Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) won the 2026 election to become Florida’s next governor, defeating Democratic hopes of flipping the seat blue through rival David Jolly.
Donalds won the race to succeed outgoing Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) with 50% of the vote compared to Jolly’s 48.7%, as of 9:09 p.m.
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The outcome cements Donalds’s rise from a state House member and U.S. representative to Florida’s first black governor. It comes after Democrats had hoped to use Jolly, a former Republican, to flip Florida, despite DeSantis winning his last election in the state by roughly 20 points.
With polls suggesting a competitive election in the weeks leading up to Nov. 3, Donalds sought to appeal to more moderate voters, taking down prominent mentions of his endorsement from President Donald Trump on his campaign website.
While he has historically avoided making his race an issue in politics, Donalds also extended an olive branch to black voters, traditionally a key voting bloc for the Democratic Party. Weeks before the election, Donalds said he was looking to capture “north of 20%” of the black vote, after only around 13% of the demographic backed DeSantis’s reelection bid in 2022.
Nationwide, only three black people have been elected governor in U.S. history.
“I think there’s a lot of Black voters who are looking at my campaign because they’re just trying to figure out who’s going to be the best person to lead Florida into the future,” Donalds told CBS News. “I think the other thing with Black voters: they’re starting to not be as monolithically tied to the Democrat Party.”
Donalds served four years in the state House before winning an election to represent southwest Florida in Congress in 2020. His gubernatorial victory comes after he served nearly six years in the U.S. House and became embroiled in a campaign filled with personal attacks between himself and Jolly.
READ THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER’S COVERAGE OF THE 2026 MIDTERM ELECTIONS
Jolly is a former Republican congressman and lawyer who became an independent, then switched parties last year. He ran a fairly moderate campaign but faced an uphill battle, as a Democrat hasn’t won a Florida gubernatorial election since 1994.
Throughout the race, Donalds maintained a sizable fundraising advantage over Jolly, allowing him to outspend his opponent on voter outreach. By August, the Republican candidate had raised more than $100 million compared to Jolly’s $10 million.