look at the current national environment and the 2018 data. It is clear that Pasco has shifted towards Dems a bit since 2016, and Trump will not win it by the +21 he did then. I'm expecting an R+10 to R+15 margin. There is no data to suggest otherwise.

 Pasco went hard for DeSantis and Scott though who both won it by big margins when you compare how Nelson did in the past there as well as how Crist and Sink did in their races. Gillum lost Pasco by 34,369 votes while Crist lost it by 2,859 votes and Sink lost it by 11,537 votes. Crist lost it in his 2010 Senate race by 9,779 while Nelson won it by 24,144 in 2012 only to lose it by 31,765 votes six years later. In 2016, Patrick Murphy lost it by 46,114 votes. In 2006, Nelson won Pasco by 28,833 votes while Davis lost it by 14,051 votes in the Gubernatorial race. And then in voter registration the GOP has gained 23,155 voters since the April report in 2016(Division of Elections latest report is the April 2020 report) while Democrats have gained only 10,247 voters since then. And at that point the GOP only had a 21,828 voter registration advantage. Now its 33,736. There are obviously some caveats here: voter registration can't be equated with election results, Obama was able to do well there in 2008/2012, Nelson ran a very poor campaign in 2018 and his last run was in a presidential year, Nikki Fried did slightly better than both Nelson and Gillum,  Biden is a better fit for the county than Clinton, Florida Democrats have an organization there now. But it seems like based on the evidence we have is that Pasco is getting redder at the moment although Wesley Chapel may get bluer if more Democratic leaning suburbanites move there. My prediction is that the lowest Trump can go in the county is a 40,000 votes win.

[MARGINS6729]

I'm curious how the rural areas that report early (if any) vote.  I feel like if Trump has any slippage (in turnout or margin) he's toast nationally.  I suspect turnout will be slightly higher in big cities and Trump is going to lose a lot of ground margin-wise in the suburbs.  So I think Trump really needs to accelerate his 2016 gains in the rural areas and exurbs.  Just a repeat probably won't be enough.

That's one thing I'll be looking for too early in the night. If anything, Trump needs to somehow squeeze more votes out of rural and exurban America (Pasco) than he did in 2016 because the suburbs are going to be nasty for him. Just keeping his 2016 rural and exurban margins probably isn't enough for any states to the left of Georgia.

Yeah.  As a general matter the rural and exurban areas are shrinking compared to the suburbs... maybe not as bad in Florida as elsewhere but it seems like if suburban turnout is through the roof like it was in the primaries then Trump is going to have to get not just really huge margins out of rural America but elevated turnout as well.  Seems like turnout was already high in 2016 so he's working with a high baseline that may be hard to maintain with the generally shrinking populations.   Demographics might finally be catching up with the GOP beyond just CO/VA.

What suburbs are you specifically talking about?