New Gen Z PAC focused on flipping Florida state seats says it stacked $20K in its first 24 hours

A Generation Z-led political action committee (PAC) dedicated to energizing youth voters and flipping elected seats blue says it’s having a successful first week.

Florida Future Leaders announced it has already amassed more than $20,000 just 24 hours after filing with the state Division of Elections.

Logan Rubenstein, a gun violence prevention activist and adviser to the PAC, said those funds and more to come will help fund Democrats’ comeback in the coming election and ones after it.

“Florida is a story of near misses,” he said in a statement. “There are at least six state legislative seats across the state that we lost in just the last election that we wouldn’t have lost if a larger fraction of the local young Democrats turned out. So, we got the best of the best youth leaders in a room, and we are doing something about it.”

State officials who pledged donations to the PAC on its first day included Miami Gardens Sen. Shevrin Jones and Reps. Dan Daley of Coral Springs, Chrstine Hunschofsky of Parkland and Marie Woodson of Hollywood.

Jones, no stranger to voter mobilization efforts, told Florida Politics by text that supporting the PAC early was a no-brainer.

“Investing in our future goes beyond lip service; it means providing the support they need to thrive and succeed,” he said.

Near-record youth voter participation nationally in 2022 helped stymie what was expected to be a red wave of GOP victories. Instead, Democrats gained a U.S. Senate seat but lost nine seats in Congress — none more than in Florida.

At the state level, it was a bloodbath. Florida Democrats lost their only seat in the Cabinet and saw their already sizable disadvantages in the Senate and House grow by four and seven seats, respectively.

A Tufts University analysis of Midterm turnout provides insight into why. Florida had the ninth-worst participation rate for voters 18-29 among all U.S. states, with just 22.4% of Gen Z voters in Florida turning out at the polls in 2022 — a 9.1% decrease from two years prior.

That decline disproportionately hurt Democrats and progressive causes with which younger voters side more than most of their generational counterparts. Gen Z adults today account for 1 in 6 eligible voters, and 43% of them identify as liberal — the highest rate of any generation, according to a Public Religion Research Institute survey.

Rather than wait for the state party to act on the matter, Florida Future Leaders Chair Jayden D’Onofrio said, college- and high school-aged Democrats are working to fill the gap.

“Great organizations like NextGen and the (Joe) Biden campaign are doing great youth turnout work all over the country, but Florida isn’t high on their priority list,” he said. “The Florida Democratic Party has voiced support for what we are doing — but it’s up to us to garner the resources to deploy an efficient ground game.”

D’Onofrio told Florida Politics the PAC’s game plan involves hiring around half a dozen full-time college campus organizers at “key colleges and universities” in Florida and supplementing their efforts with other paid positions dedicated to digital outreach.

At the high school level, the organization will help establish a continuum of resources Democratic leaders can depend on through frequent changes in leadership.

“It’s all about continuity, (and when) I took over … after COVID, it was non-existent,” Florida High School Democrats Chair Rhea Maniar said in a statement. “(With) our leadership graduating every year, transferring financial resources can be tough. They have to start from scratch every time. I’m hopeful this step will give the future leaders of High School and College Democrats a leg up on success.”