Is Florida's Republican primary for the senate open or closed?

[Qadgop_the_Mercotan]

I’m thinking of course of Governor Crist, who is a moderate republican.

He’s a popular governor, and he’ll be going up against a conservative republican for the party nomination in the primary.

If it’s an open primary, I feel fairly certain he’ll get the nod. If not, I’m not so sure he will.

Can anyone enlighten me?

[UltraVires]

@Qadgop_the_Mercotan

I’m thinking of course of Governor Crist, who is a moderate republican.

He’s a popular governor, and he’ll be going up against a conservative republican for the party nomination in the primary.

If it’s an open primary, I feel fairly certain he’ll get the nod. If not, I’m not so sure he will.

Can anyone enlighten me?

We have closed primaries.

ETA: No way in hell Crist loses the primary, and any Dem had better run one hell of a campaign to beat him. Crist is very popular.

[Bijou_Drains]

Of course I think anyone can switch their registration to the GOP to vote in this primary if they really want to.

[emmaliminal]

Do y’all think the Outrage movie will be a factor for Crist, or is it too obscure to matter?

[jayjay]

Frankly, I don’t think Meek will win against either one of the Republican likelies, and I haven’t seen any indication that anyone better is going to toss their hat in the ring. If the senator for Florida is likely to be a Republican after this election, I’d rather it be Crist than Rubio.

[Really_Not_All_That_Bright]

@emmaliminal

Do y’all think the Outrage movie will be a factor for Crist, or is it too obscure to matter?

Nah. At this point the Republican Party will take just about any candidate that can win, and Crist is indeed very popular despite the rumors that have swirled since he took office.

I’d go so far as to say he could come out and still win the Republican primary and the election.

[UltraVires]

@Really_Not_All_That_Bright

I’d go so far as to say he could come out and still win the Republican primary and the election.

That would be interesting to see. I think he could win the general election in that instance, but he would have a much tougher GOP primary…

[Qadgop_the_Mercotan]

Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight.com has an interesting analysis of this matchup: Will Crist get Toomeyed?

Basically Nate says at least two of three things need to happen for Rubio to win the primary:

1. The ability for Rubio to differentiate himself on a security issue – probably illegal immigration;
2. A Rubio endorsement from Jeb Bush;
3. The wild card of Crist’s sexuality to work against him

[Really_Not_All_That_Bright]

There is something he’s overlooked, which is that Cuban voters are starting to abandon the Republican Party en masse in favor of Democrats because they are no longer one-issue voters. There are a half dozen Congressional districts in South Florida where Republican candidates usually ran unopposed in which Democratic candidates won significant portions of the vote (or the election itself) recently.

That favors Crist, of course, not Rubio.

[UltraVires]

@Qadgop_the_Mercotan

1. The ability for Rubio to differentiate himself on a security issue – probably illegal immigration;

Would get him a few votes but not nearly enough.

@Qadgop_the_Mercotan

2. A Rubio endorsement from Jeb Bush;

Would get him a few votes but not nearly enough.

@Qadgop_the_Mercotan

3. The wild card of Crist’s sexuality to work against him

Those rumors have been around forever. The only way that this would work is if there was undisputed evidence, or if Crist actually came out. Then, if #s 1 and 2 happened, you could see a Rubio upset.

[MovieMogul]

From Salon:

WASHINGTON – If you need more proof of the Republican Party’s identity crisis, check out South Carolina Republican Sen. Jim DeMint’s endorsement of former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio.

DeMint officially threw his weight behind Rubio at a press conference outside a Senate office building Tuesday afternoon. The two men attracted about 10 reporters, there because, in running for the Florida Senate seat that will be vacated by Republican Mel Martinez, Rubio’s bucking his party, challenging Florida Gov. Charlie Crist for the GOP nomination…

It makes sense that DeMint, one of the Senate’s most conservative members, would endorse Rubio, an ideological compatriot, over Crist, a moderate Republican who upset many in the GOP when he broke from party ranks to support President Obama’s stimulus plan. DeMint, meanwhile, has called Obama “the world’s best salesman of socialism."

But that doesn’t change the fact that the Republican Party is struggling to find an identity and prevent Democrats from attaining and preserving a filibuster proof majority. More specifically, it’s having trouble finding a balance between moderation and candidates who can win in a general election (Crist, according to the Quinnipiac survey, has a 59 percent approval rating among Democrats in Florida), or sticking with the party’s conservative principles, even if it means candidates doomed to tilt at windmills.

The fault lines are already evident in this race. While Cornyn and McConnell back Crist, DeMint is joining former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, a surprisingly strong 2008 presidential candidate, in Rubio’s corner. Meanwhile, Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele has refused to take sides…

“The party needs to do what it needs to do,” DeMint said. [But] primaries are good, particularly now, as we search for the heart and soul of the Republican Party.”

That identity may be difficult for Republicans to find if more highly contested primaries emerge. For his part, DeMint said today that he spoke with Crist, promising to keep the campaign positive and support Crist if he wins the primary. But from the very first anti-Crist spot his campaign produced, which attacks the governor for fiscal irresponsibility while tying him to Obama, Rubio’s shown that this might not end with harmony for the Republican Party.