Sponsored by EWO Sliders 321-506-6367Unofficial results as of Nov. 12, 2026.
Nine days after the polls closed, the dust has mostly settled. Every race below has been called unless I tell you otherwise, but none of it is official yet. Ballots from overseas voters that were postmarked by Election Day have until Nov. 13 to arrive, 10 days after the election. Brevard's canvassing board certifies its count Friday, Nov. 13, and the state Elections Canvassing Commission certifies the statewide results Nov. 17. Nobody expects those last few ballots to change a winner. Here's where it all landed, from Tallahassee down to our own backyard.
Florida
Governor. Republican Byron Donalds is Florida's next governor. He beat Democrat David Jolly 4,135,701 to 4,029,461, which works out to 50.01% to 48.72%. That's a margin of about 106,000 votes out of more than 8.2 million cast. Six other tickets split what was left, and none of them reached 1%. Donalds and his running mate, Bryan Avila, take over from Ron DeSantis, who was term-limited out.
U.S. Senate. Ashley Moody held the seat she was appointed to when Marco Rubio left to become Secretary of State. She finished with 4,211,455 votes (50.86%) to 3,974,148 (48.00%) for Democratic state Rep. Angie Nixon. Independent Neil Gillespie pulled 1.14%. This was a special election, so Moody is serving out the last two years of Rubio's term.
The Cabinet. All three Republican incumbents kept their seats, and all three races landed right around 51-49:
Attorney General: James Uthmeier 50.92%, José Javier Rodríguez 49.08%
Chief Financial Officer: Blaise Ingoglia 50.93%, Annette Taddeo 49.07%
Agriculture Commissioner: Wilton Simpson 51.07%, Joey Mendoza Atkins 48.93%
Uthmeier and Ingoglia were both appointed by DeSantis in 2025. Now they've each won a full term on their own.
U.S. House. All 28 Florida congressional races have been called. The state redrew 20 of its 28 districts this spring, and four Democratic seats looked like they were in trouble. The delegation comes out right where it went in, though: 20 Republicans and eight Democrats. Some of those were nail-biters:
District 27 (Miami-Dade): Republican María Elvira Salazar beat Democrat Eliott Rodriguez by 1,086 votes, 50.22% to 49.78%. That came after a machine recount and a quick trip through federal court.
District 9 (Osceola and parts of Central Florida): Democrat Darren Soto held off Republican Dan Green by 1,506 votes. That's a 0.53% margin, just outside the half-point line that would have forced a recount.
District 7 (Seminole and part of Volusia): Republican Ryan Elijah edged Democrat Bale Dalton by 1,631 votes, 49.71% to 49.21%. It came within a handful of votes of a recount.
Democrats Kathy Castor (District 14) and Jared Moskowitz (District 25) both held on in districts that were redrawn to be tougher for them.
District 22: Democrat Pia Dandiya held the seat over Republican Casey Askar, 51.9% to 48.1%. That's the fourth of the Democratic seats Republicans were going after, and all four stayed blue.
Florida House. This is the storyline that might matter most in Tallahassee. Democrats flipped 17 seats in the state House, according to the News Service of Florida. The new House will be 70 Republicans and 50 Democrats, so the GOP no longer has a supermajority there. The 50th Democratic seat came right here in Brevard, and I'll get to that below.
Amendments. Florida makes you clear 60% to change the constitution. One of three made it.
Amendment 3 (bigger homestead exemption on non-school property taxes): PASSED, 61.98% yes. The exemption goes up to $150,000 in 2027 and $250,000 in 2028. The amendment also cuts the yearly cap on assessment increases for non-homestead property from 10% to 5%. DeSantis has said he'll call a special session before he leaves office to put it in place.
Amendment 2 (property tax break on farm equipment): FAILED, 58.21% yes. A clear majority liked it, and it still came up short of 60.
Amendment 1 (bigger rainy-day fund): FAILED, 40.90% yes. It wasn't close.
Space Coast
Congress, District 8. Mike Haridopolos won a second term, 53.17% to 46.83%, over Democrat Jennifer Jenkins of Satellite Beach, a former Brevard school board member. He ran stronger at home, with about 56% of the vote in the Brevard part of the district.
State House, District 33. This was the race of the night around here, and it took a week to settle. Democrat Dan McDow, a former West Melbourne city councilman, beat Republican incumbent Monique Miller 36,428 to 36,142. That's 286 votes. The first unofficial returns had the margin inside the half-point line, so it went to a machine recount, and McDow was still ahead when it was done. The margin was too wide to require a hand count. The district takes in parts of Palm Bay and West Melbourne, and it's the seat that got Democrats to 50 in the Florida House.
County Commission. In North Brevard's District 1, Republican Micah Loyd won 58.2% to 36.8% over Democrat Aldon Bookhardt, with Libertarian Nathan Slusher at 5.0%. Loyd, a Canaveral Port Authority commissioner, will finish the term Katie Delaney left when she resigned in May. That term runs through 2028. In District 2, state Rep. Tyler Sirois was elected without opposition after nobody qualified to run against him. In District 4, incumbent Rob Feltner won his Republican primary back in August, 56.7% to 43.3% over Adam Dyer.
School Board. Two new faces are coming. In District 2, which covers Merritt Island, Cocoa Beach and Cape Canaveral, Kyle Savage beat incumbent Gene Trent 55.0% to 45.0%. In District 5, an open seat covering much of Melbourne, southwest Palm Bay and the barrier island south of Eau Gallie Boulevard, teacher Michele McCormack beat Tammy Dennis 51.4% to 48.6%.
Melbourne City Council. Leigh Hinton won the open District 2 seat over Milo Zonka with about 56.5% of the vote. Rachael Bassett kept her District 4 seat, beating John Bruce with about 55%. Hunter Benninger was unopposed in District 6.
Palm Bay. No council races made the November ballot. Kenny Johnson (Seat 4) and Mike Jaffe (Seat 5) both cleared 50% in the August primary and won outright. Voters did approve the city's charter question on filling council vacancies, 64.69% to 35.31%. If a seat opens with 12 months or less left in the term, council can now appoint a replacement. With more time left than that, the seat goes to an election.
Local taxes. Brevard voters renewed all three local measures on the ballot by wide margins:
Save Our Indian River Lagoon half-cent sales tax: 75.6% yes, for another 10 years
School property tax (one mill) for teacher pay and programs: 71.5% yes, for four more years
School half-cent sales tax for facilities, security and technology: 69.1% yes, for 10 more years
So Brevard voted for the statewide property tax cut in Amendment 3 and also kept all three of its own local taxes. Make of that what you will.
The Bottom Line
Republicans swept every statewide office again, but the margins were tight all the way down the ticket. Most of the statewide races were decided within about three points, and the Florida House lost its supermajority. On the Space Coast, a 286-vote race in south Brevard ended up mattering in Tallahassee, and Brevard kept funding the lagoon and its schools. Brevard certifies Friday, the state follows Nov. 17, and I'll update this if anything moves before then.
