Miami-Dade Commissioner Joe Martinez — who everyone knows wants to run for county sheriff in 2024 — is said to be turning himself in to authorities Tuesday after a five-year public corruption investigation. Several sources who confirmed this to Ladra did not know who Martinez would surrender to, although the logical answer is the State […]
Former colleague says he used her in a hit piece without her knowledge Miami-Dade County judicial candidate Renier Diaz de la Portilla, a one-time state rep and two-time Miami-Dade School Board member, has not had the kind of legal career he had hoped for and was forced to resign from the Miami-Dade Public Defender’s office, […]
A week after banning two sex ed books, the board approves them In a striking reversal, Miami-Dade School Board Chairwoman Perla Tabares Hantman — who has been forced into retirement by a GOP-backed challenge — restored two sexual education books to the middle and high school curriculum only one week after she had voted to […]
Several candidates try to fool voters with photos and fake ‘voter guides’ Every election sees candidates that try to identify with certain electeds or political parties, inferring their endorsement or support. But this year, it’s gotten a bit ridiculous as the absentee or mail-in ballots hit voters’ homes. Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava and Florida […]
Judicial races are different, everybody says. They are more civil. They aren’t as vitriolic as state or county races in South Florida, where candidates are “communists” and investigations are exaggerated or made up altogether. Well, maybe they were different — before Renier Diaz de la Portilla decided to run against an incumbent non-Hispanic judge. Read […]
You sort of expect to see this kind of post on Facebook by radicals or Proud Boys or something. But not from the elected mayor of Miami-Dade’s second largest and Florida’s sixth largest city. Yet, Esteban Bovo‘s campaign instagram account posted this extremely radical image last week on the account’s story. Not only is Bovo […]
Former and founding Palmetto Bay Mayor Eugene Flinn will run for the village’s top seat again, challenging current incumbent Mayor Karyn Cunningham in what amounts to a rematch. Cunningham beat Flinn with 61% of the vote in 2018 when he was the incumbent. It was his second stint on the job, after he snatched it […]
Sure, there are four candidates in the Miami-Dade Commission race to replace longtime Commissioner Rebeca Sosa in District 6. But it’s really a head-to-head between Coral Gables Commissioner Jorge Fors and political operative Kevin Marino Cabrera. And it looks like it’s headed to be the most heated of the county commission contests. Last week saw […]
And Circuit Court Judge Robert Watson needs to publicly distance himself One of the things that judicial candidates can’t do, according to the very strict judicial rules in the state, is campaign or get too political. It’s canon number 7 in the Florida Supreme Court’s Judicial Code of Conduct: A Judge or Candidate for Judicial […]
Former elected and three-time loser Renier Diaz de la Portilla has raised $62,700 in little more than a month for his judicial race, according to the latest campaign finance report. And many of the campaign contributions are from real estate developers and special interests in the city of Miami, where his big brother is a […]