Florida Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum, while initially coming off as a nice guy and a possible historic first as a black governor, has some problems getting to that governor's chair.  He's revealed himself to be a big-city, Chicago-style politician, complete with big-city-style mayoral corruption, based on the scandals he's gotten himself embroiled in.  And, well, that, along with a nervous recognition of his socialist agenda, actually seems to be sinking him.

According to this inside-baseball Florida Politics blog:

A new poll of the Florida gubernatorial race finds former congressman Ron DeSantis with a slim lead over Democratic rival Andrew Gillum.

The internal poll, conducted by 1892 and obtained by Florida Politics, shows DeSantis with a 1-point lead over Gillum, 47-46 percent, with third-party candidates siphoning off 2 percent and 6 percent still undecided.

Internals are always the most interesting of polls, because they are the ones the candidates themselves commission to find out how they're doing but don't release to the public.  They're the least likely to be push polls designed to influence the public.

But the public polls are in the same neighborhood.  Florida Politics reports that Gillum is ahead, but not by much:

A NYTimes/Siena poll released Sunday had good news for Democrat Andrew Gillum and bad news for Republican Ron DeSantis.

Gillum had a five point lead (48-43 percent), and he led in every turnout scenario except for one: an electorate that looked like 2014.

The public polls tend to overcount Democrats and get the cell phone-only users all messed up.  Some are actually biased as well.  Florida Politics notes that Trump has a high above-water approval rating in Florida, so it's strange that Gillum should be so far ahead.  The other thing it notes is that Gillum is ahead in all voter make-up races, except if the voter make-up matches 2014 (which is exactly what many political analysts are forecasting this year's midterms are).

Much of this is pre-scandal reporting anyway.

What's likely to be going on is that the former Tallahassee mayor's acceptance of free cruises and takings of free pricey and hard-to-get theater tickets, as well as now going along with illicitly paid for campaign events, which is the latest news story, aren't helping him.  Why he wasn't busted for these things, after all the FBI effort to show for it, is a mystery.  But it ends Gillum's momentum as a fresh face and a new look for Florida politics, given the seediness of it all.

If Gillum's acts were too small to bust individually, what voters are seeing now is a pattern of small dishonesties, which brings the realization that if the guy can be bought on these many small things, what else will he be buyable on with greater powers as governor?

His reaction hasn't helped, either, pulling out the race card for every instance where he was questioned about his ethics and character.

It looks as though the corruption allegations are taking him down and will continue to push his momentum downward.  If so, Florida will dodge a bullet, given his big socialist plans for the state.  This would be a good thing for a state that includes so many refugees from socialism.