The race for the second most powerful position in the Florida Democratic Party (FDP) has begun, and two strong candidates have already stepped into the proverbial ring.
One is Jaden D’Onofrio, who is only 20 years old but has already compiled a strong resume in Florida politics. This includes his current work as co-founder and president of Florida Future Leaders, a youth-led voter engagement organization that raised more than $1 million for campus-based campaign efforts last year.
Another is 33-year-old Daniel Henry, who made history in 2019 by becoming the youngest chairman of the Duval County Democratic Party and the first Black LGBTQ person to hold the position.
Mr. D’Onofrio and Mr. Henry, and perhaps others, are also vying for the FDP first vice chair position.
In making the case for the post, Henry cited successes such as fielding Duvall as the Democratic presidential candidate for the first time in 44 years and electing Donna Deegan as Jacksonville’s first female Democratic mayor. Ta.
If elected, he said he would repair the party brand, implement “intensive voter registration,” provide more resources to local parties, and create “a statewide campaign that supports Democrats at every level of political office.” He vowed to focus on “building infrastructure.”
“Leadership is not easy, but with the support of leaders like outgoing First Vice President Judy Mount and Senate Democratic Leader-designate Tracy Davis, we are committed to rebuilding, expanding, and winning. We are ready to work with you,” he said in a prepared statement.
D’Onofrio comes after another dismal election cycle in which Republicans outscored Democrats by more than 1 million registered voters, made historic gains in long blue areas of the state and won two new House members. The FDP said recalibration was urgently needed. I changed the party this month.
“There are so many problems with the party,” he told Florida Politics. “And the bottom line is to recognize that if we’re going to get out of this mess, out of the Republican stranglehold, we have to build for the future and develop the next generation of voters.”
To achieve that goal, D’Onofrio believes the party needs to intensify and sustain its voter registration efforts, with focused drives in key constituencies that will help the FDP gain more power in Congress. This could accelerate the Republican Party’s breakaway from the supermajority.
He said FDP also needs to improve its “really bad” data infrastructure, adding that the problem predates Commissioner Nikki Fried’s leadership.
“It’s been that way for decades,” he said. “If you’re doing phone or text banking, 25% to 40% of your calls and text messages go to numbers that don’t exist, to wrong numbers, or to numbers that are deceased or no longer live in the state. You can’t target people accurately without having data to understand who they are, where they live, their phone numbers and email addresses, etc.
Number three on the to-do list, like the item before it, is a common sense goal and one that is essential to the successful operation of any company. It’s about raising funds.
D’Onofrio said the FDP today is not making full use of elected officials to raise money. He said that while the entire party was running digital fundraising campaigns, many of its members in public office were not.
“There are really a lot of minimal things we can do to raise funds, and there are also some unconventional strategies we can use,” he said. “And most importantly, our biggest donors. They feel cheated by the party, they feel like they’ve given a lot of money and been left behind without getting anything done. Will we have to deal with it?”
Mr D’Onofrio and Mr Henry are competing to replace Mr Mount, who must resign under the FDP’s constitution, which stipulates that the party chair and vice chair must be of different genders. She and Mr. Fried have served together since February 2023, when Mr. Fried won an election to determine the remainder of then-Chairman Manny Diaz’s term, but the party’s rules call for regular elections on January 25. It will be fully implemented again later.
Notably, D’Onofrio, former chair of the University of Florida Democratic Party and deputy strategy director for Tomorrow’s Voters, endorsed Fried’s 2023 opponent, former Sen. Annette Taddeo. It is.
D’Onofrio’s website lists endorsements from Senate Democratic Leader Jason Pizzo, Boca Raton Sen. Tina Polsky, political strategist Steve Scheer, and former U.S. Reps. Tom Keene and Katherine Waldron. Published.
The Vice-Chairman’s job is unpaid.
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