MIAMI — Less than three weeks after emerging as the de facto Democratic presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris has opened up a double-digit lead over former President Donald Trump in Miami-Dade County, according to a new poll from a top Miami Democratic consultant.
The survey, released Thursday by Democratic strategist Christian Ulvert, a top campaign adviser to several Miami-Dade candidates including Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, shows Harris notching the support of nearly 54% of Miami-Dade likely voters. Trump, a South Florida resident with an outsized business presence in the county, has just under 40% support. The poll’s margin of error is 4.6 percentage points.
The poll of 1,071 of likely general election voters in Miami-Dade County, conducted over the first five days of August by Plantation-based MDW Communications, is likely to be touted as a sign of improving fortunes for Democrats, who have faced an increasingly difficult political terrain in Florida in recent years. Trump carried the state in both 2016 and 2020, while the 2022 midterm elections saw Republicans win supermajorities in both chambers of the state Legislature and clinch every statewide elected office.
Gov. Ron DeSantis won reelection that year by 19 points statewide, while also carrying Miami-Dade, Florida’s most populous county and a part of the state that Democrats long relied on to deliver them hefty sums of votes.
Thursday’s poll found Harris winning several key voting blocs in Miami-Dade, including 55% of women and 52% of men. Among non-Cuban Hispanic voters, 58% said they plan to support Harris compared to 38% who are backing Trump. Trump still holds the lead among Cuban Americans, who have historically backed Republican candidates; 61% said they will vote for the former president, while 33% plan to support Harris, according to the poll.
While he’s already widely expected to win Florida overall in November, speculation has swirled among both Republicans and Democrats about whether Trump might be able to capture Miami-Dade. A survey commissioned by Ulvert last November found Trump leading President Joe Biden by 11 percentage points in the county.
But Biden’s sudden exit from the presidential race last month has upended the political playing field and given Democrats a jolt of momentum, both in key battleground states and nationwide. In a polling memo shared with reporters on Thursday, Ulvert wrote that the newfound enthusiasm has extended to Miami-Dade County.
“With 90 days until Election Day, the Vice President’s lead in the largest Hispanic majority county in the state of Florida affirms the coalition of voters who are excited to look ahead rather than go backwards,” Ulvert wrote.
Yet a 14-point lead in Miami-Dade likely wouldn’t be enough to put Florida in play for Harris. In 2016, then-Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton beat Trump in the county by about 30 percentage points — nearly 300,000 votes — but failed to win the statewide vote in Florida.
The poll still offers some positive signs for other Democrats running in Miami-Dade. In a hypothetical general election matchup between county sheriff candidates James Reyes, a Democrat, and Rosie Cordero-Stutz, a Trump-endorsed Republican, Reyes leads by 10 percentage points, according to the survey, though roughly a quarter of voters remain undecided in that race.
The poll also shows Democratic candidates leading Republicans in the races for Miami-Dade clerk of courts and comptroller, tax collector and supervisor of elections.
There’s also broad support for Amendment 4, a proposed state constitutional amendment that would guarantee abortion access before “fetal viability” — generally understood to be around 24 weeks of pregnancy – or if deemed medically necessary by a patient’s doctor. Sixty-six percent of voters surveyed said they plan to vote in favor of the measure compared to only 22% who said they will oppose it, according to the poll. The proposed amendment will need to win at least 60% of the statewide vote in November to pass.
By MAX GREENWOOD/Miami Herald
Max Greenwood is the Miami Herald’s senior political correspondent. A Florida native, he covered campaigns at The Hill from both Washington, D.C. and Florida for six years before joining the Herald in 2023.