The 2024 United States presidential election in Florida was held on Tuesday, November 5, 2024, as part of the 2024 United States presidential election in which all 50 states plus the District of Columbia participated. Florida voters chose electors to represent them in the Electoral College via a popular vote. The state of Florida has 30 electoral votes in the Electoral College, following reapportionment due to the 2020 United States census in which the state gained a seat. This gave Florida the third-most electoral votes in the country, which marked the first time it carried more weight than New York (28 electoral votes) in a presidential election.
A heavily populated South Atlantic state, Florida had previously been considered a crucial swing state and a bellwether in past elections, but has shifted significantly to the political right since the 2022 gubernatorial election where incumbent Governor Ron DeSantis won re-election with a 19.4% margin of victory. Trump's double-digit margin of victory solidified Florida further as a safe red state. Florida has two large distinct cultural areas: North Florida and the Florida Panhandle are part of the conservative Deep South, and South Florida has a heavy Latin American influence with large Catholic Cuban, Haitian, Nicaraguan, and Venezuelan populations in the Miami metropolitan area.
Trump defeated Harris in Florida by 13.1 percentage points, the biggest margin of victory for a candidate in the state since 1988. Trump won all three of the stateâÂÂs majority-Hispanic counties. Per exit polls, Trump won 63% of White voters, 58% of Hispanic voters of whom he won 70% of Cuban voters, and 15% of Black voters in the state. Every single county shifted to the right compared to 2020.
The Florida Republican primary was held on March 19, 2024, alongside primaries in Arizona, Illinois, and Ohio.
On November 30, 2023, Politico reported that the Florida Democratic Party had only submitted Biden's name to the Secretary of State, which meant that the primary would be cancelled under Florida law. This cancellation was criticized by the Dean Phillips and Marianne Williamson campaigns. Williamson and fellow Democratic candidate Cenk Uygur held a press conference over Zoom on December 1 criticizing the move. On December 11, 2023, a voter filed a lawsuit in federal court seeking to add Phillips's, Williamson's, and Uygur's names to the ballot. The voter lost in district court.
On September 15, 2024, Trump survived an assassination attempt while golfing at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida. 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh was spotted hiding in nearby shrubbery while aiming a rifle at a member of Trump's security detail. A Secret Service agent fired upon Routh, who fled the scene and was later captured in Martin County. The incident occurred two months after Trump survived a previous assassination attempt while speaking at a campaign rally near Butler, Pennsylvania.
The following presidential candidates received ballot access in Florida:
In addition, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. withdrew his name from the ballot after he suspended his campaign.
Donald Trump vs. Kamala Harris
Aggregate polls
Donald Trump vs. Kamala Harris vs. Cornel West vs. Jill Stein vs. Chase Oliver
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Donald Trump vs. Kamala Harris vs. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. vs. Cornel West vs. Jill Stein vs. Chase Oliver
Donald Trump vs. Kamala Harris vs. Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
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Donald Trump vs. Joe Biden
Donald Trump vs. Joe Biden vs. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. vs. Cornel West vs. Jill Stein
Donald Trump vs. Joe Biden vs. Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Donald Trump vs. Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. vs. Joe Biden
Donald Trump vs. Hillary Clinton
Nikki Haley vs. Joe Biden vs. Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Ron DeSantis vs. Joe Biden vs. Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Ron DeSantis vs. Joe Biden
Ron DeSantis vs. Kamala Harris
Ron DeSantis vs. Hillary Clinton
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Counties that flipped from Democratic to Republican
Trump won 20 of 28 congressional districts.
In 2020, Republican Donald Trump (who changed his resident state from New York to Florida in 2019) carried the state again by 3.4 percentage points, an improvement from his 1.2% margin in 2016, despite Trump losing re-election nationwide and polls pointing to a narrow Democratic win in Florida. In addition, Republicans won all statewide offices by double-digit margins in the 2022 midterms.
A heavily populated South Atlantic state, Florida had formerly been considered a crucial swing state and a bellwether in previous election cycles, but has shifted significantly to the political right and is now considered a safe red state with Trump's double-digit margin of victory solidifying it as such. Florida has two large distinct cultural areas. North Florida and the Florida Panhandle are part of the conservative Deep South. South Florida has a heavy Latin American influence, with large Catholic Cuban, Haitian, Central and South American populations in the Miami metropolitan area.
With Democrats not seriously contesting the state, they finished with their worst presidential performance in the state since 1988. Florida and Iowa had voted twice for Democrat Barack Obama, and voted for Trump by 13% in 2024.
Florida voted over 10% to the right of the nation and its neighboring state of Georgia. Florida had previously voted to the left of Georgia from 1996 to 2016, and in 2016 Florida voted for Trump by just 1.2%.
Just eight years prior in 2016, Democrat Hillary Clinton had won Miami-Dade by 29%, Broward by 35%, and Palm Beach by 15%. In 2024, Harris lost Miami-Dade by 11%, won Broward by 17%, and won Palm Beach by less than 1%. Clinton had won the Miami metropolitan area by 27%, while Harris won it by just 1%.
Some of the largest rightward swings in the country were in South Florida, along with South Texas and the New York metropolitan area. Every single county in Florida swung rightward, with the three majority-Hispanic counties swinging the hardest.
Florida handed Republican Donald Trump a decisive victory, doing so by a margin of 1,427,087 votesâÂÂhis second-largest state win in terms of vote count, behind Texas. This was the first time since 1988 that the state was won with a double-digit margin, and that Miami-Dade County voted Republican. It was also the first time since 1992 that the state voted Republican in three consecutive presidential elections. Trump became the first Republican nominee to win Hillsborough County and Osceola County since 2004. He also flipped back Duval County, Pinellas County, and Seminole County after carrying them in 2016. Trump narrowly lost his home county of Palm Beach.
Following the 2022 midterms under Governor Ron DeSantis and Senator Marco Rubio, this election has cemented Florida's transition from a swing state to a reliable red state. TrumpâÂÂs performance was similar to RubioâÂÂs 2022 U.S. Senate performance, with both only narrowly losing Palm Beach County. Relatedly, Republican Rick Scott won by a nearly identical 12.8% margin in the concurrent 2024 U.S. Senate election in Florida with the same county map. Meanwhile, although a majority of voters supported Amendments 3 and 4 which would respectively legalize recreational marijuana and enshrine abortion rights, both fell short of 60% and failed.
According to exit polls, Hispanic men voted to the right of White women in the state. Trump also won a majority of Hispanic women in Florida. DeSantis and Rubio had also won a majority of Hispanic women in Florida in 2022. Miami-Dade County (70% Hispanic) voted for Trump by over 11%, shifting rightward by 19 percentage points and voting almost as strongly for Trump as his 13% statewide margin. The stateâÂÂs most populous county, Miami-Dade had voted for Hillary Clinton by 29% and Biden by 7%, with the county shifting hard to the right like many South Texas counties over TrumpâÂÂs three runs. Trump won a majority of Hispanics in Florida and Texas, based on exit polls and county results in majority-Hispanic counties. Trump narrowly lost Miami's city limits by around 1000 votes, a strong performance for a Republican in a major city.
The only counties where Harris held up well were majority-Black Gadsden County, 30% Black Leon County (home to the state capital of Tallahassee and Florida State University), and Alachua County (home to the University of Florida). Gadsden County gave Harris 65% of the vote, Leon County 60%, and Alachua County 59%. Harris held up with Black voters and White voters with college degrees, but collapsed nationwide among Hispanic voters even in urban areas. Nationally, Trump came within single digits of winning Hispanic voters (51-46%) and won a majority of Latino male voters (54-44%). Latino men voted to the right of White women (53-46%), because Harris did well among White women with college degrees (58-41%). Harris did nonetheless win New Mexico by 6%, despite New Mexico being half-Hispanic.
Harris only narrowly won the Miami metropolitan area, as a whole winning the three counties of Palm Beach, Broward, and Miami-Dade over Trump by just 1,360,195 to 1,331,378 (49.95% to 48.89%). In Broward County (home to Fort Lauderdale and 27% Black), Harris won just 58% of the vote, the lowest for a Democratic candidate there since 1992. Broward voted to the right of Gadsden, Leon, and Alachua counties despite being far more populous. Harris only won Palm Beach County by less than 1%, though it was TrumpâÂÂs home county and Ron DeSantis had won the county in 2022.
Florida had the third-largest swing to the right in this election (after New York and New Jersey), with Trump improving his performance from 2020 by 9.7%. It was also the largest swing to the right in a state he won.
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