FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Both candidates are publicly expressing optimism, but no one knows as of Wednesday afternoon, more than 21 hours after the polls closed, if Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick or Dale Holness will be the next member of Congress from South Florida.
Unofficial results, unchanged since just after midnight Wednesday, showed the two candidates separated by just nine votes — out of 49,008 cast.
“When you’re dealing with ... or a handful or couple of dozen votes, as it is right now, when all the votes aren’t even counted, then it really is a toss-up,” said Democratic strategist Sean Phillippi. “It could go either way.”
A likely winner probably won’t be known until Nov. 12, while a final resolution, certification by the state Elections Canvassing Commission, doesn’t happen until Nov. 16. And that assumes no one files any lawsuits.
Both candidates are vying to fill the vacancy created by the April 6 death of the late Congressman Alcee Hastings.
“It’s a shocker. A shocker,” said Chris Smith, a former state legislator from Broward who served as Democratic Party leader in both the Florida Senate and House. “But when you look at it, it’s explainable.”
Not only is the race close, but it will end up being decided by a small pool of voters. More than four out of five registered Democrats didn’t bother voting in the primary.
A Republican, a Libertarian and two no party affiliation/independent candidates will appear on the Jan. 11 general election ballot. But the 20th Congressional District is so heavily Democratic that winning the party primary is tantamount to winning the seat.
Different candidates, different strategies
Holness is a veteran elected official with ties to the business and political worlds. Cherfilus-McCormick is a young progressive who has never before held elected office.
Holness positioned himself, with the tacit approval of Hastings, as the congressman’s political heir. Cherfilus-McCormick twice ran against Hastings, in the 2018 and 2020 primaries.
Cherfilus-McCormick’s signature issue was giving a monthly, $1,000 government check to everyone over 18 who earns less than $75,000 a year.
She promoted the plan heavily in media advertising, starting months ago. She was able to effectively promote the campaign because she put in $2.1 million of her own money into the campaign. Cherfilus-McCormick, a lawyer, is CEO of Trinity Health Care Services, a home health care company.
Voters often respond positively to what candidates say they’ll do for the community, Phillippi said.
Holness, who works in real estate, is a consummate political insider. He’s been a Broward County commissioner since 2010, including a one-year term as county mayor. Previously he was a member of the Lauderhill City Commission. He spent years developing a political organization in Broward, helping turn out the vote for his own campaigns and others with an eye toward an eventual run for Congress.
Those factors contributed to their ending up at the finish line together, but they aren’t the full picture.
Holness performed especially well in Broward — particularly among Caribbean American voters. (The 20th District includes most of the African American and Caribbean American communities in Broward and Palm Beach counties.)
“Dale has the largest and most loyal base of any of the candidates,” said Phillippi, who was a consultant for the candidate in 2016, but didn’t work for any candidate this year. ″The Caribbean voters west of (U.S.) 441 in his commission district are very loyal to him.”
Cherfilus-McCormick did well in Palm Beach County, where none of the candidates were well known, Smith said. Though it’s home to only about a quarter of the district’s registered Democrats, Holness finished far behind.
The leading Broward-based candidates, Holness, Thurston and County Commissioner Barbara Sharief all held elected office for years. And in Broward, Smith said, people voted for candidates they knew.
Candidates from the Palm Beach County part of the district weren’t as well known, Smith said. State Rep. Omari Hardy has had short tenure in the Legislature and previously on t he Lake Worth Beach City Commission. As a former state representative and former Palm Beach County commissioner, Priscilla Taylor, wasn’t much in the public eye recently.
Phillippi said gender was a big advantage for Cherfilus-McCormick.
Though he hasn’t reviewed data from this primary, he said voters in such contests are typically 60% female and 40% male — a plus for Cherfilus-McCormick.
Future
Regardless of who ends up as Hastings’ immediate successor, many people in the political world said the competition for the seat is just beginning.
Hastings won the first of 15 congressional elections in 1992. But with the winner of this year’s special election emerging with about 24% of the vote in a low turnout election, a competitive primary is expected in August 2022. Voters will choose candidates to run for a full two-year term.
Phillippi, Smith and others don’t see anything in the results that would discourage the losing candidate, and perhaps others from running in 2022.
“They both can look at things and justify a rematch should they come up just a little bit short,” Phillippi said.
Regardless of which one wins, Smith said, “this result guarantees another tough race in August of 2022. Someone winning with 23% of the vote — everybody’s looking at 76% did not want this person or wanted somebody else so ‘I’m going to run.’” (Smith, who years ago had considered running for Congress, said emphatically he had no interest in doing so.)
Next steps
Before the 2022 campaign gets underway, a 2021 winner will be determined.
Florida law requires a machine recount if two candidates are separated by 0.5% or less. As of Wednesday, Cherfilus-McCormick and Holness were 0.02% apart.
If the machine recount shows less than 0.25% separation, selected ballots are counted by hand. Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections said ballots that the tabulation equipment can’t count during the machine recount are pulled out.
That includes ballots in which there isn’t any vote, if someone tried to vote for more than one candidate, or if someone doesn’t mark the ballot correctly. Examples include circling the candidate’s entire name, placing a check mark next to a candidate’s name, or crossing out the name of every other candidate on the ballot.
Ultimately, each county’s three-member elections Canvassing Board decides on any questionable ballots, Link said. Candidate representatives can observe everything that happens and can raise objections to Canvassing Board decisions.
Anticipating a close race, Link scheduled recount steps, including a public notice of the Canvassing Board for Friday. In Broward, Elections Supervisor Joe Scott did the same. Each canvassing board has the supervisor of elections, a county commissioner and a judge, who chairs the proceedings.
Link said the recounting could be completed Friday. But in such a close election, the winner may not be known until at least Nov. 12. That’s the deadline for military and overseas ballots that were postmarked by Tuesday to arrive back and get counted.
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