Overview
- As of 2 p.m. Friday, Aug. 14, more than 1.47 million Floridians had cast early or vote-by-mail ballots while roughly 950,000 vote-by-mail ballots were still outstanding.
- Registered Republicans hold about a 1.5–1.6 million voter edge over Democrats, and the party breakdown of ballots cast so far is roughly 665,003 Republicans, 611,882 Democrats, and 172,268 no-party voters.
- Large counties account for much of the unreturned mail ballots, with Miami-Dade and Pinellas each over 100,000 outstanding and Palm Beach and Hillsborough holding tens of thousands more, which will affect local processing and pace of final counts.
- Early voting ends over the weekend in many counties and all vote-by-mail ballots must be in county election offices by 7 p.m. on election day, Tuesday, Aug. 18, regardless of postmark.
- The primaries are being watched as a barometer of Republican strength, Hispanic voting shifts and the impact of Florida's new districts on November House races, and county-level mail handling could change which candidates advance.