As if we needed more evidence of reality, a new poll shows that Americans would prefer living in the Florida shaped by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, than the California led by Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom.
The Daily Mail recently reported on its exclusive poll of a hypothetical 2024 matchup between DeSantis and Newsom.
The outlet reported that 47% of respondents said they would rather live in Florida than California.
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Perhaps more importantly, 57 percent of independents said they would rather live under DeSantis than Newsom.
The outcome underscores DeSantis’ recent attack on Newsom, which was repeated over last weekend in his interview with Fox News, that people are voting with their feet to leave what he called “the petri dish of American leftism.”
The Public Policy Institute of California reported in August that the Golden State is suffering through an “unprecedented demographic period.”
California’s population “is declining for the first time since records have been kept,” the organization noted, as between January 2020 and January 2023, more than 800,000 people became former Californians, according to the state’s own numbers and officials.
So dramatic is the state’s decline that the left-wing online publication Slate declared in August that “California has lost its superpower,” as the state “is losing population … with no end in sight.”
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Meanwhile, Florida is booming.
Florida’s e Demographic Estimating Conference reported in July that the state’s population as of April 1 was 22.6 million, or roughly 1.1 million more than in April 2020.
The conference further noted that between April 2024 and April 2028, the Sunshine State’s population is expected to grow by an average of about 298,000 a year, or 817 people a day.
The Daily Mail poll also showed that DeSantis would defeat Newsom in a head-to-head contest, if they become their respective party’s presidential nominee.
Daily Mail had DeSantis ahead of Newsom 43-39 in the 2024 general election.
Among independents, DeSantis leads Newsom 43-32.
Joe Alder, a senior research associate at J.L. Partners, which conducted the poll for the Daily Mail, told the paper of those voters, “It is DeSantis’ state, not Newsom’s, which swing voters see as the aspirational destination in today’s America.”
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