March 12 (Bloomberg) — Republican David Jolly's victory in a special election in Florida's 13th Congressional District, upsetting a Democratic rival in a race that drew at least $8.8 million in spending by outside groups, opens a season of midterm elections that could revolve around Obamacare.

Jolly defeated Democrat Alex Sink 48.4 percent to 46.6 percent, with 100 percent of precincts in the Tampa Bay-area district reporting yesterday, according to the Pinellas County elections office. Libertarian Lucas Overby had 4.8 percent.

With less than eight months remaining before midterm congressional elections, strategists, political committees and elected officials poured resources into this district, buying ads that tested messaging on the president's Affordable Care Act, Social Security and abortion.

Complete your profile to continue reading and get FREE access to BenefitsPRO, part of your ALM digital membership.

Your access to unlimited BenefitsPRO content isn’t changing.
Once you are an ALM digital member, you’ll receive:

  • Breaking benefits news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
  • Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
  • Critical converage of the property casualty insurance and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, PropertyCasualty360 and ThinkAdvisor
NOT FOR REPRINT

© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.