TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis confirmed Friday afternoon that Florida’s March 17 presidential primary election will take place.

“We’re definitely voting,” DeSantis said during a press conference held at a warehouse at the Florida Department of Health in Tallahassee. “They voted during the Civil War – we’re going to vote.”

The governor reiterated that he does not want anybody going into assisted living facilities to vote. Supervisors of Elections throughout the state have been moving precincts from assisted living facilities or nursing homes to other polling locations over the past few days as concerns about the novel coronavirus have increased this week.

“That may mean some voters get inconvenienced who aren’t part of those communities, but to me it’s a no brainer to err on the side of safety for our residents,” he said, adding that he doesn’t expect the elections to be “cliff-hangers.”

Although there are a couple of challengers opposing Donald Trump in the Republican Florida primary, he is expected to get the large majority of votes.

On the Democratic side, former Vice President Joe Biden has a huge lead against Vermont U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders in various public polls published this week.

Shortly before DeSantis spoke, the Florida Secretary of State’s office issued a joint statement with the secretary of state’s from Arizona, Ohio and Illinois declaring that next Tuesday’s presidential primary election will take place in all four states.

“Unlike concerts, sporting events or other mass gatherings where large groups of people travel long distances to congregate in a confined space for an extended period of time, polling locations see people from a nearby community coming into and out of the building for a short duration.”

The statement went on to say that, “Americans have participated in elections during challenging times in the past, and based on the best information we have from public health officials, we are confident that voters in our states can safely and securely cast their ballots in this election, and that otherwise healthy poll workers can and should carry out their patriotic duties on Tuesday.”

Rumors that Florida might postpone Tuesday’s election accelerated after the state of Louisiana announced that it was postponing its presidential primary scheduled for April 4 until July 25.

Earlier on Friday, political strategist Adam Goodman, who has advised the campaigns of numerous local and national politicians (including former St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Baker and former New York City Mayor Rudy Guiliani), penned an op-ed for Fox news in which he urged that upcoming presidential primaries scheduled for the next few weeks be delayed.

“It’s simply not right to hold elections where people who want to vote can’t, or are terrified that if they vote they could contract COVID-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus,” Goodman wrote ”This means “one person, one vote” will yield to many people being too frightened to vote.”

Nevertheless, Florida’s presidential primary will take place this Tuesday.

As of Friday morning, more than 1.6 million Floridians have already voted in the election, either in early voting or vote-by-mail.