Surprise Florida Primary Results Highlight the Massive Divide in the Democratic Party
The deep division in the Democratic Party — and President Donald Trump’s best hopes for the midterms — were on full display in the Florida primaries on Tuesday.
Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz in South Florida’s 25th District trounced his primary challenger backed by the far-left Democratic Socialists of America, while a DSA-affiliated nutcase won an unexpected, resounding victory in the party’s primary for Senate.
And both results indicate trouble brewing for the Democrats in November.
“Florida is known for hurricanes,” Moskowitz told Politico’s Playbook column on Tuesday after defeating opponent Barry Larkin 63.5 percent to 36.5 percent in the South Florida district.
“And so the DSA is a disaster area in Florida — and there’s no federal reimbursement coming to help these people.”
Rep. Jared Moskowitz beats DSA-backed primary challenger in redrawn Florida district https://t.co/ayrnuKld1b pic.twitter.com/OaWibiY4zc
— New York Post (@nypost) August 18, 2026
Meanwhile, state Rep. Angie Nixon, the unapologetically loony DSA newbie, scored a surprising 56.1 percent to 43.9 percent win over Democratic-establishment backed Alex Vindman — the vainglorious National Security Council “whistleblower” who helped fuel the first Trump impeachment back in 2019. Vindman had a massive fundraising advantage over Nixon as well as the support of the Democratic establishment. He managed to come up empty anyway.
FLORIDA PRIMARY UPSET: Democratic Socialist Angie Nixon scored a stunning double-digit upset over Alex Vindman in Florida’s Democratic Senate primary, setting up a general election clash against Republican Senator Ashley Moody.
Elsewhere across the Sunshine State, veteran… pic.twitter.com/VEHRjPk8Y3
— Special Report (@SpecialReport) August 19, 2026
Nixon joined the DSA this year, according to The New York Times, but has been a fixture in leftist circles since entering the state legislature in 2020.
In 2023, less than a month after the Hamas attack on Israel that killed 1,200 Jews, she was behind a resolution demanding an Israeli ceasefire in its war against the terrorist organization. Giving some indication of just how unpopular such an idea was even among Democrats, the resolution was defeated by a vote of 104-2.
Moskowitz, on the other hand, is not only Jewish himself, but a strong supporter of Israel and a furious denouncer of anti-Semitism in the Democratic Party. During President Joe Biden’s administration, he didn’t shy away from attacking then-White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre for downplaying rising reports of anti-Semitism in the country.
While he’s a Democrat, he’s even bucked both his party and the establishment media by supporting Gov. Ron DeSantis, one of the country’s leading Republicans, during a smear attempt by the CBS program “60 Minutes” — before the network’s leadership changed hands.
None of that means Moskowitz is a saint, of course. He’s still a Democrat — which means he’s still apt to pull stunts like dressing up as Vladimir Putin to criticize Republicans investigating former first son Hunter Biden.
It’s only to point out that when it comes to the modern Democratic Party there are only two almost equally loathsome factions — there are the liberal leftists, personified by Moskowitz, and the extreme, Bolshevik-style leftists of Angie Nixon and the DSA — and as the primary season has proven, they’re at each other’s throats.
The DSA has had the better of the contests so far, with wins from New York to Michigan to Colorado. But they haven’t swept the field.
And in Florida, which has gone from a swing state to solid red in recent years, Nixon’s primary Senate win amounts to a symbolic victory at best. In fact, her almost certain defeat in November could well be worse for the DSA than a primary loss in August might have been.
A romp by current Republican Sen. Ashley Moody, who was appointed to fill the term of now-Secretary of State Marco Rubio, could well prove Moskowitz correct when he told Playbook: “Florida is where DSA goes to die.”
And the Sunshine State’s Democratic Party as a whole — anemic for decades — is divided among itself.
In an interview after winning the Democratic primary for governor on Tuesday, David Jolly — a former Republican member of Congress — sounded like he was dealing with those divisions personally. He attempted to reject Nixon’s far-left politics while paying tribute to her enthusiasm.
It was all almost certainly a bid to attract her supporters while trying not to alienate the sane majority of the Sunshine State.
“I REJECT SOCIALISM:” Florida Democrat gubernatorial nominee David Jolly distances himself from the DSA member at the top of his ticket, Senate Democrat nominee Angie Nixon pic.twitter.com/kNognYxvSQ
— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) August 19, 2026
“I reject the DSA,” he said. “I reject socialism. I’m a capitalist. I think capitalism provides the greatest amount of economic mobility.”
“I have been with Angie on the trail and I tell you this, she’s a fighter. She leaves it all on the field. She goes in every room talking about what I talk about,” he continued.
“I reject socialism. I’m a capitalist. We’ll see how Florida voters sort that out.”
As the results from Tuesday show, Democratic voters are sorting it out with a civil war in their own party.
And that can only help the GOP in November — and the last two years of Trump’s time in office.
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