Welcome to what may be the definitive space for information related to the 2010 U.S. Senate race in Florida, mixing a bit of attention to the news with a dash of political science. It is required reading for my students at Florida Atlantic University, and recommended to all. With Senator Mel Martinez (R) announcing that he will not run for re-election, the race became wide-open. There are two cross-cutting phenomena at work here. First, typically when an incumbent announces that he or she will not run for re-election, this is a sign of expected electoral trouble for the incumbent party (here the Republicans). Second, midterm elections usually break against the party in power in the White House (here the Democrats). So here we now have a Senate race with no clear front-runner (incumbents generally win Senate about three out of every four races entered), the typical indicators of which party may win are at odds with one another, and the state is evenly split between Democrats and Republicans in terms of partisan registration and voting behavior. Welcome to the race; it should be quite the ride.
