It started.

The rain of negative mail we all knew we were going to get in the Republican primary for Senate District 40 began this week as an 8 1/2 by 11 piece landed in mailboxes. And former State Rep. Jose Felix “Pepi” Diaz — or his side, anyway — has drawn first blood against former Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla.

“Alex Diaz de la Portilla 16 years.. of failure,” it says on the front. “For 16 years, career politician Alex Diaz de la Portilla has raised our taxes and wrecked our economy,” it says on the front. The back has another photo of the former senator from his time in Tallahassee (not one of the best) and the same message: “Alex DLP’s higher taxes have killed jobs and hurt seniors,” it says, going after his bread and butter (the over 60 voter).

“Alex Diaz de la Portilla isn’t really conservative,” it says, with a checklist of his tax and spend plan. “His 16-year voting record proves he is just another tax and spend liberal.”

Oooooh. Them there is fighting words. Someone just called DLP a liberal. There are probably a few dozen things he would rather be called: Scoundrel, hard-headed, arrogant, evil genius even. The Dean did not return a call for immediate comment on Friday, but Ladra does not think que se queda callado.

Diaz has told Ladra and others that he was not going to attack DLP — from his own PAC, anyway. And so far, it’s true. This mailer was paid for by Making a Better Tomorrow, a political action committee that has existed since 2014 and which is funded mostly by other PACs, which is a roundabout way of hiding money. Ladra is still working on it.

Read related story: Will he or won’t he? Senate 40 race waits on Jose Felix Diaz

But this is just the first of what will likely be a series of attacks on DLP, who is leading in both polls that Ladra knows about, both his own internal poll, which has him up 36 points, and a GOP poll that has the former senator leading by a smaller double digit figure.

It is a short election cycle so there’s very little to lose by calling your opponent a career politician and a liberal and using the words higher taxes and hurting seniors.

But it’s possible that this is not the last of it. Diaz, er, I mean his supporters, will keep attacking DLP, whose name recognition is higher, because there’s very little else they can do. Absentee ballots drop in a month or so and there is no way Diaz can make up the difference in name id between now and then.

So the forecast is for a deluge.

Daisy Baez vs. Ana Rivas Logan vs. Annette Taddeo

The Senate 40 race to replace disgraced former Sen. Frank Artiles got a little more interesting Monday when Republican State Rep. Jose Felix Diaz said he would run, as expected, and perennial Democrat candidate Annette Taddeo said she would run, as always expected — setting up for some exciting primaries in both aisles. Former Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla (Republican) and newly-minted State Rep. Daisy Baez (Dem) had already announced their bid for the seat that opened up last month after Artiles was caught making racial and sexist slurs to colleagues.

Former State Rep. Ana Rivas Logan, a former Republican now Democrat, told Ladra late Monday that she intended to run as well and would announce this week, making it at least a three-way race for blue voters on July 25.

Read related story: Two new ‘open’ seats spur political pinata question: 40 or 27?

Or a two-and-a-half way race. Because even though she is the Democrat Party choice, it is going to be difficult for Baez — who is barely known in her own district, let alone the one next door — to get much traction with the other two veterans in the race. And she will have to resign her seat to run. Ladra asked the Army veteran and freshman legislator if it was worth the risk of losing a recently turned House seat and her voice, which she used this year to speak against laws to punish sanctuary cities, especially now that a Senate seat in her very own district, where she was elected six months ago, will come available next year: In what is becoming an avalanche (more on that later), newly-minted Sen. Jose Javier Rodriguez announced Monday that he would run for the congressional seat that will be vacated by a retiring Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. That means that the seat he won from former Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, which is where Baez votes now, would be open. (I stand corrected. J-Rod’s term is not up until 2020 and he does not have to resign to run so it might not be open… but it might be and there also might be a special election if he wins).

“I’m a person of my word. I’m not going to be switching around seats just because it’s convenient,” Baez said in what seemed like a dig at Taddeo. “I hope more people run. It’s good for democracy.”

Still, it really doesn’t make any sense for the Democrat Party, which has such a shallow bench, to put all their eggs into one basket and possibly lose a House seat they just won when they can spread their love. Maybe new Florida Dem Chair Stephen Bittel, for whom this is a first test, ought to rethink his longterm game plan. Both Taddeo and Rivas Logan have already had people vote for them in this district. They are both known entities here and this could very well become a race between the two of them.

Baez thinks that she can get voters interested in new blood. “I believe people are tired of the same names, the same faces, the family dynasties,” she said. “I think people in 40 have no appetite for recycled candidates.”

She scoffs at my carptebagger thing, since she would have to move. She said shares boundaries with Senate 40 and that she will still represent the people who elected her to House District 114 in November. “Many of the issues important to the constituents of 114 are the same in 40,” she said. “People want good jobs, economic development. We want to feel safe in our homes.”

Read related story: Red goes blue, blue goes red in four 305 seats

Those same people who elected her, Baez said, would support this move. “I went to Tallahassee and I had a great time and I learned a lot. And because I learned a lot there’s an understanding I can do better in the Senate. I can deliver better results to them as a state senator,” Baez said.

Rivas Logan, who ran for this seat last year and handily beat Andrew Korge in the primary blindfolded and with one hand tied behind her back, is not discouraged by the estrogen in the race or the fact that the Democrat Party would, again, pick someone else to back. She is used to being independent from her party, which used to be the GOP before it abandoned her in favor of Pepi Diaz when they were redrawn into the same district in 2012. Which means, by the way, that this could be a rematch of sorts.

“I’m going to do it and let the cards fall where they may,” Rivas Logan told Ladra Monday, adding that she called Taddeo to let her know. “I’m going to run a very positive campaign based on issues. And I hope we would support the other one in the general. But I am not getting out of anyone’s way this time.”

The schoolteacher and former Miami-Dade School Board member sort of canned her campaign for the same seat midway through the primary last year to avoid any negative attention from Korge, who was already hitting incumbent Sen. Dwight Bullard and had lots of money to do so. The strategy worked. Almost. She came back in time for early voting and actually beat Korge, who had outspent her.

Read related story: Senate 40 race: Ana Rivas logan still in it, could win it

She told Ladra that this was a better time for her because it is summer and school is out. “I spoke with my family and I have their full support,” she said, promising to keep her campaign positive. “It’s going to be about the issues. I have a track record of working for the people and fighting against the establishment.”

Taddeo — who moved into District 40 after selling her Pinecrest home in November — said she welcomed the competition. “I’ve never been afraid of races. In fact, this is the first time I run in an open seat,” Taddeo told Ladra.

This would be Taddeo’s first foray into a Senate campaign. She has run for congress, twice, and for county commission and lieutenant governor. It “wasn’t an easy decision” to run again, she said, but that she could not ignore the people in the community, including a number of influential black pastors, who had called her and asked her to run in this seat.

“They way things happened with Artiles was very hutful to a lot of constituents in our community,” she said, adding that she at first told them she would not run. “I was sure Dwight was going to do it,” she said, referring to Bullard, who won the primary last year but lost to Artiles and apparently understands now that only a Hispanic Democrat can beat a Hispanic Republican in that district. Bullard, she said, is not interested.

Read related story: Annette Taddeo has not gone gently into the good night

Even after Ros-Lehtinen, who Taddeo ran against in 2008, announced her retirement, the Colombian born small business owner said she didn’t flinch. “For me, it’s not about a title. It’s about fighting for the people. It’s not about a job. I have a job,” she said, referring to the translation company she owns.

“It really came down to listening to the people, the community that is telling you to do something. It would be inappropriate for me to ignore them,” she said.

One could say, however, that she keeps ignoring the voters who keep rejecting her. But Taddeo thinks this is the right seat at the right time. She told Ladra that she won almost 60% of the precincts that overlap with Congressional District 26 in her primary run against former Congressman Joe Garcia last August. Could she win in an off year?

This is all important because now that we are guaranteed a Hispanic woman, chances are that whoever wins the Democrat primary wins the general. It was already true because of the demographics — that district went to Clinton with 12 points — but now it becomes especially significant after the whole Artiles thing.

Sorry, Alex. Maybe he should run for his brother’s old Senate seat next year.

It’s not if or when these days in the 305 political world, it’s where.

Folks are lining up like ducks to become the next Florida Senator in District 40, after former Sen. Frank Artiles was forced to resign over racist remarks, or maybe the next Congress member from District 27, after longtime veteran U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen announced Saturday she would not seek re-election. Some are having to choose between the two.

It’s almost like someone broke open a political piñata and the big kids are just diving in, leaving no room for the new kids to grab any candy.

The latest to officially dive into the 40 contest, even though the governor has not yet set an election date, is former Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla, who switched gears from considering a city of Miami commission run and filed paperwork Wednesday so he can start fundraising for a seat he is all to familiar with. The Dean DLP was in the Senate from 2000 to 2010, serving as Majority Leader and President Pro Tempore, until he was succeeded by his big brother Miguel DLP. This would be his first foray back into politics (for himself; he’s run other campaigns) since losing a bid to go back to the State House (he served as a rep from 1994 to 2000) in 2012.

This should put to rest all the talk about State Rep. Jeanette Núñez, who was being pushed hard by the Florida GOP, which is wise to be seeking a female to replace Artiles because some of his comments were misogynist, too, and you can bet that might become part of the campaign narrative if the Democrats choose a woman (read: wisely). Núñez was already loathe to have to move her family from Doral, from where she can comfortably run for Anitere Flores‘ seat when Flores terms out, which is her plan. She certainly isn’t going to run against The Dean, who was once her boss and mentor.

Read related story: Frank Artiles resigns and an old rival, Juan Zapata, could run

It should be an intresting primary nonetheless. Unless DLP is suddenly back in the GOP’s good graces, they may still push State Rep. Jose Felix Diaz into it. Pepi “The Selfie King” Diaz is said to be in the running for either U.S. Attorney General or Florida AG once Pam Bondi goes to Washington, but Ladra has been told that it’s been a difficult sell, primarily because he hasn’t really seen the inside of a courtroom, has he? Sscares away more of the multitudes on the sidelines thinking about this same senate seat, including former Miami-Dade Commissioner Juan Zapata — who has suddenly started a new, fresh round of Facebook ads — and former Miami-Dade School Board Member Raquel Regalado, who has been spending loads of time in Tallahassee since her loss to Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez and done many of her radio shows on state rather than county issues. While she lost countywide Regalado — who Ladra helped against Gimenez but is not working with in either of the other races — got tens of thousands of votes in both districts.

Interestingly enough, both Zap and Regalado are also interested in the congressional seat, for which former Cutler Bay Mayor Ed MacDougall — who lost a Congressional primary against Carlos Curbelo in 2014 — has formed an exploratory committee and Lt. Gov. Carlos Lopez-Cantera has said he’s thinking about it

And why wouldn’t they be?

These opportunities for open seats do not come often. In the case of District 27, where Ros-Lehtinen’s announcement came out of the blue, we already had a bunch of Democrats interested in turning that seat. These include Scott Fuhrman, the DUI driver who lost to Ros-Lehtinen in November, and Miami Beach Commissioner Kristen Rosen-Gonzalez, the primary frontrunner who has a head start on everybody else — actually challenging Ileana and not waiting until she retired — as well as some early success in the city despite coming in as the mayor’s nemesis. That is, unless Miami-Dade Commissioner Daniella Levine Cava jumps in. She has said that she is considering it. That could be a game changer. But are both of them too Democrat to carry the general? Dems seem to think this seat is theirs for the taking.

Read related story: Kristen Rosen Gonzalez to challenge Ileana Ros-Lehtinen

What an episode of Miami Hollywood Squares

Nobody has officially jumped in from the GOP side but Regalado makes sense. Ros-Lehtinen has always been a moderate and Regalado is too. Plus, she’s up on issues like education, immigration, healthcare and housing so she can hit the ground running. I like Mac, but he’s got too problems: He’s a Trump-loving hardline conservative and a gringo. I love Zap, but he should stick to 40, which is where he lives. Regalado lives in 27. She represented much of it on the school board. This is her home base. It’s Dean DLP’s home base, too, but the numbers may not look as good for a more conservative Republican.

Still, these days, it looks like everybody is Annette Taddeo, the carpetbagging perennial candidate who has run for county commission, liutenant governor and Congress. Or David Rivera, for that matter.

Speaking of which, the former Congressman, who has tried to win his seat back and is now running for state rep in 105 (to replace termed-out Rep. Carlos Trujillo), has not expressed an interest in the senate race, which is more natural for him than the congressional seat. Just because he was spotted in Frank’s old office in the Capitol Building in Tallahassee doesn’t mean anything. He could have just been visiting his longtime friend Alina Garcia, Artiles’ former Chief of Staff who once worked for Rivera.

Taddeo, on the other hand, has of course expressed interest in both seats. As well as, let’s just put dibs on it now, any seat that may open up in the future.

So I guess Pedro Diaz is going to have to do another online poll.

No sooner had Ladra hit publish on the screen to post the story about the growing possibilities in the District 3 Miami Commission race — and the new threat of Alex Diaz de la Portilla spoiling it for everybody else — El Nuevo Herald breaks the news that there is yet another family dynasty member looking at the seat.

No, not Tommy Regalado, son of Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado. We had him. No, not Zoraida Barreiro, wife of Miami-Dade Commissioner Bruno Barreiro. We had her.

Add to this bowl of fruit loops one Crazy Joe Carollo, former city manager in Doral under former Mayor Luigi Boria, who fired him publicly and loudly during a city council meeting. Joe Carollo was also once the mayor and a commissioner in the city and, in fact, in the very seat his brother, Commissioner Frank Carollo, is vacating due to term limits.

Read related story: Joe Carollo goes off the reservation, naming names in Doral

“After so much time out of office, I have decided that I will aspire as commissioner of Miami, in the seat where I started, which includes Little Havana, and that was where the community initially elected me,” Carollo was quoted as saying in Spanish, speaking to El Nuevo Herald. “I would like to be able to return to that seat to return to Miami the opportunity it gave me to serve the community and make sure it continues on the path to adequate growth and protect its neighborhoods.”

Carollo said he was not using the commission seat as a stepping stone to the mayor’s office and said he has more experience by far of any other declared candidate. His key issue will be public safety, referencing the many youth gun fatalities that have plagued Miami’s neighborhoods for the last few years.

Does this mean Frank is not gonna run for mayor? After all, people are not going to elect two Carollo brothers to the same body of government? Or would they?

Or is this Crazy Joe’s way of trying to derail his brother’s dreams? Dicen las malas lenguas that there’s bad blood there.

In either case, it is an interesting twist in an already fascinating race that promises to get even more exciting. I mean, if Dean DLP was only flirting with the idea before, he’s going to be downright giddy with the challenge now. This would be an epic battle more worth his time. Also, he feels a responsibility to the people of Little Havana, his core constituents (those that got his Christmas card over the holiday). He has to run to protect them from Crazy Joe.

But Ladra thinks Miami-Dade Commissioner Bruno Barreiro will urge his wife to withdraw from the race in order to avoid the attacks that would no doubt come.

Read related story: Doral update — Councilwoman calls cops on Joe Carollo

Because Crazy Joe has no boundaries.

This is a guy who got into a fistfight with a fellow elected — at the dais. This is a guy who fired his police chief after the latter neglected to tell him that federal agents were swooping in on Elian Gonzalez’s family. This is a guy who threw a tea cup at his wife and hit her in the head — and got arrested for it.

During his time in Doral, then Councilwoman Sandra Ruiz called the police on him after, she said, he harassed her and her intern. After he was fired in a meeting where he shot insults back at the mayor, Carollo wouldn’t shut up about alleged bribery and other conspiracies and corruption going on in Doral — but he offered little proof.

At times his drive and advocacy are admirable: Ladra loved it when he came out against maquinitas and absentee ballot fraud. Other times, he is kinda creepy: Always speaking in that low, booming monotone, without much inflection ever, he seldom smiles (this photo, left, is a rarity), probably because he is constantly worried about communist and Chavista conspiracies against him and our community.

Read related story: Why is Joe Carollo on Mayor Gimenez camp’s payroll?

Most recently, Carollo got paid $144,000 by the Common Sense Now PAC to work on the re-election campaign for Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez. It’s an obscene amount by any standards. He was paid $6,000 a month for 166 months starting in March of 2015, then $8,000 a month in July and August and then $36,000 in the month of October — in four payments in 17 days. The only reason ever stated is “consulting.”

Please notice that the months that payments exceeded $6,000 is the time when the absentee ballots went out.

But nobody has any idea what Carollo did for Gimenez. And Carollo, apparently, ain’t keen on answering the question.

Let’s see how that plays now in his own campaign. And Ladra can’t help but wonder who his other clients are.

Stay tuned, folks. This is going to be an interesting race.

If former Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla runs for city of Miami mayor, he could make it into a runoff with Commissioner Francis Suarez.

And if he jumps into the commission race instead, the Dean will hit the ground as the front runner.

These are the findings of a tiny, very unscientific poll done online by a political operative using Survey Monkey. Is it science? No. Is it interesting? Absolutely.

Pedro Diaz, who is running the commission campaign in District 3 for Alex Dominguez, sent the three question survey to insiders and influencers who are not necessarily voters in the city of Miami — lobbyists, fundraisers, gatekeepers, decision makers and the like. 

Baby X will be happy to learn that he came out on top in the mayoral question — “If elections for City of Miami Mayor were held today, whom are you more likely to vote for?” — with 31% of the 368 responses. But Dean DLP was not too far behind with 27 percent.  The survey had former Miami-Dade School Board Member Raquel Regalado, who is rumored to be jumping into the race, in third place with 23% and Miami Commissioner Frank Carollo, who is termed out and expected to run also, in fourth with 19%.

Read related story: Will she or won’t she? Raquel Regalado rumors are rampant

Diaz de la Portilla has not filed any paperwork and only came into the picture last month after residents in Little Havana got a postcard in the mail from him wishing them a happy holidays. It doesn’t have a political disclaimer. “Whatever is beautiful, whatever is meaningful, whatever brings you happiness… May it be yours this holiday season and throughout the coming year,” it says, and it is signed by Alex Diaz de la Portilla “and family.”

But many seem to think ADLP — who became active on twitter in 2015 and last year to campaign for his brother and for Sen. Marco Rubio to get the GOP nomination (see photo with Jeanette Dousdebes Rubio, left) — would run for Carollo’s commission seat rather than mayor. After all, Baby X and his dad, Miami-Dade Commissioner Xavier Suarez, went out on a limb to endorse and support Miguel DLP against newly-elected Jose Javier Rodriguez in November’s race. Alex typically rewards that kind of loyalty and support for either of his brothers.

And the Carollo seat in his core base of Little Havana is an easier win — unless Tommy Regalado, the mayor’s son, runs as he has indicated to some that he might. But that depends on whether Raquelita runs for mayor. Ladra doubts both siblings would run at the same time.

Carollo’s open seat has already attracted a clusterbunch of candidates. Five have opened accounts and started to campaign, including Diaz’s client Dominguez — who ran for state rep and property appraiser already — and Zoraida Barreiro, wife of Miami-Dade Commissioner Bruno Barreiro.

Another Diaz poll has Dean DLP leading that race, with 39% and Dominguez, who has been campaigning for months, trailing with 34%. But that poll — this time by telephone and with a sample of 589 actual District 3 voters — only pitted them against two also-rans, Alfonso Leon and Miguel Soliman (17% and 10%, respectively), because Barreiro and Daniel Suarez, a longtime civilian police watchdog, had not yet filed any paperwork when it was done in early December.

The Dean told Ladra in a text message Monday that all the rumors are just that. “I am not running for anything and the ‘mailer’ is a Christmas card,” he texted.

“Now I have to be a grinch like you guys?” Us guys is the media.  “Bah humbug!”

But c’mon! A Christmas card is something you send friends and family, not voters you don’t know! Sometimes there’s a funny family picture on it. Usually, there’s a hand signed note. That wasn’t a Christmas card. That was ADLP staying relevant with his core constituency — like he does with the birthday cards he sends to seniors in public housing. They don’t have to say anything political to be politically motivated and beneficial.

“I am not running for anything at the moment,” he repeated. Key words: At the moment.

Maybe the Dean is getting ready for 2018 and thinks he can take the state House seat back from newly-elected Rep. Nick Duran. Or maybe he plans revenge against J-Rod, who beat his brother Miguel in November after beating Alex himself in the House 112 race in 2012.

But Ladra has to believe (read: hope) he is running for something someday.

And we can dream of an election cycle with a Suarez, a Carollo, a Regalado, a Barreiro and a Diaz de la Portilla on the same municipal ballot, can’t we?