Congressional race in Central Florida could help decide who wins presidency
“Flipping FL-15 needs to be treated as every bit as important as the presidential race itself to safeguard our democracy.”
Alan Cohn, Democratic candidate for Florida’s 15th Congressional District
President Donald Trump’s recent attacks on voting integrity have opened a Pandora’s box of unlikely “what if” scenarios for after the election, the kind that keeps constitutional scholars awake at night. In doing so, Trump has unwittingly elevated a handful of contested congressional races where the outcome could conceivably determine who is the next president.
The contest between Democrat Alan Cohn and Republican Scott Franklin for Florida’s 15th Congressional District that reaches into Polk County is one of them.
Under the Constitution, the House of Representatives settles disputed presidential elections in a vote where each state’s congressional delegation speaks as one voice. And as it stands, Florida’s delegation includes 14 Republicans and 13 Democrats.
District 15 is currently held by a Republican, outgoing U.S. Rep. Ross Spano, meaning the outcome there could change which party controls Florida’s vote.
A simple majority — 26 states — are needed for a presidential candidate to win a vote in the House of Representatives. Republicans control the delegations in 26 states.
If Cohn defeats Franklin, and Democrats hold the line elsewhere, Trump would lose a critical vote and former Vice President Joe Biden would gain one.
“This one district in Florida could be very important,” said Andrew Busch, a government professor at Claremont McKenna College in California.
But the odds are long for Democrats. The University of Virginia Center for Politics, tracking this scenario, predicts Republicans will maintain control of 26 delegations, with Democrats holding 22 and two tied.
A little more than 500,000 voters are spread across Florida’s 15th Congressional District, a sprawling expanse that swallows Tampa’s north suburbs, Brandon and some of Riverview. The district slips north into Lake County and reaches out east to Plant City, past its famous strawberry fields toward the streets of downtown Lakeland in the heart of Polk County and down to Bartow.
There are other Republican-held seats in Florida that Democrats are challenging, but District 15 presents the shortest uphill climb. Voter registration between Democrats and Republicans is almost evenly divided there. It ’s fastgrowing — one-third of homeowners moved in within the past three years, according to the U.S. Census Bureau — and turning more purple as two metropolitan areas converge on it. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee recently added the race to its selective Red to Blue Program for flipping seats.
Unlike elsewhere, there’s not a well-funded incumbent to fight. Spano won the district in 2018 and spent the next two years under a cloud of scandal stemming from investigations into his campaign. Franklin, a Navy veteran and firstterm Lakeland city commissioner, disposed of Spano with relative ease.
The added significance of the District 15 race hasn’t been lost on Cohn, the Democratic candidate and a former investigative television journalist in Tampa Bay.
In early September, he fired off a fundraising email accusing Trump of “laying the groundwork to claim election fraud, nullify the results and steal the presidency.” But there is a remedy, Cohn suggested.
“Flipping FL-15 needs to be treated as every bit as important as the presidential race itself to safeguard our democracy,” he wrote.
Franklin said he hadn’t considered the District 15 race’s in this way until Cohn discussed it on TV on Wednesday.
“I don’t know how many different hoops it would take to jump through to get there. That’s not really been my focus,” Franklin told the Tampa Bay Times on Thursday. “I’m focused on the concerns of the constituents of the district. Those types of things will play out but I figure if it does, I’m working to retain this seat in case that scenario comes into play.”