From a congressional contest drawing national attention to a County Commission challenger who arrived late on the radar, Pinellas voters have several down-ballot races worth watching Nov. 3.
With Election Day a month away, the top of the Pinellas ballot is hardly the only place where the political landscape is moving.
Florida’s 13th Congressional District has drawn national party attention. St. Petersburg and Clearwater each have consequential City Council runoffs. An incumbent Pinellas School Board member faces a challenger after an August primary that separated the top two candidates by little more than a percentage point.
And bubbling underneath those races is a County Commission contest that could alter the partisan makeup of a board Republicans currently dominate.
Here are five races to watch:
U.S. House District 13: Luna vs. Gray
Republican U.S. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna is seeking a third term against Democrat Leela Gray, a retired Army brigadier general and first-time candidate. No-party-affiliation candidate Tony D’Arrigo is also on the Nov. 3 ballot.
Gray emerged decisively from the Democratic primary, taking 65% of the vote against Brandt Robinson and John Liccione.
The race has since attracted increased national attention. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee added Gray to its Red to Blue program after the primary, signaling a greater investment by national Democrats in the district.
Money still favors the incumbent. Through the July 29 reporting period, Luna had raised more than $3.2 million and had roughly $1.47 million in cash on hand. Gray had raised about $1.22 million and reported roughly $683,000 on hand.
Public polling remains limited. An August Hart Research survey commissioned by the Democratic-aligned House Majority PAC reported Gray at 44%, Luna at 43% and D’Arrigo at 7% among 500 likely voters. Because the poll was sponsored by a group aligned with Democrats and there is not a robust set of independent public polling, it should be viewed as a single snapshot rather than a definitive measure of the race.
St. Petersburg City Council District 6: Grove vs. Mallory
What began as a five-person contest to replace term-limited Councilmember Gina Driscoll is now a two-person race between Linsey Grove and Trevor Mallory.
Grove finished first in the August election with 1,902 votes. Mallory followed with 1,517. Terri Balliet, Doug Homeyer and Jameka Williams were eliminated.
There is an important change in the electorate for November: while only District 6 residents voted in the August contest, all St. Petersburg voters will choose between Grove and Mallory in the general election.
The post-primary endorsement picture has also shifted. Mallory has secured endorsements from all three candidates eliminated in August — Balliet, Homeyer and Williams — as well as outgoing Councilmember Driscoll and several other current and former local officials.
Grove, meanwhile, entered the runoff after winning the largest share of the District 6 primary vote and has accumulated support from a collection of labor, environmental and advocacy organizations.
The contest now asks a citywide electorate to settle a race that District 6 voters couldn’t resolve in August.
Clearwater City Council Seat 5: Wilson vs. Bunker
Clearwater’s Seat 5 race is also headed to November after no candidate won a majority in August.
Sam Wilson finished first with 11,051 votes, followed by former Councilmember Mark Bunker with 8,024. Kevin Laughlin finished third with 3,662, sending Wilson and Bunker into the Nov. 3 runoff.
The officially nonpartisan race has nonetheless attracted overt partisan involvement.
Wilson, a congressional staffer for Luna, accumulated endorsements from Republican elected officials during the campaign, including six of seven Pinellas County commissioners. The Republican Party of Florida has also entered the race with advertising attacking Bunker.
Bunker, who served on the council after winning election in 2020, has made his longstanding opposition to the Church of Scientology’s influence in Clearwater a central element of his campaign. He is also campaigning on neighborhood investment, development and government transparency.
That leaves Clearwater voters with a municipal runoff that is formally nonpartisan but increasingly connected to broader political networks and one of the city’s longest-running debates: the relationship between City Hall, downtown development and Scientology.
Pinellas School Board District 3: Peters vs. Campogni
Incumbent Dawn Peters faces Curtis Campogni in the countywide District 3 School Board runoff.
The August election produced an unusually tight finish at the top of the three-person field. Peters received about 36% of the vote and Campogni about 35%, while Dawn Douglas finished third. Neither of the top two reached the majority required to avoid a November runoff.
Peters was elected to the board in 2022 and is currently vice chair. She has emphasized stability, academic growth, career and technical education and multiple pathways for students after graduation.
Campogni is making his first run for office after working with at-risk youth and founding Speak4MC, an organization that trains youth and family agencies. His campaign has emphasized school safety, teacher recruitment and retention, declining enrollment and stronger engagement with parents. He also has the backing of the Pinellas teachers and educational support professionals associations.
Although School Board elections are nonpartisan, the contest arrives after several election cycles in which education policy has become increasingly connected to broader political debates in Florida.
And after August, neither candidate can claim a commanding electoral advantage from the first round: they entered the runoff separated by roughly one percentage point.
Bubbling under: Pinellas County Commission District 2
One race that received considerably less attention earlier in the cycle now bears watching.
Republican Commissioner Brian Scott is seeking another term in the countywide District 2 seat against Democrat Tim Hughes. Unlike several other local contests, the race skipped an August primary and goes directly to the Nov. 3 ballot.
Scott began the cycle from a strong financial position. Current county campaign records list him with $154,839 in monetary contributions, compared with $40,500 for Hughes in the Supervisor of Elections reporting system.
Hughes is a retired environmental specialist whose background includes two decades working in watershed management. His campaign has emphasized green space, stormwater and flood resilience, insurance costs and affordable housing.
But the significance of District 2 extends beyond Scott and Hughes.
Scott currently occupies one of six Republican seats on the seven-member County Commission. District 1 Commissioner René Flowers is the board’s lone Democrat; the county’s official 2026 guide identifies Scott and the other sitting commissioners’ party affiliations.
That means a Hughes victory would flip District 2 from Republican to Democratic and change the commission’s partisan composition from 6-1 Republican to 5-2 Republican.
It would not change control of the board. It would, however, give Democrats a second seat on a commission where they currently hold only one.
For a race that spent much of the cycle outside the spotlight – Scott entered 2026 after raising nearly $100,000 while still unopposed — that alone gives District 2 a different set of stakes heading into November.
With one month remaining, Pinellas’ political story is therefore spread across several levels of government: Congress, two city councils, the School Board and the County Commission.