Vast diversity in Florida tests Republicans
Hopefuls play to strengths in winner-takes-all state
PENSACOLA, Fla. - If John McCain wins Florida's Republican presidential primary tomorrow, it will be with support from retirees like Jack Page, a career Navy pilot who was flying C-130 transports in Vietnam when McCain was a prisoner of war at the notorious Hanoi Hilton.
"When I look at the next president, it's the commander in chief I see," said Page, a Mississippi native who is now a volunteer guide at the National Museum of Naval Aviation here. "John McCain has the background and toughness to do the job; he's proven it over and over."
But if McCain loses his duel with Mitt Romney in Florida, it will be a result of the Arizona senator's failure to hold the support of voters like Milton McNease, a Marine veteran who owns an insurance agency in town and is worried about the economy. McNease has already cast his ballot for Romney under Florida rules that allow early voting.
"For a long time, I was going to support McCain; he's a good guy and his military background is magnificent," said McNease over breakfast at The Coffee Cup, a popular local spot where owner Roy Cooley sells T-shirts that say "No Grits No Glory."
"I'm concerned about terrorism and the war in Iraq, but when I looked into Mitt Romney's experience, he's better qualified to turn the country around in terms of the economy," said McNease, a native of South Carolina.
In Florida's deeply conservative panhandle, home to several large Navy and Air Force installations and 110,000 military veterans, McCain is an iconic figure. His service is enshrined at the aviation museum, on the grounds of Naval Air Station Pensacola, where he once trained. An exhibit about Navy POWs during the Vietnam War displays his military decorations, the helmet he wore when he was shot down over Hanoi in 1967, and a video in which he describes 5 1/2 years of captivity, during which he was tortured.
The military vote is crucial in a Florida contest that will set up a virtual national primary on Feb. 5 when 21 states will allot almost half the delegates to the Republican National Convention this summer. With 21 installations, 52,000 active-duty personnel, and 1.75 million veterans - second only to California's 2.2 million - this is a key demographic in the nation's fourth-most populous state.
Floridians often describe their state as a microcosm of the country with a diverse, albeit decidedly older population and profiles that vary widely in different parts of the state. McCain, Romney, Rudy Giuliani, and Mike Huckabee are not ignoring any regions because no group or area is monolithic. There are potential votes for every candidate in each place or segment of the population.
"Florida can be a hard state to figure out. It's like a raging river of people, and they flood in and out of the state," said Joe Scarborough, host of MSNBC's "Morning Joe" and a former Republican congressman from Pensacola.
"Running a campaign here is like running five or six campaigns," said Sally Bradshaw, onetime chief of staff to former governor Jeb Bush and a senior adviser to Romney's campaign.
The challenge is reaching out to demographically distinctive regions - the conservative northern tier, with military and elements of the Deep South, the southeastern coast dominated by transplants from the Northeast and a large Cuban-American population, the southwestern coast and its snowbirds from the Midwest, and the stretch along Interstate 4, from Tampa-St. Petersburg on the Gulf coast, east through Orlando, and up to Daytona Beach on the Atlantic coast. In this seven-county swath, the Republican electorate mirrors that of the national party.
The I-4 corridor, as it is called, is the center of gravity in Florida politics, a swing area in November elections and home to about half the voters in Republican primaries. It has active and retired military voters, other retirees, younger families, religious conservatives, and significant numbers of Latino voters around Tampa and Orlando.
Tomorrow's contest is a closed primary, meaning only the 3.8 million registered Republicans can vote. McCain has won primaries in New Hampshire and South Carolina with support from independents, setting up Florida as a critical test of party strength for the maverick whose unorthodox stances on immigration, campaign finance reform, and confirmation of judges has rankled many GOP stalwarts.
More than a third of registered Republicans are expected to cast ballots, and if brisk early and absentee voting are indicators, turnout could soar even higher. That's more than normal, not only because Florida for the first time is playing an important role in the presidential nominating process but also because a question to amend the state constitution and lower property taxes will appear on the ballot.
Democrats will also vote their presidential preference, but it is a beauty contest. No delegates are at stake after the national party stripped Florida of all its convention delegates once the state moved up its primary into the window of early-voting states sanctioned by the party.
Republicans were also punished, but the GOP national committee took away only half of the state's convention delegates. Under winner-take-all rules, 57 delegates will go to the GOP victor tomorrow, still a big prize heading into Feb. 5.
A 2006 survey of Republican "supervoters" who turn out for every primary showed that 59 percent are 55 or older, 67 percent consider themselves conservative, and 43 percent attend religious services at least once a week. On abortion, 53 percent of these core Republicans characterized themselves as "prolife," 21 percent as "prochoice," and 23 percent as "in between."
Each GOP candidate is playing to a strength. For Giuliani, the former New York mayor who has staked his candidacy on a Florida win, it is the southeastern coast with many New York, New Jersey, and other northeastern transplants. The challenge for Giuliani's well-regarded organization is to boost turnout there, which traditionally lags other parts of the state in Republican primaries.
Romney, who also has a first-rate ground game, has been mining the Tampa Bay and Jacksonville areas, which, with the panhandle consistently outperform the rest of the state in Republican primary turnout, and is where the former Massachusetts governor is trying to maximize his appeal to economic conservatives.
McCain, emphasizing national security and defense, has been working the veterans' community, campaigning at times with some of the 110 retired generals and admirals who have endorsed his candidacy.
A McCain trip through the panhandle drew huge crowds as he traveled with the legendary George "Bud" Day, who was imprisoned at the Hanoi Hilton with McCain. Now 82, Day, who lives in the panhandle, is a retired Air Force colonel and Medal of Honor recipient often described as the most decorated American military figure since General Douglas MacArthur.
Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, has been focusing on the I-4 area, organizing its significant concentration of evangelicals led by supportive pastors. Daniel Webster, state Senate majority leader and a Huckabee backer, is one of four pillars of the state's Republican establishment from the Orlando area whose support has scattered among the fragmented presidential field.
Attorney General Bill McCollum, who represented the area for two decades in Congress, is Giuliani's state chairman. US Senator Mel Martinez, a former mayor of Orange County, gave a late endorsement to McCain. Toni Jennings, a former state Senate president and lieutenant governor under Jeb Bush, is a big Romney supporter.
"It's amazing how we've split," said Jennings. "I think a lot of voters are in the same mode. They're not just thinking who's the best person but also who's the best guy who can beat the Democrat in November." 