You would think, from hearing Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez tell it, that he won the election Tuesday night. You would think wrong.
Gimenez, who may very well be the first incumbent mayor ever to be forced 
into a runoff in Miami-Dade, can claim victory all he wants. It rings hollow. He may have come in first with the most votes and almost 48 percent, but he really lost Tuesday.
I mean, does it look like he’s celebrating a victory here? A picture says a thousand words. Compare his face to his challenger Raquel Regalado‘s in these side-by-side Miami Herald photos of post-result candidates giving speeches. Is he holding back tears?
Gimenez tweeted that he had won every key demographic group. But he didn’t win the one key demographic that mattered most: A majority.
He told reporters in a mostly empty “victory party” room at the Miami Airport Doubltree Hotel that he was “well-poised to take this to victory in November.” Well, he thought he was “well-poised” to take this to victory yesterday — and look how that worked out.
Everybody knows Gimenez totally expected to win outright in the first round on Tuesday. He bragged about it to reporters. He dismissed Regalado as nothing more than a nuisance. Operatives were telling people that his early voting exit polls were at 53 or 54 percent.
But Gimenez and his team sure weren’t acting like they were leading. They blew his cash wad with giant mailers, constant radio ads and TV commercials. They went hyper negative with a mailer that morphed Trump’s face with Regalado’s (it totally backfired, by the way) and an uber repetitive robocall his campaign made disguised as Regalado’s campaign to piss people off, a dastardly deed and possibly illegal move (more on that later). In fact, they threw everything they had — actually everything they invented — against Regalado, who suddenly goes from underfunded underdog to front runner.
Yes, I said front runner. Everything changes now. Because, despite all the mayor’s talk, the demographics in a November race favor the challenger. She has the teachers, the cops, the nurses and doctors and the majority of the public employees. She has the librarians and the Pets’ Trust community. Because of her advocacy for immigrant children, she has the Dreamers and those who love and support them. In other words, she appeals to voters across party lines.
In November, there will be far more voters driven to the polls by the presidential election. There are a projected 600,000 voters or more who have never voted for Miami-Dade mayor — or for Carlos Gimenez. There’s no loyalty or history there for them. And many of them in this predominantly Democrat county will be excited about the possibility of the first female U.S. president topping the ballot. Regalado, who would become the first female mayor of Miami-Dade, is definitely going to get some of that #ImWithHer action.
So what on Earth does Gimenez see as his clear path to victory?
Maybe Gimenez suddenly announces today or next week that he endorses Hillary Clinton. The Democrats around him might even stage a big photo op or something.
He could even change his party registration to Democrat or Independent. He already toyed with the idea in 2014 — or just said he was considering it because he knew it would get him lots of free press.
Either of those strategies would be a way to appeal to Democrat voters in a nonpartisan race that now features two lifelong Republicans. In fact, he may not have to switch to pander for those blue votes. Just suggesting it is enough to put this into the news cycle for a week! People will assume he switched.
Certainly the Democrats surrounding him are mulling these ideas over. His county communications director, Mike Hernandez, who really wants to work for Hillary instead, is the one who came up with that whole party switch PR stunt in 2014. The mayor’s consultant, Freddy Balsera, might work for Donald Trump and his Doral resort, but he has advocated and campaigned for Clinton, most recently in Puerto Rico. And his golden goose fundraiser, Brian Goldmeier, is a former Democrat Party operative who worked for the gubernatorial run by Alex Sink and who would love nothing more than to be a blue blood again.
So it’s really not that far-fetched to think that Gimenez would switch to gain an advantage in an election. Not in Florida, where we have party switchers like former Gov. Charlie Crist and former State Rep. Ana Rivas Logan.
Although it really hasn’t worked that well for them.
Because voters are smarter than he thinks.
That’s why Ladra bets Gimenez will have that same constipated look on his face in November.
Carlos Gimenez loss could make him Dem in Novem added by Ladra on
View all posts by Ladra →
He can change his affiliation 100 times, but it is still the same rabid dog with a different collar, so how crazy it would be to get near him and pet him, he will still bite your hand off ( which he is doing by taking our tax $ ) SAY GOODBY TO THE ONE THAT IS STEALING FROM THE POOR AND GIVING IT TO HIS FAMILY AND FRIENDS.
When I first heard this woman speak during a Sunday morning interview show over a year ago, shortly after she got into this race, I knew by show’s end that she was my choice for mayor. Not only was she well-versed on the issues, but she commanded a great intellect for facts and figures and what the Gimenez regime had failed to deliver the last 4 years. She had answers, and they were appealing. She KNOWS Miami-Dade, so anybody from his camp who dares to say she’s not qualified or experienced for the job is an outright moron. He SHOULD be worried. Just like you said, Ladra, he missed the one demographic that really counted, the MAJORITY. Showing up the other day in the crowd of those mourning the murder of little 8-year-old Jada Page, alongside the county’s police director and school superintendent, was Gimenez himself. I may be wrong, but has he ever showed up in any other crowd mourning the premature death of a child? Can’t recall seeing any TV footage of him doing so before. Smells suspiciously to me like he was misusing the Page event to opportunistically promote his candidacy – which, if he was, was crass and inappropriate indeed. A new low, even for him. I’d like to know which of his political advisers imagined it would be propitious for him to subtly electioneer at such a tragedy-steeped outpouring of the black community, with TV cameras in abundance…
Numbers don’t lie. Our Mayor received 8151 more AB ballots this election as compared to 2012. But, he received 16,444 less votes at the polls on election day THIS ELECTION AS COMPARED TO THE LAST ONE IN 2012. I guess his popularity has suffered a bit because he keeps his promises. Couldn’t steal enough AB ballots this time.
Are you the PI that tried to get some “interest” from our illustrious State Attorney to investigate a boletero recently? For several years now, I always check the candidate’s donation/expense lists to help me decide who to NOT vote for. If I find the same names with similar amounts on many different candidate’s expense lists, that’s a red flag for me. This year their efforts are described as “advertising.” LOL
Do you happen to know how many of the AB that were cast were from people who don’t/ haven’t voted lately? And did the AB pecentages cast for the candidates track the percentages that voted in person?
Ever since the exit pols weren’t jiving with the “actual” results, I became suspicious.
Could you contact me privately? I’d like to continue the discussion. [email protected]
Mayor Gimenez, those of us who supported The Pets Trust have a really good memory. Now we will have our say once again in November. Go Regalado!
Good for Raquel Regaldo! She fought an honorable campaign. We have probably not heard the last of her.
LOVE IT! I JUST DISCOVERED BLOG AND CANT GET ENOUGH!!!! Keep us up to date, PLEASE..
Raquel Regalado took the high road, and despite the odds of Gimenez’s four plus millions for his campaign and his slanderous robocalls, stirred the voters who have had enough of Gimenez’s corruption, to the polls to rally for her. Instrumental in this is The Pets’ Trust, whose founders Rita Schwartz and Michael Rosenberg worked countless hours over the past several years to carry this to fruition. No doubt this momentum will build and continue on to November, to a victory for the animals and the Democracy itself, to the benefit of all who call Miami-Dade home.