DeSantis Delivers the Closing Message: Show Up November 3, Vote the Ticket, Yes on Amendment 3

Gov. Ron DeSantis has no race of his own on Tuesday's ballot - term limits bar a third consecutive run - but he closed the Republican campaign in Florida as if he did. In a video statement put out by the Republican Party of Florida ahead of Election Day, reported by The Floridian, DeSantis urged Republicans to turn out on Election Day itself, telling voters, in the party's summary of the message, to show up on November 3, vote Republican down the ballot and vote yes on Amendment 3. In the video, as reported, he said Florida has led the nation on many things and asked voters to keep that momentum going by voting for Republicans up and down the ballot.

The amendment is the message's policy core. Amendment 3 would raise the homestead exemption for non-school property taxes to $150,000 in 2027 and $250,000 in 2028, and it needs 60 percent of Tuesday's vote to pass - a mark a recent poll cited in the report says it is currently short of. That is the same amendment whose public-safety critics - firefighters, sheriffs and local officials warning of service cuts - this station carried this morning; the governor's closing push and the opposition's warning are the two sides Pensacola voters take into the booth.

Why a closing message from a governor who is leaving matters is the streak underneath it. Florida has not elected a Democratic governor since Lawton Chiles in 1994 and has seated four consecutive Republican governors since 1999. Republican Byron Donalds is trying to make it five against Democrat David Jolly, on a ticket that also carries Sen. Ashley Moody, Attorney General James Uthmeier, Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia and Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson. Tuesday decides whether the streak - and the governor's claim to have built it - holds.