2026 Florida election candidates: Primary voter guide 2%

By Times Staff Writer1%

7/16/2026, 2:27:35 PM

BS Summary: This article contains 7 faulty reasoning types, including Biased Writer Voice, Burden of Proof, and Indoctrination, with Appeal to Authority as the most egregious example at 8.9% saturation with 29 hits. Analysis detected 128 faulty-reasoning hits from 325 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 10.2% and a BS Rank of 2% (16,577 of 16,805 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 98.60% of the article peer group.

Florida’s 2026 primary election is Tuesday, Aug. 
18. 
This is your guide to the candidates running for major offices statewide and here in Tampa Bay. 
Over the next few weeks, voters will select the Democratic and Republican nominees for Florida’s next governor and U.S. senator. 
But that’s not all. 
Tampa Bay voters will choose who to put on school boards and city councils, who to be county commissioners and judges and who to be mayor of St. 
Petersburg. 
The Tampa Bay Times is covering all of these races and more. 
Our reporters wrote about each race, and they sent specific questions to more than 130 candidates, so you can learn where they stand on the issues before you vote. 
Scroll down to read it all. 
Use the buttons below to filter the guide to races in your county or open to voters in your party. 
Tap candidates’ names to add them to a list, which can be used as your own custom guide. 
Use it while you fill out your ballot at home, or take this guide into the polls with you. 
(Phones are allowed.) 
You can also print out a plain-text version. 
These are not endorsements or recommendations. 
Check with your county supervisor of elections (in Hillsborough , Pinellas or Pasco ) to find which races will be on your ballot. 
Times staff reporters Ashley Borja, Juan Carlos Chavez, Max Chesnes, Alexa Coultoff, Abby DiSalvo, Colbi Edmonds, Romy Ellenbogen, Henry Fernandez, Katelyn Ferral, Natanya Friedheim, Camila Jose Gomez, Divya Kumar, Emily L. 
Mahoney, Pedro Malkomes, Lucy Marques, Nina Moske, Lawrence Mower, Shauna Muckle, Lauren Peace, Jeffrey S. 
Solochek, Paige Stevens, Dan Sullivan, Mia Taubenblat, Michael Van Sickler, Nicolas Villamil and Colleen Wright contributed reporting. 
Editing by Jay Cridlin, Justine Griffin, Allison Ross, Michelle Stark, Chris Tisch, Bill Varian and Emily Wunderlich. 
Illustration by Sean Kristoff-Jones. 
Web design and development by Langston Taylor. 
Project management by Allison Ross. 
Confirmation Bias
0%
Anchoring Bias
0%
Availability Heuristic
0%
Representativeness Heuristic
0%
Hindsight Bias
0%
Overconfidence Bias
0%
Framing Effect
1.2%
Loss Aversion
0%
Status Quo Bias
0%
Sunk Cost Effect
0%
Optimism Bias
0%
Pessimism Bias
0%
Negativity Bias
0%
Self-Serving Bias
1.8%
Fundamental Attribution Error
0%
Actor-Observer Bias
0%
In-Group Bias
0%
Out-Group Homogeneity Bias
0%
Halo Effect
0%
Horn Effect
0%
Dunning-Kruger Effect
0%
Recency Bias
0%
Primacy Effect
0%
Blind-Spot Bias
0%
Ad Hominem
0%
Straw Man
0%
Appeal to Authority
8.9%
False Dilemma
0%
Slippery Slope
0%
Circular Reasoning
0%
Hasty Generalization
0%
Red Herring
0%
Bandwagon
0%
Appeal to Emotion
0%
Begging the Question
0%
Post Hoc (False Cause)
0%
Tu Quoque
0%
Burden of Proof
7.1%
Appeal to Nature
0%
Composition/Division
0%
Anecdotal
0%
No True Scotsman
0%
Ambiguity (Equivocation)
0%
Gambler’s Fallacy
0%
Middle Ground
0%
Personal Incredulity
0%
Special Pleading
0%
Genetic Fallacy
0%
Unattributed Quote
0%
Quote-first Misdirection
0%
Biased Writer Voice
8.9%
Indoctrination
5.8%
Politically Left Leaning Bias
0%
Politically Right Leaning Bias
0%
Attempt to Sell a Product or Service
5.5%

325 words analyzed.

Analysis

Hover over highlighted words in the article to view the associated bias or fallacy analysis.