Florida=Cubans, gays, and old people.
Politically, Florida has managed to stay a swing state because old people like to move to Florida to retire (for the good weather and cheap taxes) and this perfectly balances out the Hispanic immigrants coming in. The Cubans used to vote Republican because the dems were weak on communism but that may be changing (Cubans voted for Trump by 50-58%). The other Hispanic groups vote like you would imagine. For some reason there is also a lot of gays in Florida. I have no idea why though.
There are a lot of Cubans in Florida due to the "Wet foot, dry foot" federal law passed in 1966 which stated that if you were fleeing Cuba then you would not be labeled an illegal immigrant. This was because Cubans voted overwhelmingly Republican during the cold war along with Vietnamese and Koreans.
However, Obama ended this policy because he wanted to have fewer right wing voters in the USA. Obama targeted his deportations to Cubans to change the demographics of the country to be more left-wing. Remember, it is racist if Republicans want to deport future left wing voters.
Florida is one of the few states that has no state income tax and Unions cannot force non-union workers to pay union dues aka a "Right to Work state". So unions are weaker in Florida than in other states.
In general, Florida is just like the rest of the country. So long as you are talking to a young person or a brown person you won't have your ideas challenged. Although, it is a coin toss if you are talking to a Cuban.
Florida also has a reputation for being ridiculously weird. I can't really explain it so you should just take a look at this twitter news account:
https://twitter.com/search?q=florida+man&ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5EsearchFlorida is also known for having a lot of mass shootings. Orlando, Parkland, and that Madden video game shooting were all in Florida so if you like arguing endlessly about gun control online then now you can do it in real life as well.
Due to the growth of the sun belt (cheap taxes, weak unions, invention of AC, Aerospace investment), Florida has surpassed New York as the third largest state by population. The other two being California and Texas.
I can't answer any of your other questions. sorry.
Edited 9/19/2018 15:49:25