KISSIMMEE, Fla. (FNN) – Recently, Osceola County School Board Member Jon Arguello and St. Cloud Proud Foundation Founder Jose Martinez filed paperwork to run for the Florida State Senate District 25 open seat, according to the Florida Division of Elections’ website.

Both candidates are Hispanics and Republicans.

Could Senate District 25 Flip Republican?
Arguello and Martinez are hoping to flip State Senate District 25 seat for the Republican Party in 2024. Senate District 25 is heavily Hispanic with a large Puerto Rican population in Osceola and Orange counties.

During the 2022 midterm election, incumbent State Senator Victor Torres was clearly losing support among Democrat and independent Hispanic voters in Osceola County. Republican candidate Peter Vivaldi came within 300 votes of flipping Osceola County out of the Democratic Party’s hands. The Democrats appear to have their work cut out for them if they want to switch Osceola County from purple back to blue.

U.S. Senator Marco Rubio, Governor Ron DeSantis, both Republicans, won Osceola County in the 2022 election, showing an ideological shift in the population.

Florida State Representative Kristen Arrington, a Democratic candidate for Florida State Senate District 25, attends the Central Florida AFL-CIO annual Labor Picnic in Orlando. Photo by Florida National News.

Could Senate District 25 Flip White?
In since 2012, Darren Soto was the first and Victor Torres was the second Puerto Rican elected to the State Senate. Both are registered Democrats.

Democratic State Representative Kristen Arrington flipped a former Puerto Rican seat white when she won Florida House District 43 in 2020, vacated by then Democratic State Rep. John Cortes, who ran unsuccessful for Osceola County Clerk of the Courts. The seat is yet to be reclaimed by a Puerto Rican candidate because after redistricting, Rep. Arrington was re-elected by a landslide (Arrington 58.3% to Republican Christian De La Torre 38.7) to the predominantly Hispanic constituency, renamed District 46, in 2022.

And now, with her sights on Sen. Torres’s seat for 2024, Rep. Arrington may very well win (and flip) that seat too. Arrington carries with her a name with strong political capital. She’s working full time in the family business: Her mother-in-law, Mary Jane Arrington, is the Osceola County Supervisor of Elections, while her husband, Brandon Arrington, was elected for Osceola County Commissioner for District 3 in 2020 and became Board Chair in 2022.

After Arrington’s win in 2020, Puerto Rican Democrats only have one seat in the Florida House–Rep. Daisy Morales won in 2020 and lost in 2022 to Rita Harris, who is white and a Democrat, while Orange County School Board Member Johanna Lopez, who’s Puerto Rican and a Democrat won the District 43 seat that became available after redistricting split Rep. Morales’ District 48 in half (districts 43 and 44).

Arrington’s current Democratic opponent in the SD 25 race is Sen. Torres’s own wife Carmen Torres. While Torres has worked alongside her husband as well as their daughter–Orange County Property Appraiser Amy Mercado–in building strong relationships among unions, Democrats and political action committees (PACs), the Arringtons appear to have a dynasty in Osceola County, so Torres will have her work cut out for her in that portion of the district.

In 2022 Arrington continued to make inroads with the Puerto Rican community by endorsing State Rep. Morales re-election bid, the only Puerto Rican in the Florida House, and co-sponsored bills Morales sponsored that were signed into law. However, Senator Torres, his daughter and wife chose to endorse Harris, who is white, instead of gaining an additional House seat (District 44) and political power for the Hispanic community.

Puerto Rican political organizers and activists told NBC News, “We must elect more Puerto Ricans to local and state offices and Congress.”

During the 2022 election, Governor DeSantis focused heavily on voter registration, which appeared to benefit him in Osceola County, and the Democrats will need to focus on GOTV (get out the vote) and voter registration efforts in order to increase their chances of victory. With 2024 being a presidential election year, more Democrats will turn out, but Democrats, especially in the Hispanic and Puerto Rican communities, will need to take a page out of DeSantis’s playbook and unify–with zero infighting whatsoever, despite their differences–and turn out every vote they possibly can in order to protect their representation. If not, the seats will continue to be scooped up by others.