It’s like he’s been backed into a corner.

Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez lied again last week and slandered, again, a pair of animal activists who worked hard to get the Pets’ Trust Initiative passed by 65% of the voters in 2012 and who are brave enough to keep fighting ever since for that vote to be respected.

Michael Rosenberg and Rita Schwartz certainly have been very active in politics since Gimenez first funded the Pets Trust initiative and then scratched it in 2013. They may get a little too excited sometimes. They certainly get creative — Ladra particularly loves this video with the chihuahua — and they certainly get passionate.

But they do not, ever, incite violence. In fact, their email blasts and protests seem exceedingly polite to a man who has repeatedly ignored these people while telling others that all Rosenberg and Schwartz want is the millions for themselves, a ludicrous and impossible claim since they would have absolutely no control over the county’s funds. Ladra has seen some of the many emails they send Gimenez gatekeeper Michael Hernandez to try to meet with the mayor or just set the record straight. They might be a tad bit sarcastic, but they are exceedingly polite. There’s no other way to describe their approach.

Happier times: Michael Rosenberg and Rita Schwartz talk and smile and take photos with Mayor Carlos Gimenez in 2013, when he said he was going to fund the voter-mandated no-kill initiative.

The mayor knows this. He knows that these two animal lovers do not incite violence. So when Gimenez outright makes that claim to a misguided Miami Herald reporter and then on TV to a Univision 23 cameraman, he is basically giving them a victory in court with their slander lawsuit.

There are three things one must establish to prove slander: The source must know he or she is spreading a lie. Check. He must have an intent to hurt or discredit the subject of the lie. Check. And the lie causes the subject’s reputation to be tarnished. Check.

Because some people might believe him.

But that will be the hardest part to prove. Because most people realize that this is Cry Wolf Gimenez’s desperate attempt to keep his job and maybe even an acknowledgement that the 65% of the people who voted for the Pets’ Trust knew what they were voting for and will prove it to Gimenez by voting him out of office Nov. 8. He knows that Mike and Rita pull votes. He knows that the Pets’ Trust supporters are one of the reasons he is facing a runoff in the first place. He knows that he is really hated by thousands of animal lovers who may have even voted for him in 2011 and 2012 but now feel he is the devil himself and hold him personally responsible for the continued killing of thousands of dogs and cats at the county shelter.

Many of these people do comment on Facebook and in stories in the Miami Herald. Many of these comments are entirely too personal and passionate. Some people say they want him to suffer what the animals have suffered. They call him an asshole and other names. They are understandably frustrated by his disrespect of their votes and the continued and, perhaps, even worsening conditions for animals in Miami-Dade.

I hadn’t seen any death threats,  however, until the Herald story about the single one they quoted.

“Better watch yourself in Miami i don’t have much to lose, ever see what s person that nothing to lose is capable of?? i WILL kill you if not ill start with your family and loved ones,” wrote someone calling himself “nakmuaythai.” Turns out his name is Daniel Bowes and he lives in Ottowa. And Rosenberg has never heard of him.

“Daniel who,” Rosenberg asked.

What’s more, a Miami-Dade police spokesman told the Herald that detectives do not consider the posting a “viable threat” (they were probably pissing in their pants from the laughter) but the investigation is “nevertheless ongoing.” Really? With our limited police resources? Because this is what the mayor considers a police priority?

Michael Rosenberg spent three days in a cage to call attention to the plight of our stray animals.

For the mayor to speculate that the threat was at the direction of Rosenberg and Schwarz is just ludicrous. For him to speculate out loud is dangerous. There are many people (Ralph Garcia Toledo et al) who stand to lose millions of dollars if Gimenez is not re-elected. They might go to great lengths to silence his detractors — who have now been singled out by name.

“I’m calling them out,” Gimenez told the Herald.

“The people responsible are Michael Rosenberg and Rita Schwartz,” he said in his choppy Spanish. “They have led a campaign called ABC, Anybody But Carlos, and that is part of their campaign, pretty dirty and with lies.”

Let’s forget for a minute that the ABC campaign you see on bus benches throughout the county has been paid for by the Dade PBA. Ladra doesn’t think she has ever seen any public official — let alone the mayor of the fourth largest county in the country — talk like that publicly about a couple of civilian activists. And for what? He knows that Mike and Rita have no ties to that man in Ottawa. But he’s mad at them and, boy, there is hell to pay for going against him.

In fact, Ladra wouldn’t be surprised if this story was pitched by someone on the Gimenez camp. Because we certainly have seen similarly hateful and vitriolic comments on the Facebook posts of stories about Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump or Marco Rubio or David Rivera or Rick Scott. Especially Rick Scott. Why was the story just about Gimenez? Perhaps because it was pitched by someone on the Gimenez campaign in order to discredit a group that was hurting his re-election chances?’

Or was it to put a bull’s eye on Mike’s and Rita’s backs?

Rosenberg fears for himself and his family. He has gotten a police watch order on his home. They obviously think it’s a more viable threat than the comment against the mayor.

He also wants an apology from the mayor. He should get one, but he won’t. Gimenez is so arrogant that he is literally blind to the fact that he is wrong more often than he is right. In this case, he knew he was lying to begin with. It matters nothing because it’s all about perception.

It’s too bad that David Ovalle or some other Herald reporter doesn’t spend as much time as they did stringing together the worse comments they could find to actually investigate the claims of the animal activists — that the death count is only down because the county has changed the way it counts euthanized cats and dogs, that the increases in animal services funding has mostly gone to salaries and benefits, not spay and neutering programs.

There is still time to actually do a fact check on Gimenez with this, David. Wouldn’t that be more challenging? It’s a better story.

Meanwhile, Ladra is going to make a complaint about some commenter herself. We have taken to moderating reader comments here on Political Cortadito in recent weeks, since some people are (or one person specifically is) trying to use my space to malign others and myself without any context and to make threats. I have been told that I deserve to be “trashed,” whatever that means. And I have received multiple threats from the same source about shutting the website down. I haven’t taken them seriously but people say that I should and, in light of this story, perhaps they are right. Because some of Ladra’s friends and loyal readers say the commenter — who sometimes goes by the name of Got-A-Point and sometimes other names but with the same IP address — is Gimenez spokesman Mike Hernandez. Others say he is the mayor’s son, CJ Gimenez.

So let’s find out. Ladra will print out some of those comments and see if the Miami-Dade Police Department can’t find out who the commenter is.

But I am willing to bet that whoever it is is far more directly connected to Carlos Gimenez than some loudmouth in Ottowa is to Mike and Rita of the Pets’ Trust.

The government response to Zika has been slow and chaotic. But the politicians’ response to it has been quick and consistent — as far as campaigning goes.

Election in the Time of Zika ought to be a how-to for any candidate on a South Florida ballot in November.

The latest to get in on the buzz is former Congressman Joe Garcia, who wants to take his seat back from U.S. Rep. Carlos Curbelo, who took it two years ago amid bad headlines. Garcia will have a press conference this morning — alongside South Florida doctors, nurses, mothers-to-be and concerned residents — to demand congressional leadership take action and approve urgently needed Zika funding.

Read related story: Zika politics: State House candidate has repellent wristbands

Today marks 2oo days since President Barack Obama proposed in February $1.9 billion in federal emergency money, a request Congress has to approve. Garcia, who has called on the House Speaker  to cut their break short so they can address the Zika crisis, says that, for 200 days, Curbelo and his fellow House Republicans have failed South Florida’s families.

“The rapid spread of Zika during Congress’s 7-week vacation should have resulted in the immediate approval of a funding bill, not more obstruction from the Republican leadership. We’re coming together to demand that Congress and Carlos Curbelo put the rhetoric aside, approve the funding immediately and do what’s right for South Florida’s families.”

But as much as Ladra dislikes him for other reasons (mostly because he is a liar and a lobbyist with a secret client list), Curbelo may as well stand with Garcia at this presser because the congressman has broken party ranks on the Zika funding issue. In May, Curbelo met with Gov. Rick Scott and other members of Congress and urged for the federal funding to be passed.

“As representatives from the state of Florida, we understand the real threat that Zika poses to our families and neighbors,” Curbelo was quoted as saying.

He voted against the House Republicans compromise bill for $622 million in funding, because he said it was too little.

Read related story: Joe Garcia releases first web ad in congressional contest

“As a Member of Congress representing the country’s southernmost district — closest to the region where this disease is currently wreaking havoc — I am acutely aware of the impacts Zika will have if not contained and eradicated,” Curbelo said in a statement. “I cannot vote for this half-hearted, short-sighted effort, and I remain in strong support of funding the Administration’s $1.9 billion Zika response requests.”

Maybe Democrats think Curbelo should do more but Ladra is not sure what more he can do — other than maybe jar mosquitoes up and take them to D.C. to visit with the Republicans who don’t want to pass the funding.

So when Joe Garcia gets up to the podium at Big Bear Academy, a school for children with special needs — which there might be a lot more of if this Zika outbreak is not contained — take what he says with a grain of salt. It’s just a campaign stop.

Because on Zika, like on many other things, both these candidates agree.

Ouch.

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen just showed the rest of the 305 political world how negative campaign ads are done with a commercial that has basically stopped her challenger, Democrat Scott Fuhrman, in his tracks. Ladra doubts that Fuhrman can come back from this.

The ad doesn’t only remind people about Fuhrman’s old drunk driving charge. It features John Witty, the father of Helen Marie Witty, a Pinecrest teenager who was killed by a drunk driver in 2000.

“My 16-year-old daughter Helen Marie Witty was killed by a drunk driver on Red Road. Now, another drunk driver, Scott Fuhrman, wants to be in Congress, even after also being convicted of possessing a firearm while intoxicated,” John Witty says, sitting in what we are to assume is his living room, staring into the camera. “Less than two years ago he fled on foot from a hit and run on U.S. 1.

“I don’t trust Scott Fuhrman to be in Congress.”

And boom! Just like that, Fuhrman’s bid to unseat our veteran congresswoman — which was kinda iffy anyway — is over before it really began.

Some might say that Fuhrman already admitted to his checkered past, which in addition to the 2009 DUI also includes carrying a firearm while intoxicated (Colorado, 2009) and leaving the scene of an accident (Miami-Dade, 2013). But all the disclosure in the world becomes moot when you bring in the ghost of Helen Witty. The popular Palmetto High School student, run over as she rollerbladed on the bike path on Red Road, is not forgotten. Her death — another teenager was at the wheel of the car that hit her — shocked South Dade. A team of her friends and loved ones walk every year in the Miami Walk Like MADD walkathon event.

They will likely vote for Ros-Lehtinen in November.

The Daddy Witty ad is on in Spanish radio also. A lot. It’s relentless in the morning. And she has another spot, in both English and Spanish, featuring police officers with the same message: Don’t trust a drunk driver who only three years ago fled the scene of an accident.

But the video — with a photo of the Colorado police report and iron bars closing over a photo of someone who is supposed to represent Fuhrman (or is that his mug shot?) — is one of the most visceral Ladra has seen in a while. And effective. My own 16-year-old who never pays attention to anything but the constant dinging alerts on her phone, was stopped in her tracks.

While she sure seems to be taking the Fuhrman challenge seriously — and this might be the most serious challenge she’s ever had — IRL already has a lot of Democrat support. She’s on the right (left) side of immigration reform policy. She’s on the right (left) side of equal marriage. She’s going to get a lot of Dems just on those issues and on the fact that as a senior congresswoman, she can get a lot more done than Fuhrman would as a freshman.

Add to that the ghost of Helen Witty and Fuhrman is fuhr sure toast.

Not many people were surprised by the Miami-Dade County Commission’s decision Wednesday to ignore the petition of 127,000 voters who clamor for campaign finance reform in our pay-to-play county government.

And it’s not like they didn’t have good reason.

Even the petition gatherers — a group calling itself An Accountable Miami-Dade — had already filed a lawsuit in the court. Even before Wednesday’s meeting, the county attorney had already said last month that the language for the ballot question that the petition was based on was legally insufficient — a term used to discredit the work done by dozens or perhaps hundreds of volunteers.

The group itself was also discredited. Exposed as part of a national phenomenon with labor and Democratic Party interests at the wheel rather than the grassroots effort it claims to be, Accountable took a beating on the dais Wednesday. Perhaps they deserve it a bit. The connect the dots to special interests is undeniable and they did try to pass themselves off as just one of us.

Read related story: After stalling, Miami-Dade Commission to meet on ballot issue

“I love to have people get involved and engaged and the fact that they signed these petitions is a good sign. But I have to question the motivation,” said Commission Juan Zapata, who wasn’t keen on having “outside interference” drive the effort.

Commissioners had legitimate questions about how the petition may have targeted black voters in certain neighborhoods or intentionally had it set up to go to commission during their break for a distracted, smaller group.

But others had questions about the county’s own process. The Accountable group got approval from the county clerk for the language of the petition and had no reason to think it was legally insufficient, some commissioners said.

“These people went out and collected signatures based on what they believed was sufficient. And we let it happen,” said Commissioner Barbara Jordan.

If passed, the measure would have cut maximum contributions from $1,000 to $500 and would have prohibited gifts from anyone doing business with the county. There was also some language about matching public funds for some candidates.

Ladra could never really get behind the petition itself. The language seemed insufficient for other reasons, not legal. Of course, once the signatures were gathered, they had to be counted and verified. But we told Juan Cuba months ago that this measure, if passed, would only make PACs and non-profits stronger and more prevalent. If people can’t collect contributions one way, they will find another. And who has the most access to PACs and non-profits? The professional politicians. The insiders and incumbents. Not the newcomers. On the public money front, Ladra thinks that there are a whole lot of other things that need to be addressed with our tax dollars and that candidates, by the very nature of being candidates, ought to be able to stand on their own merits. Money doesn’t always buy elections. Look at Miami City Commission Ken Russell.

Read related story: Mr. and Mrs. Sarnoff give up seat to Ken Russell sans runoff

Of course it helps. But getting contributions is also a sign of viability. If you can’t get anybody to support you by putting their money where their mouth is, then why are you even running? Wouldn’t this, as one commissioner suggested Wednesday, encourage every nut, loony-tunes and wacko to run for office?

Unfortunately, the merits of the petition are not what we are talking about now. The commission squashed that when it squashed the referendum in a 9-4 vote.  But it should still be part of the conversation.

The commission can, all by itself, move an ordinance forward that would accomplish the same thing — more or less — on the campaign finance reform. At least the thing that we really want — which is to limit contributions from those who do business with the county. Something logical. Something sensical. And stand alone. Let’s not tie public financing to it.

Yes, hundreds of people worked really hard to make the petitions happen. But if the county wants to squirm out of it in some legal way, trust me, they will.

They don’t pay their legal staff millions of dollars for nothing.

What An Accountable Miami-Dade should do now is apply pressure directly to the source — until the commission puts forth something on its own.

And there is, indeed, hope that they will. Even though not immediately. After all, many of them are termed out four years from now. The rest are termed out the election cycle after that.

What do they have to lose?

While everybody was concentrated on the primary last week, several Republicans without August challengers were eager to get to November, with mailers and TV ads already — since even before qualification and the Fourth of July.

That would be State Rep. Frank Artiles, who is running for Senate in District 40 against incumbent Sen. Dwight Bullard, who won Tuesday. Artiles, whose also had people knocking on doors, sent a Happy Fourth of July piece with a framed picture of his family. In others, he touts himself as an education champion. He even sent a 2016-2017 public school calendar as school started. Smart.

Read related story: So much Andrew Korge in the mailbox — maybe a record 

And Artiles is targeting independent voters, which is also smart. He’s got the Republicans sewn up already. And maybe he can win some Democrats over with his campaign against the MDX tolls. The most recent mailer Ladra saw touted Artiles’ fight against these tolls.

Incumbent Sens. Anitere Flores and Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, as well as State Rep. Michael Bileca, have also been working it alongside the August wannabes.

Flores has traveled to the Keys, which are also in her district, for months and she has been airing a TV commercial for a couple of weeks that features her husband, Dustin, and their two boys, who she is raising in the same neighborhood where she grew up.

The Flagship DLP started airing a TV ad this week, paid for by the United Teachers of Dade, featuring real teachers thanking him for listening to them and voting to increase their funding. He also sent a couple of mailers way before the primary. One of them had voter petitions enclosed, so it was even before qualification. The most recent used the Zika scare to offer voters a list of tips voters can keep on the fridge.

Read related story: Miguel DLP vs J-Rod make it a hard choice in Senate 37

Bileca’s most recent “fighting for taxpayers” mailer touts the old Miami Dolphins stadium financing he helped kill in 2013. What? He’s got nothing fresher from the last three years? He, too, is very smartly targeting independent voters. 

But his first piece — “Working Hard. Delivering Results.” — was sent in both English and Spanish and was a four-panel bi-fold. The latest piece is a 8X11 flat card.

Up to the north, State Sen. Rene Garcia and State Reps. Manny Diaz, Jr., Jose Oliva and Bryan Avila have been hitting the streets since at least mid August, when they opened their collective headquarters in Hialeah.

Maybe these early birds know that the weeks ahead are going to give our mailboxes a bellyache, so they snuck in before prime time.

Let’s see if voters remember come November.

There have been a few protests of Donald Trump‘s immigration positions and proposals at the Doral Resort and Spa he owns. Now, it’s his side’s turn to picket.

Latinas Por Trump — “a 100% volunteer coalition of Latina influencers that networks and stays true to the promises created by the Trump campaign and the needs of Hispanics” — is calling on local supporters of the Republican presidential candidate to bring their “homemade signs” and join a protest of the Univision television station, also in Doral.

“Our mission is to inform and educate the public with the truth from now until the elections in November,” said a statement. “We plan to reinforce the values, needs and importance of Latinos/Hispanics in MAKING AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”

Yes, the statement yelled with all caps. They really take that “staying true” to the Trump campaign seriously. Either that or they did it because they sent the press release on #ALLCAPSTHURSDAY.

Read related story: Local Latinas come out for Trump with Brickell event

“This is a peaceful protest to call attention to the liberal media bias especially with regards to the Spanish networks like Univision. #LatinasPorTrump is tired of responding to the lies perpetuated by the liberal media and people like #MrJorgeRamos.”

Univision star anchor Jorge Ramos, if you remember, is the national Spanish-language journalist who first challenged Trump and got into a little tussle with him last year after Trump cut him off mid-sentence in a press conference. Seemed The Donald didn’t like the question about, you guessed it, his immigration proposals. And he had Ramos thrown out of the press conference. Reminds me of someone in Hialeah.

Ramos has not let up the heat, however, staying critical of Trump. Most recently, he got into a tweet rant ripping Mexico President Enrique Peña Nieto on Wednesday after the president met with Trump. Clearly upset that Trump has not apologized for his comments Mexicans being all criminals — and, specifically, rapists — Ramos called Peña Nieto’s attitude a “weak and shy response.”

“What a poor, lukewarm and fearful answer from @epn when facing Trump. Where is the indignation with Trump’s insults,” said one tweet.

That’s the kind of thing that rubs the Latinas the wrong way.

“We are hosting this protest and sign-waving event to once again show that the liberal media does not represent the millions of Legal Immigrant Latinos in this country,” read the statement. “The Latino community has been fed lies since Donald J. Trump announced his candidacy last June.

“Latinos are extremely important to this election especially in key swing states like Florida and we plan to make sure they come out in support of Donald J Trump for President. This event will emphasize the fact that #JorgeRamos and #Univision do not represent all Latinos,” it said.

Well, neither do Latinas for Trump. Let’s agree on that.

The protest will not be in front of the Univision studios on Northwest 41st Street but at Doral Central Park, 3000 NW 87th Ave., several blocks away. There’s plenty of parking, sure. But do Latinas hope Univision execs drive by on their way home from work?

Interestingly enough, it is scheduled from 5 to 7 p.m. — during the news show.