ASHINGTON - The return to Cuba of shipwreck survivor Elian Gonzalez could doom Vice President Al Gore's slim hopes of carrying Florida in the November presidential election, political analysts said yesterday.
If the 6-year-old is returned to his father in Cuba, which seems increasingly likely, the 800,000-strong Cuban-American community in South Florida is likely to blame Gore along with the rest of the Clinton administration.
''Obviously it will harm Gore with the Cuban-American community, which is a significant element of the electorate,'' said William Claggett, a political scientist with Florida State University.
''If the return was an ugly affair, with US federal marshals called in to take the boy from his relatives, that would be especially bad,'' he said.
Florida with its 25 Electoral College votes is a key battleground in the Nov. 7 election. Both Gore, the certain Democratic presidential nominee, and his likely Republican opponent, Texas Governor George W. Bush, have visited frequently and both have stated their determination to carry the fourth-largest state.
There has been speculation that either or both men might select a Floridian as his vice presidential running mate, Senator Connie Mack for Bush and Senator Bob Graham for Gore.
President Clinton carried the state for the Democrats in the 1996 election with just over 48 percent of the vote, against Republican Bob Dole with 42.5 percent and Reform Party candidate Ross Perot with 9 percent.
Clinton won more than a third of the Cuban-American vote, performing especially well among second- and third-generation Cubans, who were born in the United States and lack some of the fervor of their parents and grandparents.
If Elian went back to Cuba, Gore could probably write off that vote, said Susan MacManus, a political scientist with the University of South Florida.
''That would be something that would burn in the minds of Cuban-Americans, young and old, for a long time,'' she said.
While Bush has opposed the return of the child unless and until his father is allowed to come to the United States to ''express himself in freedom,'' Gore has taken a more nuanced position, calling for the judicial process to be honored while condemning Cuban President Fidel Castro.
Even without the Gonzalez affair, winning Florida would be tough for Gore. Bush's brother, Jeb Bush, is the governor and many of the issues that helped Clinton in 1996 have disappeared.
