JACKSONVILLE, Fla.—A new University of North Florida poll puts Nikki Fried ahead of Charlie Crist for Florida’s Democratic gubernatorial race.


What You Need To Know

  • UNF poll puts Nikki Fried ahead of Charlie Crist

  • 1,624 registered Florida voters surveyed on topics including governor’s race and job approval ratings

  • Gov. Ron DeSantis is still in the lead against Fried and Crist, poll says

The poll of 1,624 registered Florida voters likely to vote in the primary found 47% of Democrats surveyed would vote for Nikki Fried and 43% would vote for Charlie Crist. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.4 percentage points.

“I was very surprised that we came out with a number that had Nikki Fried ahead, based on the conversations that have been around this race for the last 6, 7 months or so,” said Michael Binder, the faculty director for UNF’s Public Opinion Research Lab. “I think what our poll highlights is that maybe [this race is] closer than people thought it was.”

Aubrey Jewett, a political science professor at the University of Central Florida, was surprised by the survey’s findings as well. “If the UNF poll is correct or even close to being correct, it really shows Nikki Fried doing much better in the polling than she has done most of this election cycle,” he said.

Jewett added people should take any poll with a grain of salt. “You don’t know who’s really going to cast a vote in the primaries,” he explained. “It’s hard to do even in the general election. It’s even more difficult in the primary election, which is why you see some of these polls being way off or just way different.”

Meanwhile, Governor Ron DeSantis’ lead in the survey released Tuesday lessened since the university’s polling in February, but the Republican is still polling ahead of Fried and Crist. 

Couple that, Binder says, with Republicans being the ones more likely to turn out in a mid-term election: “It’s Ron’s world and everybody else is just living in it right now.”