Democratic hold Democratic gain Republican hold Republican gain Independent gain No election
United States gubernatorial elections were held on November 8, 2022, in 36 states and three territories. As most governors serve four-year terms, the last regular gubernatorial elections for all but two of the seats took place in the 2018 U.S. gubernatorial elections.[a] The gubernatorial elections took place concurrently with several other federal, state, and local elections, as part of the 2022 midterm elections.
This is the first midterm cycle since 1998 in which the non-incumbent party suffered net losses, the first since 1986 in which the incumbent party gained seats overall, and the first since 1934 in which Democrats did so.[1] Democrats won the popular vote in this gubernatorial election cycle by 0.24 points, making this the closest midterm gubernatorial election cycle since at least 1990.[2] However, the 2019 off-year elections were won by Democrats with a smaller margin of 0.01 points.
Partisan composition
Going into the election, there were 28 Republican governors and 22 Democratic governors in the United States. This class of governors is made up of 20 Republicans and 16 Democrats. In contrast to 2018, where Republicans were defending eight seats in states won by Hillary Clinton in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Republicans held six seats in states won by Joe Biden in the 2020 U.S. presidential election (Vermont, New Hampshire, Arizona, Georgia, Massachusetts, and Maryland). Meanwhile, Democrats were defending four governorships in states Trump had previously won (Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin in 2016, and Kansas in 2016 and 2020).
Election predictions
Several sites and individuals publish predictions of competitive seats. These predictions look at factors such as the strength of the incumbent (if the incumbent is running for re-election), the strength of the candidates, and the partisan leanings of the state (reflected in part by the state's Cook Partisan Voting Index rating). The predictions assign ratings to each state, with the rating indicating the predicted advantage that a party has in winning that seat.
Most election predictors use:
"tossup": no advantage
"tilt" (used by some predictors): advantage that is not quite as strong as "lean"
"lean": slight advantage
"likely": significant, but surmountable, advantage
IncumbentRepublican governor Kay Ivey took office on April 10, 2017, upon the resignation of former governor Robert J. Bentley, and was elected to a full term in 2018. She ran for re-election to a second full term and won in a landslide.[19]
Primary elections in Alabama were held on May 24. Runoff elections for instances where no candidate received 50% plus one vote were scheduled for June 21. A runoff was avoided in the Republican primary, with Ivey winning outright. The Democratic primary advanced to a runoff between Malika Sanders-Fortier and Yolanda Flowers, with Flowers winning the Democratic nomination.
This was the first gubernatorial election in Alabama history in which both major party nominees were women. Flowers was also the first Black female gubernatorial nominee in Alabama.[20] Governor Ivey was re-elected and sworn in for her second full term on January 16, 2023.
This is the only gubernatorial election in the 2020s to be won by a member of the Silent Generation.
Incumbent Republican governor Mike Dunleavy won re-election to a second term, becoming the first Republican governor to be re-elected to a second term since Jay Hammond in 1978 and the first governor, regardless of political affiliation, to be re-elected to a second term since Tony Knowles in 1998.
Primaries were held on August 2 for both parties, with Lake winning the Republican nomination and Hobbs winning the Democratic nomination, making this the first gubernatorial election in Arizona history in which both major party candidates for governor were women. Hobbs became the fifth female governor of Arizona, with Arizona setting a record for the most female governors in American history.[28][29] With the concurrent passage of Proposition 131, this will be the last gubernatorial election in Arizona without a lieutenant governor on the ticket.[30]
Going into the election, most polling had Lake leading and analysts generally considered the race to either be a tossup or leaning towards the Republican. Nonetheless, Hobbs ultimately defeated Lake with 50.32% of the vote, becoming the first Democrat elected governor of Arizona since Janet Napolitano in 2006. Lake refused to concede and filed a post-election lawsuit in an attempt to overturn the results, with all her claims either being dismissed or ruled against for lack of evidence.[31]
This race was one of six Republican-held governorships up for election in 2022 taking place in a state that was carried by Democrat Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election. With a margin of 0.67%, it was the closest election of the 2022 gubernatorial election cycle.
Leading up to the Republican primary, Sanders received many endorsements from key Republican figures, including Donald Trump, Mike Pence, incumbent Asa Hutchinson, Arkansas' entire U.S. Congressional delegation, and dozens of GOP representatives from the State House and State Senate. She cruised to a landslide victory in the primary, and as Arkansas is a GOP stronghold, her victory virtually guaranteed she would win the general election, in which she defeated Jones by 28 points. Jones became the first Democrat to win Washington County since 2010, and Sanders became the first Republican to win majority-Black Crittenden County since her father in 1998. This is the first time ever that a Republican won three straight gubernatorial elections in the state's history.
Sanders became the first female governor of Arkansas, as well as the first daughter of a former governor to take office in United States history. In addition, with the election of Leslie Rutledge as lieutenant governor, Arkansas, along with Massachusetts, became the first two U.S. states to have both a female governor and female lieutenant governor serving at the same time.
The elections featured universal mail-in ballots; in-person voting was also available.[39] All statewide elected offices are currently held by Democrats. Newsom won 61.9% of the vote in both the 2018 gubernatorial election and the 2021 recall election. He received 55.9% of the top-two primary vote and faced Republican Partystate senatorBrian Dahle, who received 17.7% of the primary vote, in the general election.[40] Newsom easily won re-election with 59.2% of the vote to Dahle's 40.8%, but with a smaller margin of victory than in 2018. Dahle flipped five counties that Newsom carried in 2018, namely Lake, Merced (although Merced voted to recall Newsom), Orange, San Bernardino, and San Joaquin. Dahle received 32% of the vote in Los Angeles County, a respectable performance for a Republican in the Democratic stronghold.
Polis's 2022 victory marked the first time in American history that an openly gay politician was re-elected governor of a state.[45] Polis had the best performance for a re-elected Colorado governor since Bill Owens in 2002, the best for a Democrat since Roy Romer in 1990, and the highest raw vote total ever in a Colorado gubernatorial race.
GovernorNed Lamont was elected in 2018 with 49.4% of the vote and ran for re-election for a second term. The race simultaneously took place with the election to the state's Class III Senate seat. This election featured a rematch of the previous 2018 gubernatorial election, pitting Lamont against RepublicanBob Stefanowski, who he previously defeated by 3.2% of the vote.[48] This time Lamont won re-election by a wider margin, becoming the first Democrat to win a gubernatorial election by more than 5 points in the state since 1986. This is the first time since 1994 that Tolland County voted Democratic in a gubernatorial election.
DeSantis won re-election by a sizable margin due to the state as a whole swinging further Republican than it voted in the 2020 United States presidential election and continuing the state's rightward shift since the 2008 United States presidential election. County flips by DeSantis were Miami-Dade, Palm Beach, Hillsborough, and Osceola counties, all of which were previous Democratic Party strongholds; these counties, notably, have relatively high Latino populations, for which their growth in support for the Republican Party was further cemented.[56][57] This election was seen by many to more firmly assert Florida's status as a red state and not a swing state.[58][57]
Incumbent Republican governor Brian Kemp won re-election to a second term, defeating Democratic nominee Stacey Abrams in a rematch. Abrams conceded on election night.[62] The primary occurred on May 24, 2022.[63] Kemp was sworn in for a second term on January 12, 2023.
Libertarian Shane T. Hazel, the Libertarian nominee for U.S. Senate in 2020, also declared he would run.[66] This race was one of six Republican-held governorships up for election in 2022 in a state carried by Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election.
Despite Kemp's narrow 55,000-vote victory in 2018, which was Georgia's closest gubernatorial election since 1966, he went on to win by 300,000 votes (7.5%) – the largest raw vote victory for a Georgia governor since 2006. The race was seen as a potential benefit to Herschel Walker, who ran in the concurrent Senate race, as it was speculated Kemp's strong performance could help Walker avoid a runoff. He vastly underperformed compared to Kemp, however, and lost to incumbent Democratic senator Raphael Warnock in the December 6 runoff election.[67][68]
Incumbent Democratic governor David Ige was term-limited and ineligible to run for a third consecutive term. Incumbent lieutenant governorJosh Green was the Democratic nominee, and faced former lieutenant governor Duke Aiona, the Republican nominee. This marked the third time Aiona had been the Republican gubernatorial nominee, having previously run unsuccessfully in 2010 and 2014. Green won the election with 63.2% of the vote with Aiona receiving 36.8% of the vote.[71][72]
Green's performance was the highest percentage of the vote ever received by any gubernatorial candidate in the state's history. Despite this, Aiona performed 3 points better and received 20,000 more raw votes than Andria Tupola did in 2018.
GovernorBrad Little was elected in 2018 with 59.8% of the vote and ran for re-election to a second term. Little won his re-election bid by a landslide, defeating his Democratic challenger Stephen Heidt.
Incumbent lieutenant governorJanice McGeachin announced a primary challenge to Little, but Little won the Republican primary.[75] Anti-government activist Ammon Bundy also announced a run for the Republican nomination, but switched to an independent on February 17, 2022.[76]
GovernorJ. B. Pritzker was elected in 2018 with 54.5% of the vote and ran for a second term.[80] In the general election, Pritzker won re-election with 54.9% of the vote.
Republican candidates who announced their candidacy included Richard Irvin, Darren Bailey, Gary Rabine, Paul Schimpf, and Jesse Sullivan. Bailey won the primary on June 28.[81]
GovernorKim Reynolds took office on May 24, 2017, upon the resignation of Terry Branstad and was elected to a full term in her own right in 2018 with 50.3% of the vote. She ran for re-election to a second full term.[86] In the general election, incumbent Republican governor Kim Reynolds won re-election in a landslide, defeating Democratic nominee Deidre DeJear.
Democrat Deidre DeJear, who announced her candidacy in August 2021,[87] was the Democratic nominee.[88]
GovernorLaura Kelly, a Democrat, was elected in 2018 with 48% of the vote and ran for re-election to a second term.[91] On the Republican side, Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt ran against her.[92]
Kelly narrowly won re-election, defeating Schmidt by 49.4% of the vote to 47.4% and by a margin of 20,614 votes in a minor upset.
Laura Kelly won the election by a margin of 2.2 percentage points over Derek Schmidt, similar to the percentage of votes that independent Dennis Pyle received. Kansas Republican Party Chair Mike Kuckelman pointed to this as evidence that Pyle was somewhat responsible for Schmidt's defeat. However, Pyle insisted that "Kansas needed a strong conservative candidate" and instead highlighted Schmidt's underperformance compared to other Republican candidates in Kansas.[93]
Kelly's personal popularity was also a factor in her victory, where a majority of voters approved of Kelly's job performance, while only a third did so for President Joe Biden.[94][95] Her win was also propelled by Democratic candidates' increased strength in suburban areas, such as Johnson County, in spite of Schmidt's increased vote share from 2018 in the Republican strongholds of rural Kansas.[96]
GovernorJanet Mills, a Democrat, was first elected in 2018 with 50.9% of the vote. Mills easily won re-election, soundly defeating Paul LePage by over 13 points, 55.7%–42.4%.[99] Hunkler took 1.9%. Mills's margin of victory was the largest for any Maine gubernatorial candidate since Angus King won re-election in 1998, and the largest victory for a statewide Democratic candidate since George J. Mitchell won re-election to the US Senate in 1988.
Incumbent governor Larry Hogan, the two-term Republican, was term-limited and could not seek a third consecutive term.
The Democratic and Republican primaries were held on July 19,[102] with state delegate Dan Cox securing the Republican nomination, while author and former nonprofit CEO Wes Moore won the Democratic nomination. Political observers gave Moore a strong chance of defeating Cox in the general election in this reliably Democratic state where Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-to-1. Shortly after polls closed, several national news organizations called the election for Moore. Moore became the first African-Americangovernor of Maryland after being sworn in on January 18, 2023.[103]
This race was also one of six Republican-held governorships up for election in 2022 in a state carried by Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, and one of three that voted for Biden by double-digits. Moore flipped six counties that had voted for Hogan in 2018, and his electoral strength largely came from densely populated Prince George's County and Baltimore, where he improved on the margins of 2018 Democratic nominee Ben Jealous by roughly 20 percent. Moore's margin of victory was the highest of any gubernatorial candidate in the state since William Donald Schaefer in 1986.[104]
GovernorCharlie Baker was re-elected to a second term in 2018 with 66.6% of the vote. Because Massachusetts does not have gubernatorial term limits in its Constitution, he was eligible to run for re-election for a third term. However, in December 2021, Baker announced he would not be running for re-election.[110][111]
Diehl and Healey won their respective primaries on September 6.
Due to Massachusetts's strong liberal lean and Diehl's conservative political views, Healey was widely expected to win the election. The general election was called for the Democrat shortly after polls closed, with Healey becoming the first woman ever elected governor of Massachusetts and the first openly lesbian governor to take office in United States history.[112]
Incumbent Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer ran for re-election to a second term and faced former political commentator Tudor Dixon in the general election.[115] Whitmer defeated Dixon by a vote margin of nearly 11 percentage points, a larger victory than when she was first elected four years prior.
In the end, Jensen's advantage in rural Greater Minnesota could not overcome Walz's large lead in the Twin Cities metropolitan area, with Walz going on to win the election with a comfortable 7.7% margin. However, this was the first time ever in Walz's career that he lost Minnesota's 1st congressional district, the district that he used to represent in Congress and prior to this election, carried seven times in a row. This election was also the first time ever that Walz failed to carry the following counties in any election which he ran in: Freeborn County, Houston County, Mower County, and Winona County. Winona County was significant given the fact that President Joe Biden carried the county in 2020.
The race took on increased importance in October 2022, when U.S. Senator Ben Sasse announced he would resign and Ricketts said he would allow the winner of the 2022 gubernatorial election to appoint Sasse's replacement.[125] The winner, Jim Pillen, ultimately decided to appoint his predecessor (Ricketts) to fill Sasse's seat.
Sisolak was the first Democrat to seek re-election to Nevada's governorship since Bob Miller in 1994, and was subsequently the only incumbent governor in the United States to lose re-election in the 2022 elections. Decision Desk HQ called the race for Lombardo on November 11.[129] Amid a slate of failed gubernatorial pickup attempts, this was the only governorship Republicans flipped in the 2022 elections, as well as the only governorship in a state carried by one party in the prior presidential election to flip to the other party. This was also the first time since Pat Quinn's defeat in the 2014 Illinois gubernatorial election that an incumbent Democratic governor had lost re-election.
Incumbent Republican governorChris Sununu was re-elected in 2020 with 65.1% of the vote and ran for a fourth term.[137] Physician Tom Sherman challenged Sununu as a Democrat.[138] Chris Sununu won re-election to a fourth term.
GovernorMichelle Lujan Grisham was elected in 2018 with 57.2% of the vote and ran for a second term.[141] The Republican nominee is former meteorologist Mark Ronchetti.[142] Incumbent Democratic governor Michelle Lujan Grisham won a second term. She was first elected in 2018 with 57.2% of the vote. This was the first gubernatorial election in New Mexico since 1986 in which the winner was from the same party as the incumbent president.
GovernorAndrew Cuomo was re-elected to a third term in 2018 with 59.6% of the vote. Because New York does not have gubernatorial term limits in its Constitution, he was eligible to run for re-election for a fourth term. On May 28, 2019, Cuomo announced that he would run for re-election for a fourth term in 2022.[145][146]
Larry Shape is the Libertarian candidate for governor. The state board of elections disqualified him for not meeting ballot access requirements. He continued as a write in candidate.[156] He was also the Libertarian nominee in the 2018 election.[157]
GovernorMike DeWine was elected in 2018 with 50.4% of the vote and ran for re-election to a second term.
DeWine faced a primary challenge from former US Representative and 2018 Ohio Republican Senate Nominee Jim Renacci and farmer Joe Blystone. Former Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley[161][162][163] and former Cincinnati Mayor John Cranley[164] ran for the Democratic nomination.DeWine and Whaley won their respective primaries on May 3.
Incumbent Republican governor Mike DeWine won re-election to a second term in a landslide, defeating Democrat nominee Nan Whaley, the former mayor of Dayton, 62.8% to 37.2%.[165] DeWine's 25-point victory marked the continuation of a trend in which every incumbent Republican governor of Ohio since 1978 has won re-election by a double digit margin.
This was the first time since 1994 in which Trumbull and Mahoning counties have gone to the Republican candidate with over 60% of the vote.
GovernorKevin Stitt was elected in 2018 with 54.3% of the vote and ran for re-election to a second term.[168] Former state senator and physician Ervin Yen filed paperwork to challenge Stitt in the Republican Primary.[169] Stitt won the primary on June 28.[170]
On October 7, 2021, Oklahoma Superintendent of Public InstructionJoy Hofmeister announced she would be switching to the Democratic Party and subsequently announced her campaign for the Democratic nomination for governor.[171][172] Hofmeister won the nomination on June 28, defeating former state senator Connie Johnson in the primary.[170] Natalie Bruno has filed to run for the Libertarian Party's nomination.[173] Paul Tay has filed with the state ethics commission to run as an independent.[174]
Although Stitt won by a comfortable margin, his performance was the worst of any 2022 Republican candidate for statewide office in Oklahoma. Meanwhile, Hofmeister's performance was the second best of any 2022 Democratic statewide candidate in Oklahoma, only behind State Superintendent of Public Instruction nominee Jena Nelson.
The incumbent governor, DemocratKate Brown, took office on February 18, 2015, upon the resignation of John Kitzhaber.[179] She was subsequently elected in the gubernatorial special election in 2016,[180] and was re-elected to a full term in 2018.[181] Due to term limits, she was ineligible for re-election in 2022.[182]
The Oregonian anticipated the election to have "the first competitive Democratic primary in more than a decade and potentially the closest such race since 2002."[183]Willamette Week anticipated a "wide open field of Democrats", citing the lack of an incumbent.[184] Almost 20 Republican candidates ran for the office, including two previous nominees for governor in 1998 and 2016,[185][186] as well as 15 Democrats and some non-affiliates/third-party members.[187]
In the May 17 primary elections, former Oregon House Speaker Tina Kotek was declared the winner of the Democratic primary half an hour after the ballot deadline.[188] The next day, former House Minority Leader Christine Drazan was determined to have won the Republican primary.[189] Notably, the general election featured three prominent female candidates, including former state senator Betsy Johnson, who was a moderate Democrat, running as an independent.
Oregon was considered a possible Republican pickup, as Brown had the lowest approval rating of any governor in the United States at the time and Johnson could have siphoned votes from Kotek.[190][191][192] Nonetheless, Kotek won the election by a slim margin, becoming Oregon's 7th consecutive Democratic governor.[193] She became one of the first lesbian governors in the United States, along with Maura Healey in Massachusetts.[194]
Democratic state attorney general Josh Shapiro defeated Republican state senator Doug Mastriano in a landslide victory to succeed term-limited incumbent Democratic governor Tom Wolf. Primaries were held on May 17, 2022. Shapiro won the Democratic nomination after running unopposed and Mastriano won the Republican nomination with 44% of the vote. Mastriano's nomination drew attention due to his far-right political views.[198][199][200][201]
Shapiro defeated Mastriano by almost 15 points, a margin consistent with most polls. Shapiro scored the largest margin for a non-incumbent candidate for governor since 1946,[202][203] and his victory marked the first time since 1844 that the Democratic Party won three consecutive gubernatorial elections in Pennsylvania. Shapiro also made history by earning the most votes of any gubernatorial candidate in the state's history, garnering just over three million votes. Austin Davis was elected lieutenant governor, and became the second African-American elected to statewide office in the state's history, following Republican Timothy DeFoor in 2020.
Shapiro's large margin of victory has been widely credited with helping down-ballot Democrats in concurrent elections.
McMaster won the general election with 58% of the vote — a subsequently larger majority than in 2018. McMaster took office on January 24, 2017, upon the resignation of Nikki Haley, and was elected to a full term in 2018.
South Carolina Gubernatorial Republican Primary Election, 2022
GovernorKristi Noem was elected in 2018 with 51% of the vote, and ran for re-election to a second term.[211] The Democratic nominee is state representative Jamie Smith.[212] Noem won a second term, winning 62% of the vote.
The Democratic and Republican primaries were held on March 1, 2022. O'Rourke and Abbott won outright majorities in their respective primaries, and therefore did not participate in the May 24 runoffs.
Texas has not voted for a Democratic candidate for governor since Ann Richards in 1990. Additionally, Abbott had a strong approval rating on election day, with 55% of voters approving to 45% disapproving.[221] Beto O'Rourke, who gained national attention in 2018 for his unusually close and competitive campaign against Senator Ted Cruz, was widely viewed as a rising star in the Texas Democratic Party and potential challenger for Abbott, but a failed run for President of the United States in 2020 prompted criticisms of opportunism, via Republican attempts to brand him as anti-law enforcement and his former comments on guns.
Abbott won re-election by 10.9%, which is a margin slightly smaller than his 13.3% in 2018 in spite of a much redder national climate in 2022, making this the closest gubernatorial election in Texas since 2006, and the closest election of Abbott's entire political career since his first race for the Texas Supreme Court in 1998. Beto O'Rourke, meanwhile, performed 8.3% worse than his 2018 Senate run, but did still win the highest share for a Democratic gubernatorial candidate since Ann Richards received 45.88% in her unsuccessful reelection bid against George W. Bush in 1994. Abbott's raw vote total was less than his 4.65 million in 2018, while O'Rourke set a record of most raw votes for a Texas Democratic gubernatorial candidate at around 3.55 million, but was also less than his 4.04 million vote total in the 2018 Senate race.
Abbott carried 235 out of 254 counties in his re-election victory, flipping the heavily Hispanic counties of Culberson and Zapata and becoming the first Republican gubernatorial candidate to win the latter in the state's history (though Zapata had voted Republican in the 2020 presidential election), while O'Rourke became the first Democratic gubernatorial candidate to win the county of Fort Bend since 1974. O'Rourke outperformed Joe Biden two years prior among Latino voters though his performance with them was still worse than past nominees.
Incumbent Republican governorPhil Scott was re-elected in 2020 with 68.5% of the vote and ran for re-election to a fourth term.
In the general election, Scott easily defeated Democrat Brenda Siegel for his fourth consecutive term.[224][225]
This race was one of six Republican-held governorships up for election in 2022 in a state carried by Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election. Scott's victory, in which he carried every municipality in the state, is the largest by margin in a Vermont gubernatorial race since Howard Dean's landslide in 1996. Scott's 47-point victory margin was the largest for a Republican candidate since 1950, even while Democratic congressman Peter Welch won the concurrent U.S. Senate election by a 40-point margin.
This was the first gubernatorial election in Wisconsin since 2006 in which a Democrat won with an outright majority of the vote, the first since 1990 in which the winner was from the same party as the incumbentpresident, and the first since 1962 in which Wisconsin voted for a Democratic governor at the same time the party held the presidency. This was also the first gubernatorial election in the state since 1998 in which the winning candidate was of a different party than the winner of the concurrent U.S. Senate election.
GovernorMark Gordon was elected in 2018 with 67.1% of the vote and ran for re-election to a second term.[231] Perennial candidate Rex Rammell[232] and truck driver Aaron Nab[233] were primary challenging Gordon.
Gordon and Livingston won their primaries on August 16, 2022. Livingston's 16.3% of the vote was the worst performance that year in a gubernatorial or senate race, doing worse than Leslie Petersen's 22.9% in 2010 and Brenda Siegel's 26.2% in Vermont 2022, and the worst performance by a Democrat in gubernatorial race in Wyoming history.
GovernorRalph Torres became governor on December 29, 2015, upon the death of incumbent governor Eloy Inos.[244][245] He was elected to his first full term in 2018 with 62.2% of the vote. Torres was challenged by his lieutenant governor, Arnold Palacios, a career Republican who ran as an independent, and by Democratic representative Tina Sablan. Torres earned 38.8% of the votes in the general election, ahead of Palacios and Sablan, but since no candidate won a clear majority a runoff between Torres and Palacios was held on November 25. Palacios, who gained the backing of Sablan, won the runoff handily, earning 54.05% of the vote.[246]
GovernorAlbert Bryan was elected in 2018 with 54.5% of the vote and ran for re-election to a second term.[249] St. Croix Democratic senator Kurt Vialet is running as an independent.[250]
2022 U.S. Virgin Islands gubernatorial election [251]
^FiveThirtyEight has three separate models for their House and Senate ratings: Lite (polling data only), Classic (polls, fundraising, and past voting patterns), and Deluxe (Classic alongside experts' ratings). This table uses the Deluxe model.
^Suspended her campaign and endorsed Dunleavy on October 25, 2022 after allegations of sexual harassment against Pierce but remained on the ballot.[26]
^Candidate received the nominations of both the Democratic and Progressive parties and will be listed on the ballot as "Democratic/Progressive" (candidate is primarily a Democrat).
^Carrasquillo, Adrian (November 9, 2022). "Ron DeSantis Wins the Florida Latino Vote, Setting Stage for 2024 Clash". Newsweek. Retrieved November 12, 2022. [DeSantis] flipped Miami-Dade County, Florida's political crown jewel, which completed a stunning reversal in just six years, after backing Hillary Clinton by 30 points in 2016, Joe Biden by 7 in 2020, and now DeSantis by 11 points. In running up the score, DeSantis also secured another major win, becoming the first Florida Republican gubernatorial candidate to win the Latino vote in 20 years, and the first Republican governor to do so since Brian Sandoval in Nevada in 2014. ... Devon Murphy-Anderson, the former finance director for the Florida Democratic Party and cofounder of Mi Vecino, which works to activate Latino voters in Florida, told Newsweek that while Miami-Dade is getting all of the attention, DeSantis' complete and total win also impressively flipped traditional blue areas like Palm Beach County and Hillsborough County. "It's important to know this was a strategy from Florida Republicans, and not to shift the blame to Latino voters," she argued, seeing the results as "a response to strategic investment by a political party."
^ abTawfik, Nada (November 12, 2022). "Ron DeSantis: How the Republican governor conquered Florida". BBC News. Retrieved November 12, 2022. DeSantis outperformed Trump's 2020 figures in key groups that Democrats will need to hold onto the White House. He made gains with Latinos, women and even slightly with black voters, which allowed him to flip counties that traditionally favour Democrats such as Palm Beach, Osceola and of course Miami Dade. He was the first Republican governor since 2002 to win the state's most populous and heavily Hispanic county - not only with Cuban Americans who traditionally lean Republican but also many South Americans and Puerto Ricans who tend to vote Democratic. Joe Biden won the Latino vote in Florida by seven points in 2020 and now DeSantis has carried it by 15 points. These results will shape Florida's politics for years to come. In his victory speech, the governor declared that they had "rewritten the political map". There is no question that Florida is now a Republican state, ending its status as one of the most important swing states in the nation.