Some voters in Miami Lakes got a long, rambling text message about the village mayoral election — but not from one of the candidates. It was from former Mayor Michael “Muscles” Pizzi , who recently got a $1.7 million settlement from the city for his defense costs in a federal bribery trial.
Vice Mayor Antonio “Tony” Fernandez, who is running to replace termed-out Mayor Manny Cid, voted against the settlement. And Pizzi is trying to make that seem like a bad decision.
“I have not gotten involved in Miami Lakes politics for many years because I think it is beneath former mayors to tell people who to vote for,” started the “message from Mayor Michael A. Pizzi,” no former.
Editor’s note: This was in an email he sent to a voter in the town named Hope (Spanish for Esperanza) and she told Ladra that she copied it and sent it out to her friends. Somehow, it got redistributed enough so that it turned up in someone’s text messages and forwarded to Ladra.
Read Related: Miami Lakes votes to pay former Mayor Michael Pizzi $1.7 million for legal fees
“I cannot imagine how anyone with any intelligence would vote for Tony Fernandez,” Pizzi continued, pretending he has any intelligence. “He is a demagogue of the worst kind who panders to people because he thinks that they are stupid.
“Tony Fernandez just says whatever he thinks will get him votes, even if it is irresponsible,” Pizzi said, talking, of course, about the vice mayor’s vote to deny the former mayor a taxpayer-funded settlement for the legal fees Pizzi incurred defending himself against federal bribery and extortion charges after he was caught in a 2013 sting conspiring to approve a bogus grant scheme in exchange for cash and campaign contributions. He was acquitted in 2014.
This is the same guy who was recorded on undercover conversations talking about kickbacks for his help greasing the wheels of grants that were obviously bogus and never intended to really go to the city. The same guy who told a lobbyist/bagman to step into a closet before handing him $3,000. The same guy who grabbed a bag with two cigars and an envelope stuffed with $2,000 that had been set for him on a bar table at a local pool hall by two undercover FBI agents.
Read related: Chatty Michael Pizzi claims innocence, blames Michael Kesti
And now he wants to tell Village residents how to vote.
Pizzi says the town of Miami Lakes “wasted millions of dollars on my reimbursement case because they put political slogans ahead of sound judgement. We will never get that money back?”
He dares say “we”?
The argument is based on the assumption that Pizzi would have won the case — a lawsuit to get the town to pay the attorney’sl fees for his eight-member legal dream team — which is why the majority of the council approved the settlement in June. They said it wasn’t worth the risk, which could have cost many more millions.
“Tony Gonzalez actually voted to spend over five million dollars in a certain judgment and more litigation and to drag this out at taxpayer expense anther ten years,” Pizzi writes in his message. “How could anyone with half a brain vote someone like Fernandez who has such poor judgement that he would bankrupt the town?”
Fernandez has two opponents in the mayoral race, but many observers believe Yuniett Gonzalez is a plantidate, put there to force a runoff with Councilman Josh Dieguez (more on that later). So this text message has to be sent on behalf of Dieguez, who apparently started his political career with Pizzi and voted in favor of the settlement, at the end of a seven-hour budget meeting where it was not on the agenda and, so, nobody in the public could speak for or against it.
How could anyone with half a brain vote for anybody supported by Michael Pizzi, who lost his last election to Cid and is almost a bad word in Miami Lakes. This text message should backfire. Hard.
Fernandez’s judgement is not the one in question.
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Former Miami Lakes Mayor Michael Pizzi meddles in mayoral election added by Ladra on
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Oh, but Ms. Ladra, how’s that cortadito going to taste for you tomorrow when you hear that Dieguez just beat Fernandez in the runoff with over 56% of the vote? When you finally stop favoring anything and anyone having to do with Cid in Miami Lakes, then perhaps you’ll realize who the real “plantidate” was in this scenario. Contrary to your misinformed perspective, Fernandez’ judgement was indeed the one in question here – that the poor guy just spent about $100 thousand of his own money trying to win a race he should have never entered into is fact you overlooked. But then Ladra is not the only one unduly influenced by Cid, who has never lacked for excess hubris. As for Pizzi, no one in this town cares what he has to say – we’re just glad he’s finally off our backs, no thanks to Fernandez or Cid. Go easy on the sipping tomorrow.
This article has so many errors, first published claiming what was not true, so we called Ladra to ask her to correct the record, which she did. But finally, after reading it:
A. Why does she always use the same photo?
B. What is ‘rambling’ about the email sent by Michael Pizzi?
C. Ladra received a text message which forwarded an email sent to me that I then distributed via email
D. ‘The village mayoral election?’ We are a municipality, Miami Lakes is the Town’s name, no village here
E. While Ladra writes the name of Antonio ‘Tony’ Fernandez at first, then under his picture she writes Antonio/Tony Gonzalez
F. When Pizzi says the town of Miami Lakes wasted millions of dollars, yes, that is correct. The Mayor should have returned to office without a challenge to the Charter, which then went to several stages until it was clear Pizzi would return to the Office of the Mayor
G. The people of Miami Lakes, through the ballot box, chose to move away from Pizzi and that should have happened from day one. ‘We will never get that money back’ means that as a Miami Laker for Pizzi lives in the Town wasted resources to fight the inevitable as it was court mandated that the Town make payment to his attorneys.
H. The close to $2 million dollars spent on fighting / litigation is what will never come back
I. The word ‘plantidate’ does not exist ‘plantadita’ would be the right Spanish word but Yuniett Gonzalez explained during a Candidate Forum that she was going to vote for Joshua and had contributed to his campaign then decided to run to offer something new, a non-political candidate, and at some point we need to live by the Constitution and not accuse anyone without proof…
Hope these suggested revisions are made, thanks
We Have SOO Much CORRUPTION , We Need a Sheriff and a SAO State Attorney NOT Manipulated by DANIELA !
Michael Pizzi is corrupt.