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State Rep. Carlos Trujillo, who announced last week that he qualified for re-election by collecting the required 
signatures — including Dems and Independents, he says — said he, too, welcomed the challenge.
“It’s nice to be re-elected without opposition, but it’s even better to have to campaign and go out and show voters your record,” said Trujillo, who Democrats repeatedly say blocked the minimum wage bill from even being heard in committee, but also killed the Miami Dolphins stadium tax grab scam last year.
“I’m confident in my history,” Trujillo told Ladra. “Come November, it’s going to really show well for the party and the governor.”
“I think we’re going to be surprising a lot of folks,” said Miami-Dade Democratic Party Executive Director Juan Cuba, who the party is pretty much paying to run against State Rep. Jose Felix “One More Pepe” Diaz. He says he is pumped by the fact that voters registrations for Dems and Independents are growing faster than Republicans.
Cuba told Ladra that he knew it was going to be a hard fought. He said it a couple of times. “Republicans turn out better at midterms,” he admitted.
But they are trying to send a message.
“We need to challenge every single seat. Nobody has stood up to run in these districts. If we had done that in 2012, we would have picked up three more victories,” Cuba told me, adding that they are looking to do the same blitz in 2016.
He says that because Democratic and Independent registrations are growing quickly, District 116 — where just over 60% of the voters are Republicans and no blue has ever been elected — may not always stay red.
“People agree with us on very important issues that Republicans are just not on the right side of,” Cuba said, bringing up Medicaid expansion, that minimum wage bill and public education dollars.
“These are the things that affect people in real ways.”
Ladra says Cuba is the only one of the Fat Chance Crew who gets double digits. He can talk the talk, and walk the door-to-door walk — since he’s been running ground games for a couple of years now and has that campaign experience — but even he knows that this is about a long-term vision.
“It takes a lot to ask someone to be a candidate, to ask people to run. None of us are going into this thinking it’s easy and we are going to win because Obama won,” Cuba said.
“But if we lose, we’re still winners.”
Um, no, you would be also rans at best. But perhaps the names get out there and this is just practice for 2016, which is when the dems might really make a difference. Cuba thinks so, too.
“Another two years of this voter shift and Miami-Dade will be definitely, absolutely Democratic,” he said.
But then, I wonder if that will be of little solace to folks like Charlie Crist and Conressman Joe Garcia, who are focused on the present moment.
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