Gainesville, Florida, is a vibrant city located in Alachua County, and is the county seat. The current population of Gainesville is estimated to be 133,857 people as of 2019. Politically speaking, Gainesville is an important part of the 8th Congressional District of Florida. The current representative for this district is Democrat Stephanie Murphy who has been in office since 2016. The major political party in Gainesville is the Democratic Party with the Republican Party being their main competition. Additionally, there are several local elected government positions in Gainesville such as Mayor, City Commissioners, and state representatives that hold offices in the city. Currently the mayor of Gainesville is Lauren Poe and the city commissioners are Harvey Budd, Adrian Hayes-Santos, Gail Johnson and David Arreola. As well as local politicians, citizens also have many opportunities to get involved with organizations such as nonprofits and advocacy groups that can help shape policy at both the local level and statewide level.
The political climate in Zip 32641 (Gainesville, FL) is moderately liberal.
Alachua County, FL is strongly liberal. In Alachua County, FL 62.7% of the people voted Democrat in the last presidential election, 35.6% voted for the Republican Party, and the remaining 1.7% voted Independent.
In the last Presidential election, Alachua county remained overwhelmingly Democratic, 62.7% to 35.6%.
Alachua county voted Democratic in every Presidential election since 2000.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index
Zip 32641 (Gainesville, FL) is moderately liberal.
Gainesville, Florida is moderately liberal.
Alachua County, Florida is strongly liberal.
Gainesville Metro Area is moderately liberal.
Florida is leaning conservative.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index is based on recent voting in national elections, federal campaign contributions by local residents, and consumer personality profiles.
VoteWord™
Displaying 20 years of Presidential voting, visualized in one word.
Gainesville, Florida: D D D D D D
How It Works:
Here at BestPlaces, we were looking at the voting patterns since the 2000 election and realized that we could express the results of each election as one letter. R if the Republican Party candidate won, D for the Democrat and I for the Independent. The six elections (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020) would be expressed as six-letter word (R R D R R).
Then we went a little further and added the dimension of magnitude. If the difference of victory was greater than 10 percent, the letter is upper case, and lower case if the difference was less than 10 percent. This allows us to see interesting voting patterns at just a glance.
Here's the VoteWord for Iowa d r d d r. In the last six elections the state has been closely contested, voting narrowly for the Republican Party candidate in 2016 and 2020 after voting for the Democratic Party in 2008 and 2012. Virginia (r r d d d D) has voted for the Democratic Party in the last three elections.
Individual Campaign Contributions in zip 32641 (Gainesville)
In the last 4 years (2018-2021), there were 400 contributions totaling $23,345 to the Democratic Party and liberal campaigns, averaging $58 per contribution.
In the last 4 years, there were 9 contributions totaling $1,195 to the Republican Party and conservative campaigns, averaging $133 per contribution.
(source: Federal Election Commission)