Mainline Florida

The Washington pundits have been talking about how reactionary Alabama ex-judge Roy Moore, who won the special Republican U.S. Senate primary this past week, is likely to win the special general election for Jeff Sessions' old Senate seat in December, and how that will make an already dysfunctional Senate even more so - or Moore so.   But meanwhile, in Florida, a Democratic victory in a special election could portend what's to come in 2018. 

Former Miami-Dade County Democratic chair Annette Taddeo (above) just won a special election to fill a vacancy in the Florida State Senate, and the seat, which is in a Hispanic-majority district, had been previously held by a Republican.  The Miami area's Cuban-dominated Hispanic population has been solidly Republican for years, so the victory of Taddeo - a Colombian-American - is a big deal.  It shows that more voters are beginning to doubt the GOP's effectiveness at governance at the state and local level, and it demonstrates just how serious some Democrats - maybe even DNC chair Tom Perez (ha!) - are at winning back state legislative offices in order to put themselves in a better position to win congressional (the word "congressional" refers to both the House and Senate here) and gubernatorial elections in 2018.  

Taddeo's victory doesn't give the Democrats a majority in the Florida State Senate, but it should go a long way toward energizing Florida Democrats as they look to 2018, when Democratic U.S. Senator Bill Nelson is up for re-election and the state's voters choose a new governor to succeed the insufferable Rick Scott, who is thankfully ineligible to run for a third term.  Taddeo is the seventh Democrat to flip a former Republican state legislative seat since Trump won the Presidency.  Martin O'Malley and Joe Biden - both potential candidates for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination - campaigned for her.  They get it.  Let's hope Perez finally does as well.   

(P.S.  Also, in New Hampshire, Democrat Kari Lerner won a special election for a seat in the state House of Representatives, defeating her Republican opponent in a upset and becoming the eighth Democrat to flip a former Republican state legislative seat since November 2016.)