Vice President JD Vance held his first-ever political rally in Florida on Thursday. Why is the vice president’s midterm campaign tour stopping in a solid red state?
President Donald Trump and Vance have both both been expanding their travels beyond battleground states to visit states that GOP candidates should have in the bag. While Vance was in Lakeland, Florida, Trump visited Oklahoma.
Polls show that races that should be shoe-ins for Republicans are tighter than expected. The Cook Political Report just shifted the governor’s races in Florida and Texas from likely Republican to lean Republican. The RealClearPolitics average for the Florida gubernatorial race has Republican Rep. Byron Donalds up six percentage points against David Jolly. Similarly, Sen. Ashley Moody is up 6.6 percentage points in her reelection campaign against Angie Nixon.
These are mind-bogglingly narrow margins, especially considering Ron DeSantis won reelection as Florida governor in 2022 by 19.4 percentage points and Trump won the state in 2024 by 13.1 points.
Enter Air Force Two, flying into central Florida to boost key Republicans’ campaigns. The Daily Signal joined Vance on the trip.
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Vance articulated the 2026 Republican midterm messaging theme that the election is a choice between socialism and common sense, this time with a Florida twist.
“Now, one of the things I love about Florida is you have so many people who came to the state legally, of course, from Latin America, people who know that socialism kills,” he said. “People who saw it in their friends and their family. Well, ladies and gentlemen, when Angie Nixon calls herself a socialist, I think the right response is to say, ‘Then get the hell out of here. You don’t belong in America’.’”
He highlighted Nixon’s membership as a Democratic Socialist of America and ownership of a “communism-themed bookstore.”
He said Jolly “wants the power to force your daughters to play against boys on a soccer field” and “to take money from your pockets and give it to fraudsters.”
Vance aimed to help the base look past current cost of living concerns to see the bigger picture of showing up to the polls to make sure the “free state of Florida” stays free from socialism.
He made it clear he wasn’t in Florida because he’s worried, but because he wanted to support “some amazing up-and-coming patriots.”
“If anybody was unsure, I would say by the turnout today, it seems very obvious that Florida is MAGA country,” he said.
Vance is right that Floridians are uniquely averse to socialism due to the large number of immigrants who experienced the horrors of communism. Republicans can hold Florida through midterms if they can tap into the passion for freedom that has delivered big wins to DeSantis and Trump.
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