William Diaz has a mantra: His only political party is his Venezuelan community.

He doesn’t abide by strict partisan rules, and doesn't believe in only voting for Democrats or Republicans. He supported Republicans Sen. Rick Scott and Secretary of State Marco Rubio when they were running for office in Florida, where Diaz has lived for 37 years.

For these midterm elections, however, the Orlando resident hopes to make a clear statement: He does not support President Donald Trump’s immigration policies and is unhappy with how Republican-backed initiatives have affected his community.

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“I voted already, and what I did when I was voting and when I was with my ballot, I was really thinking and praying for all those that has no voice, those that can not vote, those immigrants that are right now victim of actions on the streets,” Diaz tells TIME, referring to Trump’s mass deportation agenda and the expansive influence of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). “My people have been suffering that much.”

Diaz is one of more than 2.6 million people who have already cast ballots in Florida, either by mail or through in-person early voting, according to state figures released Sunday. In-person early voting began in some counties Oct. 19 and expanded statewide Oct. 24.

Diaz’s community is one part of a Florida Latino electorate with varied national origins and political loyalties. Taken together, however, Latino voters are a swing vote in several closely watched races statewide. They were key to Trump’s Florida victory in 2024, with 56% supporting him over Kamala Harris, according to the 2024 American Electorate Voter Poll.

But new polls ahead of Election Day suggest that Latino support for the GOP may be on shaky ground—a shift that could put Republicans to the test in Florida and shape the political landscape beyond November.

Why Florida’s Latino voters are frustrated with Trump

Dissatisfaction among Florida’s Latino voters reflects a broader national mood, according to Stephanie Valencia, a co-founder of Equis Research, an organization that studies Latino voting behavior.

Concerns about the economy and immigration enforcement tactics are fueling dissatisfaction among Latino voters, who “make up a huge part of the electorate in Florida,” she says, pointing out that both of these issues are “disproportionately impacting” them.

A Univision/YouGov poll, conducted Oct. 2–15, showed that 41% of registered Latino voters in Florida were “very or somewhat worried” that they, a family member, or someone close could be detained or otherwise directly affected by immigration enforcement, compared with 27% of Florida voters overall. 

The same poll showed that 4 in 10 Latino voters in the state felt that their finances had worsened over the past year, with 70% disapproving of Trump’s handling of the cost of living in the U.S. That stands in comparison to a 63% disapproval rate from Florida voters overall.

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For Johanna Chavez, a Dominican immigrant living in Kissimmee, Florida, the economy is top of mind.

“Many people are concerned about the economy and the price of gasoline … and then there’s the cost of rent, it’s become incredibly, overwhelmingly high,” Chavez, who speaks Spanish, tells TIME through a translator. “All the things they promised would be done—nothing has happened.”

In the past few years, Chavez says it has felt like the United States has started “regressing,” and the opportunities she was looking for when she arrived here have not materialized in the way she had hoped.

“It’s starting to feel just like the situation back in my home country, the Dominican Republic,” she says. “We all came here hoping for change, seeking a better life, but it’s ending up being the same thing all over again. Things just aren’t what they’re supposed to be.”

Jared Nordlund, the Florida State Advocacy Director at UnidosUS, the largest nonprofit Latino rights organization in the U.S., says this is a common refrain among Floridian Latinos; people are upset over how the economy has been affected by tariffs and the war in Iran. Florida was hit particularly hard by rising gas prices after the closure of the Strait of Hormuz squeezed the global energy supply, he says.

“Florida is not a state friendly for public transportation, so people are highly reliant on the cars, and so what they would be paying for food now is having to kind of get broke between … paying to get the gas and then going to get food,” Nordlund says.

The question now is whether that dissatisfaction will translate into votes against Republicans—and whether it will be enough to tip the state’s close races.

Trump’s declining Latino support puts Florida Republicans on notice

Trump’s approval rating has plummeted with Latino voters in Florida, dropping from 58% approval at the start of his term to 36% ahead of midterm elections, according to Equis Research.

According to an AP-NORC poll from October, about 6 in 10 Latino voters disapprove of how Trump is handling the presidency, and more than 7 in 10 disapprove of how he is handling the economy. 

A Pew Research Center poll found that Trump’s job approval rating among Latino voters dropped from 38% in February 2025 to 24% in September and October. Of those who backed him in the last election, approval dropped to 57%—down from 93% in early 2025.

The shift may be resonating with Republicans like Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar, who is seeking re-election in Florida’s 27th District in Miami-Dade—a majority Latino district that Trump carried by some 15 points in 2024. She publicly broke with Trump in her campaign and criticized his immigration policies.

In one ad in September, Salazar said that Trump has “gone too far" with his deportation agenda.

“In July, 50% of the 50,000 people that were detained had no criminal record,” she notes in the ad.

“Be careful what your advisers are telling you about immigration policy,” Salazar continues, addressing Trump. “The same Hispanics who helped you get to the White House in 2024 feel betrayed today.”

Why Latino frustration may not translate into Democratic votes

Guillermo Grenier, a Cuban American professor of sociology at Florida International University (FIU), agrees that many Latino voters are “ticked off” at Trump.

“The population, if you look at the whole Latino conglomerate, is turned off pretty strongly with Trump,” he says.

But South Florida’s Latino electorate is unique; Grenier points out that the state is home to 1.9 million Cuban Americans—the largest concentration in the United States. 

As a voting bloc, the community has significant sway. In 2024, FIU’s Cuba poll found that 68% of likely Cuban American voters in Miami-Dade County supported Trump, compared to 23% for Harris—representing his highest-recorded support level in the poll's history.

A shift away from Republicans among Cuban American voters could therefore have significant consequences in South Florida. But disillusionment doesn’t always turn into action, according to Grenier. 

“I think a lot of Cubans are pissed off at Trump, but they're still Republicans,” he says.

The Democratic Party’s response to this potential opening may unfold over several election cycles.

“Democrats are going to be in a probationary period with Latinos and with all voters, quite frankly, on whether they can deliver or not,” Valencia says. “One election is not durable support among a particular group.”

The electorate’s age also matters to its long-term political influence, says Michael McDonald, a professor of political science at the University of Florida. “Latinos are much younger than the rest of the population in the United States.”

He points out that voter turnout “is highly correlated with age” and expects Latino participation to increase as younger voters grow older. In his assessment, that could reshape the electoral map beyond Florida.

“Hispanics are getting old enough so that their turnout rates are going to start increasing, and that's going to have like profound consequences on American politics,” he says. “A state like Texas is now going to be purple, and some other states with large Hispanic populations are going to start trending even further away from the Republicans.”

Both Valencia and Grenier suggest that it will come down to Democrats proving that they are willing to reinvest in Florida.

What are the key races to watch in Florida?

There are several key races at stake in Florida. Although the state has leaned reliably red for the past three election cycles, Democrats are investing late in the race through campaigning and financing. 

Florida Democrats posted a larger monthly net gain in active registered voters than Republicans, according to figures the party highlighted Oct. 1. The Florida Democratic Party touted the gains as a sign of its growing base in the state.

“We’ve spent years rebuilding this party from the ground up. Our organizers are in communities year-round, our volunteers are knocking doors across this state, and Democrats are having real conversations with Floridians about what’s at stake,” Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried said in an October statement. “The momentum is real.”

Gov. Ron DeSantis is term-limited and cannot run for re-election, leaving the role open for Byron Donalds, the Republican candidate who has been endorsed by Trump, and David Jolly, who is running as a Democrat after leaving the GOP in 2018. 

A poll released Oct. 21 by the Public Opinion Research Lab (PORL) at the University of North Florida (UNF) found that Donalds leads 49% to 47%—within the poll's almost 3-percentage-point margin of error.

Latino voters could be important to Jolly’s chances. The Univision/YouGov poll found that they favored him over Donalds, 48% to 43%, even as Donalds led 50% to 42% among Florida voters overall.

Democrats are taking note. Weeks after Jolly beseeched the Democratic Party to send money to his campaign, the Democratic Governors Association announced Oct. 20 that it will invest $1 million to help close the narrowing gap in the weeks before Election Day.

That trend follows in certain congressional races downballot. 

A September poll found Salazar leading Democratic challenger Eliott Rodriguez, a former local news anchor, by just 1 point.

Angie Nixon, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, is an underdog for Senate, taking on Republican incumbent Sen. Ashley Moody. A recent UNF poll has Moody leading by 49% to 45%, halving the advantage she had in July.

National Democratic leaders and allies have made the trip to Florida to bolster these close races. 

Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Democratic ally, rallied in Tampa for Nixon on Oct. 17. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries campaigned with Rodriguez on Oct. 16; they held a campaign event at a Cuban coffee shop and bakery.

The decision received some blowback, with one conservative Cuban influencer taking to Instagram to slam the business for hosting Jeffries. He argued that associating with the Democrats equated to supporting socialism.

For Grenier, the incident shows that Democrats have some serious work to do to gain trust in Florida—and while it might be “too late” to invest in candidates in this election, the party can lay the groundwork for 2028 and beyond.

He said that if Democrats want to build on the momentum after the midterms, they can’t get “gun shy.”

“This new beachhead that [Democrats] are trying to establish is the way to go for the next elections,” Grenier says. 

“You know, it was 10 years of investing before Republicans flipped the state in 1996,” he continues. “So, they need to just keep it up, and have national leaders support local leaders.”

McDonald observes a "shifting democracy" and believes the GOP will continue to face new challenges when it comes to remaining competitive with Latino voters. He says: “The Republican Party is going to have to adjust.”

The Department of Justice (DOJ) last week filed a lawsuit that intends to weigh in on the results of the Senate race in Alaska. It seeks to block certification of the election results under certain conditions if Republican Sen. Dan S. Sullivan loses. 

Experts question whether it has the legal basis to do so—and if this intervention is a preview of how the Trump Administration might respond to unfavorable midterm results across the U.S.

The DOJ, in its Oct. 22 filing, expressed concern that there might be “voter confusion” stemming from the fact that two candidates on the ballot are named Dan Sullivan. Republican Sen. Dan S. Sullivan is currently seeking re-election, and one of his challengers is Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. (a Republican whose party affiliation does not appear beside his name on the general-election ballot).

The GOP first raised concerns in May, prompting a proposal to add “incumbent” beside the sitting senator’s name on the ballot. But the party continued to warn that voters could split their votes between the two Sullivans, opening the door for Democrat Mary Peltola.

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Alaska has traditionally been a state that leans Republican: Trump won the state by 13 points in 2024, and the state has not had a Democratic governor since 2002. 

But the race is closer than analysts first expected. October polls from The New York Times/Siena, Alaska Survey Research, and Data for Progress show Peltola leading Dan S. Sullivan by between 2 and 7 points.

The DOJ lawsuit claims that the “sole purpose” of Daniel J. Sullivan’s candidacy is to benefit Peltola. Therefore, it seeks to block certification if the incumbent loses but would have won with all of Daniel J. Sullivan’s votes. To determine that, it proposes recalculating the ranked-choice count as though those votes had gone to the incumbent instead.

Under Alaska’s ranked-choice system, voters rank candidates by preference. If no candidate initially wins a majority, the lowest-ranking candidates are eliminated in successive rounds and their ballots transfer to the next remaining choice.

In a Truth Social post on Oct. 21, Trump said he was “very concerned” about the race and described the situation as “totally confusing.”

“Even 1, 2, or 3% could make the difference,” he wrote of the potential outcomes.

The DOJ said there would need to be an “investigation” to determine which vote was meant for which Sullivan. The DOJ said an “investigation” would be needed to determine which Sullivan voters intended to support. 

Attorney General Todd Blanche suggested on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday that voters’ rankings could provide clues: “There are a number of scenarios where it could be obvious that a voter was confused by the way they wrote down candidates.” He did not elaborate on what those scenarios might look like within the parameters of a formal investigation. 

Neither the DOJ nor the candidates’ campaigns responded to TIME’s requests for comment.

On Oct. 23, Peltola’s campaign and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee asked to join the DOJ’s case as defendants, writing: “Alaskans, apparently, must elect Senator Dan S. Sullivan or the President will not let them elect anyone at all.”

On Sunday, Peltola’s campaign and the DSCC asked the court for permission to seek dismissal and requested an expedited ruling this week. They proposed requiring a DOJ response by Tuesday afternoon, arguing that the pending lawsuit could undermine confidence in the election.

Voting rights experts are calling it a “garbage lawsuit” and “an unprecedented intervention by the federal government.” 

Lisa Murkowski, the state’s other Republican Senator who is not up for re-election, endorsed the incumbent Sullivan in January. Last week, however, she condemned the DOJ’s efforts to intervene.

“Alaskans don’t need any help voting for their preferred candidates,” she wrote Oct. 23 in a post on X. “The Department of Justice should never have filed this lawsuit.”

Trump responded to her comments with a scathing post on Truth Social on Oct. 24, calling Murkowski “Republicans’ Worst Senator, by far” and “a DISGRACE to Alaska and our country.”

He also criticized the state’s ranked-choice voting system, writing: “Ranked Choice Voting Ballot is a TOTAL DEMOCRAT SCAM meant to confuse the Voter.”

Asked to comment on the DOJ filing the next day, Trump told reporters: "I'm the one that said do it." 

Blanche declined to confirm whether the Justice Department acted at the behest of the President during his appearance on CNN on Sunday. 

He denied that the Trump Administration was laying the groundwork to overturn election results, arguing that the lawsuit would allow Alaska officials and courts to address any unlawful voter confusion after the election.

“It is an obligation of the states to avoid confusion, among other things, confusion in the minds of voters in the election process,” he said. “So the question is whether Alaska, by allowing this to happen, is violating the law and the federal law and the constitution by allowing confusion in the ballot.”  

Why experts question the DOJ’s Alaska election lawsuit

Prior to the DOJ lawsuit, Republicans sought to remove Daniel J. Sullivan from the ballot in June. 

When he decided to run, Republicans sent complaints to Carol Beecher, the director of Alaska’s Division of Elections. She wrote a letter to Sullivan in June saying that election officials had determined that he would be removed, claiming his candidacy was not filed “in good faith for the purpose of genuinely pursuing” leadership. 

Sullivan challenged the decision and sued the state. Judge Thomas Matthews of Alaska’s Third District Superior Court ruled in June that he could remain on the ballot beside the other candidates. He wrote in a 32-page decision that elections officials were introducing a “new, previously unstated ‘good faith’ criteria” and said that this requirement is not present in state law or the Constitution. 

That decision was upheld by the Alaska Supreme Court on June 29.

It was later determined that a “mitigating remedy” would be to present each candidate’s name with the middle initial and to add “incumbent” to the sitting senator’s name. 

The Alaska Supreme Court ruling did not end scrutiny of Daniel J. Sullivan’s candidacy. In August, Reuters reported that the DOJ had issued grand jury subpoenas while investigating whether he entered the race to confuse voters.

The DOJ then filed its new lawsuit amid October polling that showed Peltola ahead.

The department justifies the move using language in the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) that says its purpose is to “protect the integrity of the electoral process.” 

Experts, however, dispute whether that language authorizes the intervention.

Derek Muller, a professor of election law at the University of Notre Dame, wrote in a blog post after the filing that the proposed investigation is “essentially impossible.” But succeeding is not the point, he continues. 

“The legal claim is so absurdly thin, there’s essentially no likelihood of success,” he wrote, adding that the real purpose of litigation is to signal to the press and public that the Trump Administration is “ready” if the result goes against the GOP’s interests in Alaska.

The Center for Election Innovation and Research (CEIR), a nonpartisan nonprofit working to inform voters, called the move “unprecedented” in a statement that also said the lawsuit “raises serious concerns about political interference.”

“I cannot recall an administration ever attempting to stop the certification of an election—and certainly not 11 days before polls close,” CEIR Executive Director David Becker said in the statement. 

“Furthermore, this issue has already been fully litigated by Alaska’s courts,” he continued. “Alaska election officials are following state law, as the Constitution requires, and the courts will uphold that.”

Richard Hasen, a professor of law at UCLA, called the move a “desperate and unprofessional assault” on the American elections system.

Common Cause, a nonpartisan organization represented by the ACLU, filed a motion on Oct. 23 seeking to join the case to oppose the DOJ’s effort. Its president and CEO, Virginia Kase Solomon, said in a statement Oct. 24: “Politicians don’t dictate election outcomes; the people do.”

Nate Adams, a spokesperson for Dan S. Sullivan’s campaign, expressed confidence in his candidate’s re-election but told local media outlet KFSK last week: “We’ll let the DOJ complaint run its course.”

How has the federal government used the National Voter Registration Act?

The National Voter Registration Act was enacted in 1993 to address barriers to voter registration that depressed participation and disproportionately affected racial minorities. It was predicated upon the fundamental right of every eligible citizen to vote, as well as the duty of local and federal governments to protect that participation in the democratic process.

In the past 30-plus years, it has been used to sue states that fail to maintain their voter rolls or enforce registration requirements.

The Biden Administration also reckoned with Alaska in 2022, finding that the state wasn’t consistently letting residents register to vote—or update their voter registration—as part of their routine paperwork at the Department of Motor Vehicles. An agreement reached that June required Alaska to bring those procedures into compliance with the NVRA.

In 2012, the Obama Administration sued the state of Florida over a program intended to identify and remove suspected noncitizens from its voter-registration rolls too close to the elections. The parties agreed to dismiss the case in January 2013. 

The George W. Bush Administration also sued several states under the NVRA to enforce requirements for offering voter registration and maintaining accurate voter rolls. 

The DOJ’s Alaska lawsuit goes further than those earlier cases. Experts say the NVRA does not expressly authorize blocking election certification over suspected voter confusion.

If courts accept the DOJ’s argument, the consequences could extend beyond Alaska, warns Walter Olson, a senior fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute. It could give the federal government a new basis to challenge how states design ballots, determine which candidates qualify, and certify election results—all in the name of protecting election integrity.

“[The lawsuit] attempts to stretch a federal statute, the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), beyond recognition by snipping language from the law’s preamble and treating it as if it creates vast and open-ended new duties that the federal government can enforce on states,” Olson said in a statement Oct. 23. “If accepted, it would suddenly federalize many issues of local election administration.”