Florida Republicans Sweep Special Legislative Elections 2026

Florida Republicans were poised Tuesday night to sweep three special legislative elections, extending the party’s structural grip on a state that has left Democrats searching for answers heading into a critical election cycle.

Polls closed across SD 14, HD 51 and HD 87, with results expected quickly in all three contests. The outcomes themselves were never seriously in doubt. The question hanging over each race was margin, and what those margins might signal about the competitive environment Democrats desperately need ahead of November.

The highest-profile contest, SD 14, centered on Republican Josie Tomkow, who entered Election Day with a roughly 3,000-vote cushion built during early voting in a district that already leans red. Democrats pointed to stronger-than-expected engagement from their base as a potential bright spot, but party insiders conceded it was not enough to fundamentally change the math.

Down in northern Polk County, HD 51, the seat Tomkow previously held, Republican Hilary Holley faced Democrat Edwin Pérez with a significant fundraising advantage and a voter registration edge that reflected the district’s deeply Republican character. Holley was positioned for a comfortable win.

In Palm Beach County’s HD 87, the numbers told a similar story. Early voting data from the county Supervisor of Elections showed Republican Jon Maples with a clear cushion: 12,686 Republican ballots cast during early voting compared to 10,377 for Democrats, with another 4,908 from third-party and no-party voters. His opponent, Democrat Emily Gregory, faced a structural hole she would need extraordinary Election Day turnout to overcome.

For Florida Democrats, the real work of Tuesday night was not watching victory speeches. It was parsing the margins for anything that might suggest momentum. A string of underwhelming performances in special elections has haunted the state party for years. Another sweep, absent a meaningful sign of Democratic overperformance, likely signals more of the same heading into a cycle when the party needs to show it can compete statewide.

While votes were still being counted, a different kind of Florida political news broke in Southwest Florida. President Donald Trump on Tuesday threw his support behind Sydney Gruters as a potential candidate for Florida’s 16th Congressional District, the seat currently held by U.S. Rep. Vern Buchanan, who has signaled he will not seek another term.

Trump offered his “Complete and Total Endorsement” should Gruters formally enter the race, a move that instantly elevated her from a speculated contender to the clear frontrunner in a Republican-leaning district where the primary will almost certainly decide the next member of Congress.

Gruters, a Sarasota Republican who currently serves as Executive Director of the New College Foundation, stopped short of a formal announcement but left little ambiguity about her intentions. She called Trump’s support an honor and said she expects to share more about her plans “very soon.”

Her biography is deeply woven into the Republican infrastructure of Southwest Florida and Washington. She spent more than a decade working for Buchanan himself, later served as District Director for U.S. Rep. Greg Steube, and held a position in the Trump administration at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. She is also the wife of Republican National Committee Chair Joe Gruters, giving her institutional ties that few potential candidates in the district could match.

The 16th District, which stretches across Sarasota and parts of surrounding counties, has been reliably Republican territory. With Trump’s backing secured before she even filed paperwork, Gruters would enter any primary with formidable advantages in name recognition, fundraising access, and party alignment.

The convergence of these two stories on the same Tuesday night captures something real about Florida’s current political reality. Republicans are defending turf with ease in legislative specials while simultaneously managing a robust internal competition for congressional seats built on Trump loyalty and party infrastructure. Democrats, meanwhile, are left hoping that margins in low-turnout specials hold some hidden clue to a more competitive map come November.

If Tuesday’s results follow the trajectory the early numbers suggested, that clue may prove elusive.