Special Elections Pressing In On Donald Trump. The Horror.

The Special Elections Special rolls on!

Poor Donald Trump is probably all put out that a Democrat went and won the deep-red Florida state House district where his Mar-a-Lago trash palace is located. Why yes, the string of Democratic wins in special elections keeps humming right along! It’s like there’s some sort of ugly orange magnet drawing Democrats to the polls, even if it gets wet.

Emily Gregory, a first-time candidate, won yesterday’s special election for the seat in a squeaker, getting 51 percent of the vote against Republican Jon Maples, a former council member from nearby Lake Shores. Despite Trump’s “Complete and Total Endorsement” and misused capitalization, Maples received 49 percent, without any Libertarian squirrels in the race to Confuse Things. Trump won the district by 10 points in 2024.

Emily Gregory. Campaign website photo.

In a nice little neener-neener, CNN notes that Trump and his secret-documents toilet chandelier will now be represented by “a trio of Democrats across the Florida state House, Senate and US House,” even though Republicans control all three of those bodies.

Gregory told CNN shortly after polls closed last night that the guy who’ll now be her noisiest, smelliest constituent wasn’t really an issue in the campaign, because she remained focused on the race against Maples, and on “issues that matter most to Florida families,” like the affordability crisis and the fact that gas is hitting $4 a gallon, which, OK, actually has a lot to do with that one constituent.

Gregory said, before the race was called in her favor, that if she won she’d “be happy to have a conversation” with Trump if he’d like, but added that “all 180,000 residents of District 87 are my priority if I’m so lucky to serve. I will put them all with equal weight.”

We would suggest that if he drops by her office, he could bring along his little child-sized desk with the presidential seal on it, from that one Thanksgiving presser after he lost the 2020 election.

This was all over Twitter back then; as far as we can tell it’s not copyrighted.

We think Gregory will be pretty good for women in the district; Politico reports that she has a background “in public health and mental health administration,” and that she now runs a fitness center for postpartum mothers. That’s pretty awesome, and we all know how much Donald Trump loves exercise.

In 2024, the Republican incumbent in the district, Mike Caruso, sailed to reelection by a 19-point margin, outperforming Trump in District 87. Seems like attitudes have changed a bit since then!

Oh, yes, and you should probably know that Donald, Melania, and Barron Trump all voted by mail (presumably for Maples, though that last name may unsettle the Trumps), even as the Great Man is trying to make most mail-in voting illegal with his shitty SAVE American America (and America) Act. In a visit to Memphis Monday, Trump called his preferred voting method “mail-in cheating,” just not when he does it.

Gregory wasn’t the only surprise Democratic winner in Florida special elections yesterday, either. In an even closer outcome in a special election for state Senate, Democrat Brian Nathan edged out former Republican state Rep. Josie Tomkow by just 408 votes in another habitually red district. Tomkow was the favorite in the race, with a great big fundraising advantage over Nathan, a union organizer and Navy vet who was also a first-time candidate. Tomkow outspent Nathan by about 10 to one, and Nathan didn’t receive much support from the state party.

Can you say “Contest every seat,” kids? Can you say it louder, and in every last election from school board or public utility commission, all the way to the state Lege and Congress?

Again, it was a very GOP-friendly seat. In 2022, the last time it was on the ballot, then-Rep. Jay Collins was reelected by 10 percent, and in ‘24, Trump won the district by seven points and change.

Nathan’s 408-vote win looks to be just enough votes that it won’t trigger an automatic recount.

As a consolation prize, the state House District 51 seat from which Tomkow resigned so she could run for state Senate remained in GOP hands, which isn’t much of a surprise since that district is among the reddest in Florida. But it wasn’t a blowout, either; Republican Hilary Holley, who heads up an agriculture nonprofit, beat Democrat Edwin Pérez 54 percent to 46 points, an eight point margin. And even that was off from Trump’s 2024 performance, when he won by a bit more than 13 points.

The message to Democratic state parties in every state, even the reddest, should be clear: Run someone in EVERY seat.

OPEN THREAD, y’all!

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[CNN / Florida Phoenix / Politico]

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