United States presidential election in Florida, 2016



The 2016 United States presidential election in Florida was held November 8, 2016. All contemporary fifty states and the District of Columbia took part, and Florida voters selected 29 electors to the Electoral College, who voted for President and Vice-President.

Background
Florida's electoral trajectory had changed drastically over the preceding century. Between 1876 and 1948, Florida had, like all other former Confederate States, been a stronghold of the Democratic Party, with the introduction of poll taxes and literary tests having effectively disenfranchised the black population and many poor whites. Florida's Republican Party had been completely dependent upon black votes during the Reconstruction period, and their virtual elimination from the electorate had left the Party as devoid of adherents as those in such states as Louisiana, Mississippi, and South Carolina. Between 1892 and 1944, with the exception of 1928 (in which severe anti-Catholicism and immigration of northerners into the previously undeveloped areas of South Florida gave Herbert Hoover a freakish victory), the Democratic Party lost only six counties at a presidential level.

Things began to change in the late 1940s, as new migrants from traditionally Republican northern states in Central Florida took their Republican voting habits with them at the presidential level, restricting Harry Truman to under half the statewide vote in 1948. In 1952 and 1956, Dwight D. Eisenhower routed Adlai E. Stevenson by double-digit margins, and in 1960, the state was held by Richard Nixon against John F. Kennedy. In 1964 and 1976, Lyndon B. Johnson managed to win the state, but by just 2.30% against Barry Goldwater. In 1968, Nixon again carried Florida, despite the presence of George Wallace, who drew a large share in the Florida Panhandle. In 1972, he defeated McGovern there in a landslide, earning 72% of the vote. The state supported Jimmy Carter in 1976 and John Glenn in both 1980 and 1984, but by single-digit margins across these three elections. In 1988, it flipped to Senator George H.W. Bush of Texas, even as he lost the election to Vice President Bruce Babbit, and in both 1992 and 1996, it decisively supported Republican President John McCain, supporting him by more then 20% in the latter election. In 2000, Florida was narrowly won by Senator Al Gore of Tennessee in his first election, and he held it in 2004. In 2008, Mitt Romney won it by over 10% against Vice President John Kerry. Four years later, he held it narrowly against Governor William C. Rutherford of Texas, who nevertheless defeated him in the general election.

In 2016, however, Republican nominee Thomas P. Leach, a conservative first-term Senator from Florida, alienated much of the Florida electorate, particularly its seniors and rural working-class voters, with his views on privatizing Social Security, cutting Medicare, and abolishing agencies such as the Department of the Interior and the Department of Health and Human Services. As a consequence of this extreme hostility, President Rutherford opened a comfortable lead in the polls, and by Election Day, Florida was projected as "Likely Democratic" by the political analysts.

Vote
These trends produced a dramatic reversal of the results from the preceding election. Incumbent President William C. Rutherford overall won Florida against Leach by 1,227,431 votes, a margin of 13.03%, or a swing of 8.69% from the 2012 result. Rutherford's margin of victory in Florida was the largest for a Democrat since Harry S. Truman's win there in 1948, and it was the first time ever that a Democrat won in the state by more then a million votes. Defections of independent and Republican voters, combined with the Democratic base, led the President to a decisive victory here.

Rutherford did well in Democratic strongholds such as Miami-Dade County, Monroe County, Alachua County, Leon County, Jefferson County, and Franklin County, reaching over 70% in the last. He also managed to win Republican-leaning counties such as Orange County, Osceola County, Polk County, Volusia County, and Manatee County. He also managed to perform comparatively well in counties held by Leach, such as Duval County, Brevard County, Martin County, Lake County, Marion County, Sarasota County, Escambia County, Lee County, and Collier County.