US election 2020: Is Florida (again) key to this election?
North America reporter
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Florida is where liberal dreams are broken. It's the place where, in what was otherwise a Democratic wave election of 2018, the party narrowly lost the governorship and an incumbent Senate seat. It's where, in 2000, 540 votes delivered the White House to Republican George W Bush, instead of Al Gore.
For Democrats, Florida is like an unreliable friend - never around when needed. The last four times the party won the presidency, they could have lost Florida and still prevailed. But in two of the last three Democratic defeats, winning Florida would have meant taking the White House.
That one exception was 2016, when despite losing the nationwide popular vote, Donald Trump eked out a plurality in enough states to win a comfortable electoral college victory. The results from Florida, however, were the first flashing sign that Democrat Hillary Clinton was in trouble on election night.
Fast forward four years, and Florida is once again an electoral battleground that could decide the presidency. Polls, as they always seem to do here, show the state is close. And if the overall race is tight, Florida - with its 29 electoral votes - could once again be decisive.
Trump's Florida base
Since winning the presidency, Trump has lavished attention on Florida - a reflection of how important the state is to his electoral strategy. He regularly visits his Mar-a-Lago and the Doral properties there and relinquished his official New York residence in favour of the state's warmer, and politically friendlier, climes.
Trump referred to Florida as his "home state" before a cheering crowd of thousands of supporters at an airport rally in the northwest city of Pensacola on Friday - and the following day, he travelled to Palm Beach to cast his ballot in person.
Pensacola was Trump's fourth rally in the "sunshine state" since being hospitalised for Covid-19 at the end of September and the first in the state's panhandle, a Republican stronghold with its high number of conservative-leaning current and retired military personnel and politics that hews closer to neighbouring Alabama and Mississippi.
"The panhandle is what makes Florida a swing state," says Dana Arduini, a Pensacola resident who ran a stand selling Trump-related merchandise outside the rally. She says the area balances out the more Democratic areas in the southern portion of the state.
According to Arduini, flags are usually the big sellers for her, although on this particular sunny afternoon, hats were in demand. There's been talk in the past about so-called "shy" Trump voters who aren't registered in the polls showing Biden ahead, but at least in Florida the president's supporters are vocal and visible.
"I think people in Florida like Trump because he doesn't blow sunshine up your butt," says Kristen Rasmussen, who attended her first presidential rally wearing a bright red Trump-Pence T-shirt. "I'm a pre-school teacher, so I don't like when he bullies people, but if you're going into politics you've got to be ready for that. You've got to have a tough skin."
Congressman Matt Gaetz, who represents Pensacola in the House of Representatives, laid out the stakes in a warm-up speech for the president. "We've elected presidents before, and we know how to do it," he said. "We love our military, and our veterans, and our law enforcement and our flag and our anthem, and we love the fact that Donald J Trump is the president of the United States."
The level of devotion to the president, particularly in Florida, is readily apparent at his campaign rallies. His supporters gather outside Mar-a-Lago, waving signs and cheering whenever Trump visits the estate. Before the coronavirus pandemic hit, the campaign organised regular social events - in bars, restaurants and even bowling alleys. The southern Florida city of West Palm Beach, which despite being president's new official residence is reliable Democratic, is also home to what's touted as the largest independently organised Trump fan club.
The Club 45, as it's called, has hosted monthly gatherings with hundreds, sometimes thousands, attending complete with merchants, guest speakers and Trump-themed regalia. On Tuesday, it is planning a Trump victory party in a hotel ballroom with a buffet and ice-cream bar.
"We've had candidates who couldn't connect with the Florida voter," said Joe Budd, co-founder of the club. "The president connects on a different level than anybody in the past. I like to call him the blue-collar billionaire. He's a real people-person. He was a working man."
Democratic hopes and fears
On Saturday, 90km (56 miles) south of Palm Beach and 850km (528 miles) from Trump's Pensacola airport gathering the day before, Barack Obama - the Democrat who carried Florida twice in his presidential bids - was hitting the campaign trail for his former vice president.
"If you bring Florida home, this thing's over," he said, using bullhorn to address a group of campaign volunteers in Miami.
A few hours later, over the din of honking horns at a drive-in car rally at a local university, he struck an incredulous tone when talking about the man who replaced him in the White House.
"This pandemic would have been tough for any president, because we have not seen something like this in 100 years," he said. "But the idea that somehow this White House has done anything but completely screw this thing up is nonsense."
Amore Rodrigues, a 27-year-old volunteer with the group Cubanos for Biden, said she listened to Obama speak with tears in her eyes. "I realised how much I missed having a president that is competent, that shares love, that exudes peace, stand up there and speak to us," she said.
She says she vividly remembers the pain of Clinton's 2016 loss and continues to be nervous about the Florida race even with polls showing a slight Biden lead.
One of her big concerns is that Republicans, including Trump, have been trying to paint Biden as a socialist, which has negative connotations among the regions many Cuban and South American transplants, who equate the term with Fidel Castro and Nicolas Maduro dictatorships.
If Trump and the Republicans can build on traditional Cuban support in south Florida - while continuing to turn out their faithful in the northern part of the state - it could go a long way toward ensuring Trump wins again.
"Our people's trauma is being manipulated as a fear tactic to get people to vote for the right," she says.
It was a concern Obama himself tried to address in his speech, saying that Republican attempts to paint Biden as a Latin American-style communist were ridiculous. "He was a senator from Delaware. He was my vice-president. I think people would know if he were a secret socialist by now."
Hispanics were just part of the electoral coalition Obama assembled in his Florida victories, along with young and black voters. Four years ago, that coalition failed the Democrats. But this time, says Raymond Adderly, a 16-year-old Biden volunteer, will be different.
"It was embarrassing that Hillary Clinton lost. We thought Florida would do better," he says. "But we're seeing some of the highest youth turnout in history now. We're seeing more and more African-Americans take to the streets every day not only to protest, but to vote.
"Vote by vote, we'll win this election."
Florida delivers early
Although election day in the US is still a week away, Floridians have been voting by mail for weeks and at early in-person locations since last Monday. Because the state processes the ballots as they receive them and release information about the party affiliation of those who have voted, that has given campaigns and political analysts an early look at how the race might be shaping up.
So far, at least, there have been encouraging signs for the Democrats. As of Monday, the state has already received 86% of the total early vote recorded in 2016. Registered Democrats have cast 596,000 more mail-in ballots than Republicans, while 230,000 more Republicans have voted early at in-person locations - giving Biden what could amount to an early 366,000 vote advantage.
The Trump campaign has touted a poll showing that Republicans might have a big advantage during in-person voting on election day - perhaps enough to erase the Democratic lead - in part because of the president's repeated questioning of the safety and reliability of mail-in voting. The risk, according to pollster and Democratic campaign consultant Evan Roth Smith, is that the size of such a late-breaking "red wave" would have to be unprecedented.
"There's no room for error," Smith says. "Trump can't have a couple of bad news cycles that keep people home. He can't have a massive Covid spike that scares voters away. If you're going to pick a position, would you rather be counting on people planning to vote, or do you want a lead that's already banked?"
There is cause for concern for both sides with just over a week left, however.
Democratic turnout in Miami, particularly among Hispanics, is lower than expected. For Republicans, the margins in the retirement communities in the centre of the state - which traditionally tilt conservative - are approaching uncomfortable territory. And if anecdotal and polling evidence of elderly Republicans voting for Biden because of concerns about the coronavirus pandemic are true, it could be disaster for Trump.
"That's something he wouldn't be able to survive in Florida or, for that matter, in the upper Midwest swing states [Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio] with large elderly populations," Smith says.
Unless something unexpected happens or the race is decided by a razor-thin margin, it won't take long for Democrats and Republicans to receive Florida's verdict on election night. The early vote tabulations will be announced as soon as the state's in-person polling places close, leaving only the day's results to be accounted for.
If the Democrats maintain their early lead, it will be a question of whether there are enough Republican votes left to be counted. If the Democrats have underperformed, then it's just matter of waiting for Trump to eventually catch up.
While it may be a long night in other states, Florida tradition of breaking hearts and prompting celebrations on election night is likely to continue in 2020.
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