Qualifying came and went quietly last month and we ended up with quite a few challenges in the Florida House and some interesting contests in four of the five open seats. But nothing like what we were promised. There is no huge blue wave in sight, folks. More like a sky blue splash. To begin […]
The Miami-Dade Democratic Party has big egg on their face in the wake of qualifying last week that left the one incumbent who was most important to challenge this year completely unfazed: State Rep. Jose Oliva — who brought guns to our schools, ladies and gentlemen — was reelected already without even a sigh. Duysevi […]
Another elected office is suddenly going to be prematurely vacant soon: Miami Lakes Vice Mayor Tony Lama is expected to resign in July to move to Seattle for a plum job at Amazon dot com. But the replacement will be an appointee until the next election in Miami Lakes, which is not until 2018. Lama, first elected in […]
It has to be the biggest host committee in formation list that Ladra has ever seen and far too many people to name them all here. But among the most notable “young professionals” hosting a fundraiser Thursday night for Commissioner Francis Suarez‘s bid for Miami mayor are Congressman Carlos Curbelo, Coral Gables Commissioners Vince Lago, […]
Turns out Glenn “The Goon” Rice, the political black ops soldier who did Hialeah Mayor Carlos Hernandez‘s dirty work for years, was indeed paid with city funds, supposedly for odd jobs for the public works and human resources departments — and through the lawfirm of a sitting Miami Lakes councilmember — during part of his time as […]
Former Congressman Joe Garcia will join others at County Hall this afternoon to protest Mayor Carlos Gimenez‘s directive last week to have illegal immigrants who are arrested for other crimes detained for federal immigration proceedings. “While I’m a good friend of Mayor Gimenez’s, I think this is a mistake,” Garcia told Ladra Tuesday morning. “Hopefully, […]
One of the biggest 2017 political questions in the 305 is will she or won’t she? We’re speaking, of course, about former Miami-Dade School Board Member Raquel Regalado, who lost a bid to unseat Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez in November. She has been dogged for more than a year by rumors that the county campaign was […]
Local Democrats are stuck between a rock and a hard place in tonight’s vote for a new state committeeman, which would be a stepping stone for the Florida chair position the same year that the Democrats lost the traditionally blue state to a rabid Republican in a crazy presidential contest and a no-show Senator that […]
Newly elected Commissioner Joe Martinez is sort of on a war path. And there is no bigger casualty than former Commissioner Juan Zapata. Martinez has several items on Tuesday’s agenda to start to undo some of the things that Zapata is most proud of from the last four years. Martinez will ask his colleauges to strip […]
UPDATED: Talk about kicking a man when he’s down. First, former Miami Lakes Mayor Michael “Muscles” Pizzi loses his re-election just a couple of weeks ago, getting an abysmal 23% against newly elected Mayor Manny Cid, who was a councilman. Then — boom! — a Miami-Dade court tells him Wednesday that the town is not on […]