Florida, Attorney General

Former circuit court judge Ashley Moody (R) defeated state Rep. Sean Shaw (D) and independent Jeffrey Siskind in the November 6, 2018, general election for Florida's open attorney general seat. The incumbent attorney general, Pam Bondi (R), was term-limited.

Governing identified this as one of six Toss-up attorney general races in 2018.

Florida maintained its Republican triplex status in the 2018 elections. A triplex is a state where the governor, attorney general, and secretary of state belong to the same political party. That status was at stake in 2018. The attorney general election occurred alongside a competitive gubernatorial election to replace term-limited Gov. Rick Scott (R).

Florida elected its first Republican attorney general in 2002 and elected Republicans every four years between then and the 2018 election. Bondi won the 2010 and 2014 elections by 13 percentage points each.

Other statewide races were closer. Rick Scott won the 2010 and 2014 gubernatorial elections by 1 point each. Pres. Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton in Florida by 1 point in 2016; Barack Obama won the state in 2008 and 2012 by under 3 points each time. In 2018, Florida had one Democratic and one Republican senator.

In 2018, Moody beat Shaw in the attorney general race by 6 points. Ron DeSantis (R) won the gubernatorial race and Rick Scott won the U.S. Senate election in Florida, each with a margin of victory under 1 percent.

Polls

Florida Attorney General Election, 2018, Moody (R) v. Shaw (D)

Poll	Poll sponsor	Ashley Moody (R)	Sean Shaw (D)	Undecided	Margin of Error	Sample Size
University of North Florida October 23-26, 2018	N/A	47%	40%	13%	+/-3	1,048
SEA Polling & Strategic Design October 17-20, 2018	N/A	43%	37%	20%	+/-4	600
St. Pete Polls Released September 13, 2018	N/A	46%	44%	9%	+/-2.4	1,657
Public Policy Polling August 29-30, 2018	EDGE Communications	44%	41%	15%	+/-3.6	743

Seat election history

2014

Attorney General of Florida, 2014

Party	Candidate	Vote %	Votes
	Republican	Pam Bondi Incumbent	55.1%	3,222,524
	Democratic	George Sheldon	42%	2,457,317
	Libertarian	Bill Wohlsifer	2.9%	169,394
Total Votes			5,849,235
Election results via Florida Division of Elections

2010

Attorney General of Florida, 2010

Party	Candidate	Vote %	Votes
	Republican	Pam Bondi	54.8%	2,882,868
	Democratic	Dan Gelber	41.4%	2,181,377
	Nonpartisan	Jim Lewis	3.8%	199,147
Total Votes			5,263,392
Election results via Florida Department of State

2006

Attorney General of Florida, 2006

Party	Candidate	Vote %	Votes
	Republican	Bill McCollum	52.7%	2,448,008
	Democratic	Walter "Skip" Campbell	47.3%	2,197,959
Total Votes			4,645,967
Election results via Florida Department of State

2002

Attorney General of Florida, 2002

Party	Candidate	Vote %	Votes
	Republican	Charlie Crist	53.4%	2,636,616
	Democratic	Buddy Dyer	46.6%	2,299,149
Total Votes			4,935,765
Election results via Florida Department of State

Demographics

Demographic data for Florida

	Florida	U.S.
Total population:	20,244,914	316,515,021
Land area (sq mi):	53,625	3,531,905
Gender
Female:	51.1%	50.8%
Race and ethnicity**
White:	76%	73.6%
Black/African American:	16.1%	12.6%
Asian:	2.6%	5.1%
Native American:	0.3%	0.8%
Pacific Islander:	0.1%	0.2%
Two or more:	2.4%	3%
Hispanic/Latino:	23.7%	17.1%
Education
High school graduation rate:	86.9%	86.7%
College graduation rate:	27.3%	29.8%
Income
Median household income:	$47,507	$53,889
Persons below poverty level:	19.8%	11.3%
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, "American Community Survey" (5-year estimates 2010-2015) for more information on the 2020 census and here for more on its impact on the redistricting process in Florida.

As of July 2017, Florida's three largest cities were Jacksonville (pop. est. 860,000), Miami (pop. est. 430,000), and Tampa (pop. est. 360,000).