David Jolly is running an underdog campaign that may just succeed where other Democrats have failed.
After Zohran Mamdani clinched the Democratic Party nomination for New York mayor in June, Democratic elected officials were slow to embrace him, worried about being tarred as socialists. A notable exception? The Democratic candidate for governor in the red state of Florida: David Jolly, a former congressman — and former Republican.
“I’m not at all worried about Mamdani winning as a super-progressive in the city,” said Jolly. Speaking on MSNBC with host Stephanie Ruhle, Jolly said that voters across the country were hungry for change and that the party’s tent was big enough for everyone from “a socialist Democrat” in New York to Jolly himself.
Maybe because Jolly, 52, has not been a lifelong Democrat, it was easier for him to eschew the hyper-cautious approach that has suffocated veteran Democrats in Florida for decades. But it intrigued me because his embrace of Mamdani was the first signal that his campaign would do something leaders in his party need to do more often: demonstrate how to shore up a very wide tent. America could use more of the big-tent approach to politics in this highly polarized moment.
Jolly is betting that by running a disciplined campaign that tightly focuses on economic issues important to Floridians and refuses to be baited by Republicans into debates over culture wars, he will attract support from independents and crossover Republicans.
It’s a strategy Democrats have struggled to deploy at the national level. But it has worked for Democratic governors in other Republican-majority states — like Andy Beshear in Kentucky, Steve Bullock in Montana and Laura Kelly in Kansas — said Jolly campaign adviser Eric Hyers, who ran Beshear’s and Bullock’s successful campaigns.
“Democrats can win in red states when they are laser-focused on issues that matter to voters,” Hyers told me. “I’ve seen this across the country. When one side tries to nationalize the governor’s race, that side often loses because that’s not what people wake up thinking about.”
But Florida has been remarkably hostile to Democratic gubernatorial candidates for decades. It’s been 31 years since a Democrat was elected to the governor’s mansion, seven years since the party won a statewide office, and registered Republicans outnumber Democrats by 1.3 million voters.
Across the country, Democrats are in a strong position to pick up governor’s seats now held by Republicans in Virginia, Georgia and Nevada, according to theCook Political Report. The Cook analysts list Florida, however, as a “solid R.”
After doing some 40 town halls in four months, Jolly tells audiences that he’s convinced Democrats can defy the odds in 2026. “Florida’s voters are screaming for change and our incumbents aren’t listening,” he told a bipartisan crowd last week at a Tallahassee political forum. “We are in the grips of a generational affordability crisis,” he explained.
He ticks off a list of proposed reforms that include creating a fund to replace the failing private homeowners insurance market, providing property tax relief to first-time homebuyers, investing in a 10-year “renaissance” for public schools, lowering utility costs, and applying the same rigor to private schools that accept vouchers as is applied to public schools.
Jolly knows how to identify the right issues. He spent 20 years working as an adviser to the late Florida Republican Congressman Bill Young before succeeding him in Congress. He served in the House for four years and worked on numerous political campaigns. In 2018, he left the party and became a political commentator on MSNBC.
Candidate Jolly is now following the Beshear template. He addresses differences with civility and respect. He tells South Florida’s immigrant voters that while Democrats condemn socialism and communism, “we’re going to fight for fair capitalism that lifts everybody up.” He tells the agriculture community that “your labor markets are tight because [Governor] Ron DeSantis is attacking the immigrant community, not crime.” And he tells conservatives, “we don’t have to do away with meritocracy, but we should stop attacking diversity.”
When a Republican at a recent forum asked why he was willing to “dumb down” the state’s universities to enact a plan to give admission preference to Florida residents, Jolly was courteous. “I appreciate that,” Jolly answered. “Where we can work together, we’re going to work together, and where we’re going to disagree, we’re going to disagree.”
Unlike legislative and congressional races, where Florida’s gerrymandered districts give Republicans a built-in advantage, a governor’s race is a more reliable barometer of voter sentiment. But count me among the skeptics doubtful that most Florida voters are even paying attention.
Changing that is going to be enormously expensive. That could give a huge advantage to the Republican frontrunner in the race, US Representative Byron Donalds of Naples, who has Trump’s endorsement and nearly $20 million in the bank — twenty times what Jolly has raised. He faces a primary challenge from former Florida House Speaker Paul Renner of Palm Coast and a likely challenge from Lieutenant Governor Jay Collins. None of them has much name recognition.
A recent poll commissioned by Jolly found that 62% of Florida voters do not know who he is, and more than half the state doesn’t recognize the Republican frontrunners. When matched against the Republicans, however, the poll had Jolly in a statistical tie. Nearly 20% of all voters were still undecided.
Jolly also must overcome some baggage. He makes a point to differentiate himself from former Governor Charlie Crist, another Republican-turned-Democrat who challenged DeSantis in 2022 and lost by a crushing 19 points. Crist’s explanation for leaving the GOP was that although he hadn’t changed, the party had changed. “That’s not my story,” Jolly, the son of a Baptist minister, tells his audiences. “I’ve changed some of my positions.” He points to his evolution on gun rights and abortion rights, saying he “was wrongly applying my faith teachings to a constitutional question.” He now supports restoring abortion law to its pre-Dobbs status.
But Jolly’s biggest challenge may be the one that has daunted Democrats for the last two election cycles — energizing the party’s base in Florida. The party veterans I spoke with told me that the former congressman has yet to demonstrate he’s got a foothold with Black voters who have been staying home in substantial numbers.
And he may face a primary challenger. Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings, the former Orlando police chief and husband of Val Demings — the unsuccessful Democratic candidate for US Senate in 2022 — has hinted that he “just might” run.
Jolly told me it’s his responsibility to persuade Demings and others that he is building “a coalition strong enough that they can see themselves supporting it.” That includes more work on fixing that tent.