Issue #50: Florida House District 9 - The GOP's 'Fool's Gold'

Past GOP efforts to win in Tallahassee always fall short

(Conflict note: This post covers the house district I live in, and incumbent Allison Tant has been a friend for over a decade. So you may feel my conclusions are biased, but I will let the data tell the story).

Redistricting for Florida’s state house wrapped up months ago, and candidates are filing for office. You know what that means? Another Republican effort to win House District 9. For those who don’t know, HD9 is a seat that has historically been located in the suburbs and campus community of Tallahassee/Leon County. Republicans have made multiple attempts over the years to take the seat, falling short every time. Incumbent Democrat Allison Tant faces a challenge from Republican businesswoman Ashley Guy. The GOP party line is the same that it has been every time they file a candidate for the seat - “we can win.”

Well, my take is simple. This seat is the FL GOP’s perpetual fool’s gold. A seat the GOP has made constant efforts to take, but consistently fallen short. Lets delve into the data.

The New House District 9

The redistricting cycle was always likely to result in changes to HD9. The whole panhandle was under-populated, hurt by the massive growth in Central Florida. The majority-black HD8, which covers southside Leon County and neighboring Gadsden, had to grab additional voters from HD9; which itself was already was going to be forced into rural Jefferson County. The final plan saw HD9 go into Jefferson and Madison counties. The district doubled the acreage, however, 80% of its population was in the old HD9. Both Jefferson and Madison are low density, rural counties.

The rural counties are redder than Leon. The Jefferson portion votes for Trump 51%-47% while Madison voted for Trump 59%-39%. The Leon portion, however, was Biden 56%-43%. The result is a district Biden won by 9.5%.

The vote is heavily clustered in the corridor of voters around Meridian and Thomasville roads; broadly known as midtown and Northside. The FSU campus, located in the SW end of the seat, also provides a large block of Democratic votes.

The new HD9 remains steadily Democratic. The only statewide Republicans to win the seat in the last decade are Adam Putnam and Jeff Atwater; both who faced no-name Democratic opponents. Otherwise the district votes to the left of the state, sometimes by double digit margins.

HD9, regardless of its form, has long been a target by the Republican Party. However, despite past bluster that they could take the seat, the GOP has constantly fallen short. Lets take a look at past HD9 races.

Past GOP Efforts to take HD9

Without a doubt, the most high-profile effort of Republicans to win HD9 came in 2008. At the time, the district covered North Leon and a small chunk of Jefferson County. Democrat Loranne Ausley was termed out. The last time Republicans had challenged for the seat was 2000, which saw Ausley defeat former Leon Commissioner Manny Joanos by 10 points. With Ausley now leaving, Republicans recruited Peter Boulware for the seat.

Peter Boulware was the perfect GOP candidate. He was a former FSU football player who played as a linebacker for the Baltimore Ravens for 9 years. He’d retired the year before he filed, and was the VP at the Tallahassee Toyota dealership. A former Democrat, and African-American, Boulware was a strong GOP candidate in a year where Obama would win Florida. Boulware would raise almost $500,000 for his bid, the highest fundraising hall for any non-incumbent house candidate that year.

Democrats, meanwhile, had a great deal of drama. Once June qualifying came around, two democrats, lawyer/professor Michelle Rehwinkel Vasilinda and School Board member Fred Varn, were filed or the seat. Florida has a resign-to-run law. which requires elected officials to resign their office to run for something else. Varn did not think he needed to file resignation paperwork, since his school board term ended that same year. This would have been correct had his school board term ended before or the same day as his term as a state lawmaker would begin. However, it turned out Varn’s school board term would go two weeks into a state house term. Once Vasilinda realized this, she filed to get Varn kicked off the primary ballot. This effort succeeded, and Vasilinda was the official Democratic nominee. The move infuriated Varn’s supporters and sowed division within the party. Varn would go on to campaign for Boulware.

The race was a top GOP priority. Republican leaders promised Boulware would have a prime role in the caucus, while Boulware and his supporters argued that Tallahassee having a delegation member who was part of the majority would ensure state employees had a strong voice. Democrats countered that Boulware was still conservative and that it was highly unlikely the GOP caucus would back major pay increases or funding that the city wanted. Democrats also suffered from independent John Shaw - who was running on a platform of hemp legalization.

Partisanship was the major deciding factor. As Obama won Florida and took the district by 10 points, Vasilinda pulled off a narrow 0.5% win.

Boulware dominated in the northern suburbs of Tallahassee, but could not overcome the Democratic lean of the middle-suburbs that are south of I-10. Vasilinda still took the FSU area, Boulware’s FSU ties aside.

The 2010 cycle would see another effort by the GOP to take HD9. Michelle Vasilinda was facing a primary challenge from Leon Democratic Chair Rick Minor. Vasilinda had angered liberals for votes with the GOP caucus on issues around offshore oil drilling. The primary effort did not succeed, but likely made Vasilinda viewed as a moderate to non-Democrats. Republicans recruited Kirk Headley-Perdue, who self-funded over $100,000 for her race. However, Perdue was waded down by Rick Scott’s poor performance in the district in that year’s governors race. Vasilinda would go on to win by 17 points, far higher than most expected.

In 2012, HD9 was redrawn as part of redistricting. The district was confined entirely to Leon County, adding SE area precincts, namely the Southwood and Woodville communities.

Vasilinda faced a challenge from Leon GOP Chair Bradley Maxwell. Despite FL GOP aid, this campaign never really seemed to garner the attention of the past races. Maxwell only got 38% of the vote. Maxwell lost several traditionally Republican precincts in Killearn and Ox Bottom. This solid win came as Democrats gained state house seats and Obama carried Florida in his re-election bid.

In 2014, despite the red year, Republicans didn’t even field a candidate for HD9. Vasilinda’s only opposition were underfunded fellow Democrats.

In 2016, Vasilinda was termed out. Former Rep Loranne Ausley announced she would run for the district, and faced little opposition on the Democratic side. She faced Republican Jim Messer, a Tallahassee attorney. Messer managed to raise $150,000, but was dwarfed by Ausley’s $500,000. Ausley easily reclaimed the seat.

Ausley would be unopposed in 2018.

Allison Tant’s Current Term

The 2020 election cycle saw HD9 open once again. Ausley ran for, and won, a seat in the State Senate. Former Florida Democratic Party Chair Allison Tant was the democratic frontrunner for the seat. She drew only minor primary opposition and faced off against Jim Kallinger in the general election. Kallinger was actually a former State Representative from the Orlando area back in the early 2000s. Tant was always the frontrunner for the seat, raising over $450,000 while Kallinger couldn’t even cobble together $50,000. She defeated Kallinger by almost 16 points.

Tant’s 58% win was 1 point better than Joe Biden’s performance in the district. I did a precinct map from 2020 that shows how Biden and the state house democratic candidates compared; and HD9 stands out clearly in the inset.

Tant underperformed Ausley in some of the rural precincts (especially in the southern end of the district), but then flipped several suburban precincts; namely Killearn Estates and Summerbrook. That shift pretty well reflects the trends we see across the nation.

Looking Ahead to November

My general view that HD9 is a “fool’s gold” for the FL GOP is many year’s old. The 2016 and 2020 efforts came off very much as a “we just need to run someone so these Democrats have to spend their money.” Leon County and Tallahassee’s suburbs have continued to trend left, and it is incredible hard to imagine a scenario where HD9 flips red. To put it this way, if HD9 fell, it would mark the reddest midterm in ages - far more than 2010.

The FL GOP insists they will make a play for HD9. Well, I’m going to use a wrestling quote to sum up my views on these efforts.

“When the fight starts, it’s always going to end the same way.”