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.

State Rep. Jose Oliva is the only Republican incumbent in South Florida without a challenger. Reps. Kionne McGhee, Barbara Watson, Richard Stark, Sharon Pritchett, Shevron Dion Jones, Joe Geller and Evan Jenne were also automatically re-elected without opposition, but they are Democrats in areas that are already dark blue.
There are a couple of head-to-heads. Rep. Holly Raschein (R-Key Largo) will face Steve Friedman and Rep. Robert Asencio (D-West Kendall) has a rematch, of sorts, with Anthony Rodriguez, who lost the Republican primary two years ago to former State Rep. David Rivera (who never qualified  for State House 119 this year as he had threatened to, either). In another rematch in House 112, Rep. Nicholas Duran (D-Shenandoah) will face Republican Rosy Palomino again.  And, next door, newly elected Rep. Javier Fernandez (D-Coral Gables) will face a guy with a similar name, Republican Javier Enriquez. Someone named Ahmed Rizwan is challenging Rep. Bryan Avila (R-Hialeah), but nobody is watching that.
Read related: Unforgivable: Jose Oliva goes unchallenged in blue wave year
And all those contests are in November, anyway, more than four months away.
In August, we have some big, fat primary ballots due to termed out reps that leave open seat opportunities that nobody wants to pass up.
In 115, where Ladra lives, we have two Democrats and four Republicans vying for former State Rep. Michael Bileca‘s seat. Jeffrey Solomon (photographed, left) will probably and should win against someone named James Schulman. This is Doc Solomon’s third or fourth run at the seat — he’s not afraid of running against an incumbent — so he is like the incumbent this time and everybody knows his name. Among the Republicans, it will either be GOP favorite Vance Aloupis or Jose Fernandez, the only two who have dropped any mail so far. Carlos Gobel and Rhonda Rebman Lopez, who dropped the Rebman from her name to sound more Hispanic and has loaned herself almost $100,000 (more on that later), are still silent but could make moves in the next couple of weeks. This seat is totally flipable. One of the five most vulnerable House seats in Miami-Dade.
Not so much so in 119, where Jeanette Nuñez exits right, and we have another four Republicans, but only one Democrat and one NPA. So, in August, we will see the battle between Juan Fernandez-Barquin, Enrique Lopez, Analeen “Annie” Martinez — daughter of Miami-Dade Commissioner Joe Martinez, (photographed with her, right) which could be why she has quite a bit of a fundraising lead (more on that later) — and Bibiana “Bibi” Potestad. The winner there, like Ladra just said, will likely take it in November because Democrat Heath Rassner seems like he doesn’t know what he’s doing, having first filed in HD 5 in the panhandle and having lost already once in the 116 race to former State Rep. Jose Felix Diaz. NPA Daniel Sotelo, however, has raised $24,455 so far and could be a factor — especially if Martinez wins and Sotelo makes the whole general campaign about dynasties. We know that works.
Read related: Republicans start lining up for 2018 state primaries, challenges
Democrats could gain one in District 103, which covers Miami Lakes and Hialeah Gardens and is vacated by Manny Diaz, Jr., a charter school no-show employee and quarry mining industry sellout who thinks he can win a senate race now (more on that later). Diaz and Oliva handpicked Miami Lakes Councilman and Oliva Cigars employee Frank Mingo to replace him. But there’s a primary with Cindy Polo, a stay at home mom inspired to run after the school shooting at Parkland against Richard Tapia, who dropped out of the Miami-Dade School Board race against the mayor’s sister-in-law after he met with CJ Gimenez, who discouraged him. Ladra can’t help but wonder if someone is encouraging him now. This is only flipable if Polo wins and yes it’s flipable (more on this race later).
The blue team could have scored again in Ambassador Carlos Trujillo‘s former district in Doral — but instead they fumbled another one. Doral Councilwoman Ana Maria Rodriguez (photographed left) is running as the sole Republican after King Nine Lives Rivera himself decided not to throw his hat in the ring this year — and it’s the first time since when that David is not on the ballot? Rodriguez, who has remained unscathed during the mud bath in Doral, is a worthy opponent even in one of the most flipable seats. Especially since the primary pits Ross Hancock, who has run in so many districts already that he hasn’t been able to build a base, against Javier Estevez, who has raised less than $1,700 since September of last year.  Dems in Doral have voted for Ana Maria before. They won’t mind doing so again. This seat likely stays red. And it could have gone blue with the right candidate. The Miami-Dade Democratic Party really blew it. Again.
On the flip side of that, House District 113 — which became open when David Richardson decided he had enough of butting heads in Tallahassee and he would try to ride his first gay elected thing to Washington — has three Democrats and only one Republican who is wasting his time, because whoever wins this race in August is the next state rep. That means it’s either one of two former Miami Beach Commissioners Deede Weithorn and Michael Grieco the comeback kid, who got off probation for campaign law violations in his 2017 mayoral bid just in time to run, or “Kubs” Lalchandani, an attorney for plastic surgery centers where botched procedures have led to patient deaths whose real name is Kabir Arjan. Like Ladra said, whoever wins that primary is going to win in November say the demographics, so Republican Jonathan Parker is irrelevant. This seat will stay blue forever.
Read related: New Mayor Dan Gelber endroses Deede Weithorn for State House
Interestingly enough, there are also a couple of incumbents facing challenges from their own party:
Newly-elected State Rep. Daniel Anthony Perez (R-Westchester) — who beat Jose Mallea and some Republican lady from Broward for the seat in a special election last summer, after Jose Felix Diaz resigned to run for senate (and lost) — will face tax attorney Frank Polo, a balsero from the 1994 crisis who spent 10 months at the refugee camps for Cuban rafters at Guantanamo. That’s a GOP leaning district so whoever wins that will likely easily beat Democrat James Alexander Harden. Another lost opportunity for the blue team, who should have had a player here.
On the blue side, State Rep. Roy Hardemon faces two Democrat challengers in the primary — Joseph Beauvil and Dotie Joseph. There’s an LPF in that race also but this is a solid Democrat district. Republicans need not apply, and they didn’t.
And in 109, we have two Democrats longtime and well-known Democrats battling it out: Former State Rep. James Bush III hasn’t been able to win even a seat on the United Teachers of Dade board, so what makes him think he can beat Cedric McMinn, a political climber who worked as district assistant to State Rep. Cynthia Stafford in this very district before he became chief of staff to Miami-Dade School Board Member Dr. Dorothy Bendross-Mindingall. This election is going to be run and decided by educators (and educational interests?) so it may be worth watching.
But that was a blue seat that will stay blue. At the end of the day, the Democrats really didn’t come through with that promised blue wave — at least not in the Florida House. They could have flipped four or five seats (if you count Raschein) and will be lucky if they get even two. Let’s call it what it is: a blue trickle.

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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 Miyar, the teacher and failed Miami-Dade School Board and one-time state House candidate who said she was going to challenge him, told her friends on Facebook last week, after she failed to do so, that she wasn’t gonna dwell on it.
“Sometimes things happen, and it hits you like a truck! I sent my qualifying documents and they didn’t make it on time. I don’t want to look back in the rear mirror. I want to look foward,” she wrote on her Facebook page eight hours after she missed the qualifying deadline June 22 and two days after she announced having been endorsed by United Teachers of Dade. “I will now focus my energies on helping my colleagues that are running. I will not lose hope! Thank you all that supported me! For this I am blessed.”
Blah blah things happen blah. Sorry not sorry but it should not have been left to the last moment or sent with someone else. Or maybe Miyar shouldn’t have been “feeling fantastic” at Disney World a day earlier, according to her Facebook addiction. Did the mouse make her late?
Read related: Florida State Rep. Jose Oliva must go — before he is speaker
But, really, it isn’t her fault. A race this important should never have been left to this flake in the first place and qualifying should have been taken care of on Day 1 by the Democratic Party, which gets all the blame.
“I’m also extremely disappointed,” Dade Dems Chair Juan Cuba texted Ladra Friday. “Sevy feels terrible.”
Sevy feels terrible? Doesn’t really seem that way from Facebook. And anyway, you should feel worse. Wasn’t this the blue wave year to make a statement? And what better statement could you have made than to take out the House Speaker? We talked about this, Juan. We agreed he was the No. 1 target.
Cuba and any other self respecting Democrat leader should feel the total weight of this epic fail for the rest of this election cycle and maybe beyond. If they hadn’t been so busy meddling in a local county election getting Eileen Higgins elected (to impact a congressional race not local issues so much), maybe they would have been able to unseat the next Speaker of the House.
Read related: Dems push full court press for Eileen Higgins in special District 5 county race
Oliva was ripe for the taking. As the architect of the vile and widely hated Marshall Program part of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Student Safety Act, he was vulnerable. The Dems coudla shoulda ran someone else against him. Anybody would do this year. Just put Oliva with guns up on some billboards and bingo, we got ourselves a new state rep in Miami Lakes — and a new Speaker.
But noooooooo. Instead, he coasts. Like he’s done something to deserve a coast.
This is by far the biggest missed opportunity in state races that we’ve seen probably in a decade. It’s why Cuba wouldn’t call me back about it. Or text further. If some think that Miami-Dade GOP Chair Nelson Diaz should resign his seat for losing the Miami-Dade District 5 election, what does Cuba deserve for this colossal crapout?
And how can we have any confidence in anything else they do this year?
No matter how many seats they turn blue this is going to be the Dems’ legacy for 2018: Eileen Higgins for Jose Oliva.

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Are nonpartisan municipal races a thing of the past?
 
The Democrats made them do it.
That’s what Nelson Diaz, chairman of the Miami-Dade Republican Party, said about an email they blasted Wednesday for Zoraida Barreiro, who is running in the special shotgun wedding election for the county commission district 5 seat vacated by her husband Bruno Barreiro, so he could run for Congress.
“Of course we’re going to help Zoraida,” Diaz told Ladra last week. “And you can blame the Democrats. My preference is not to do that. It’s important to have independent, free elections at the local level. But if Democrats are going to get involved to push their radical, left wing agenda, then we will get involved.”
And so they did.
“We Need to Stop the Democrats,” the email reads.
“The Democrats are trying to force a radical, left-wing liberal that just recently moved to Miami from out of state. She is so out of touch with our community, she has stated her support for the elimination of the Homestead exemption. If she wins, they will have enough Democrats to take down the tax deduction and it will increase our taxes,” it says, urging votes for Barreiro.
“We cannot allow the Democrat to win!”
Read related: Dems push full court press for Eileen Higgins in special District 5 county race
Sure sounds like a desperate cry — and Ladra is pretty sure Higgins would not advocate lifting the Homestead exemption, which isn’t the county commission’s purview anyway, but, hey, it’s a good tactic in the working class parts of the district: “Oh! My! God! She’s going to raise taxes!” It’s almost as good as “She’s a communist!”
Diaz said Higgins said as much in a Spanish-language TV  interview. But la gringa — whose Spanish is okay but could be better — was only saying what many electeds at the county and cities are saying: That this additional exemption voters are likely to pass in November is going to drain government coffers and cause serious cuts. Government officials and sitting electeds everywhere are worried about that and planning.
“It must have been misinterpreted in my terrible Spanish,” Higgins said, adding that the county mayor has done a good job. “We have to plan for it. When we sit around meetings and say we want more buses we have to remember that when we vote in November.”
Democrats have been actively and publicly helping Eileen Higgins in this race since the very beginning. She was the only Democrat running against three Republicans, including former State Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla. The party paid political consultant Christian Ulvert, who took precious time from a gubernatorial candidate. And Higgins had local electeds, state reps and even another gubernatorial candidate endorse and promote her online.
She won the first round with 35%, two points over Barreiro, forcing a runoff. Democrats like to think they did that. After all, it’s not their first rodeo.
While it’s the first time the local GOP steps into a traditionally non-partisan municipal race, Diaz said, the local Dems have been involved in them since at least Daniella Levine-Cava ran for Miami-Dade Commission. Her race in 2014 against incumbent Lynda Bell, who happened to be a staunch right-to-life Republican, became the first local non partisan election the Miami-Dade Democratic Party got really involved in. Since then, they’ve helped Homestead Mayor Jeff Porter, Miami Beach Commissioner Micky Steinberg and Miami Commissioner Ken Russell.
Read related story: Eileen Higgins would upset the apple cart, add checks and balances
“We’ve always had the approach that if you’re running for office, who you affiliate yourself with, what party, speaks to the types of decisions you’ll be making at the dais,” said Miami-Dade Democratic Party Chairman Juan Cuba. “Even though it’s local, we’re dealing with zoning and services. And you also deal at the local level with national issues — minimum wage, affordable housing, police oversight.”
Sanctuary cities. Gender-neutral bathrooms.
“We do want to make sure we are electing people who align with our values, especially at the local level where we need more people who will fight for working families,” Cuba said.
The Miami-Dade Commission already has a Democrat majority. And that doesn’t necessarily translate to a “progressive agenda” when it comes to the votes. The mega mall development, for example, was passed with Levine-Cava as the sole dissenting vote. In fact, that happens to her a lot. And the ordinance to hold immigrant detainees for ICE — to remove Miami from the list of sanctuary cities and please Donald Trump — was sponsored by Sally Heyman, a Democrat and former state rep.
On the flip side, Mayor Carlos Gimenez endorsed Hillary Clinton — though one could argue that was a publicity stunt since his son works for Trump — and Commissioner Jose “Pepe” Diaz, another Republican, is very friendly to labor, which is usually a Democrat characteristic. Barreiro has long been considered a moderate Republican because he pioneered LGBT issues. But he represents Miami Beach, so maybe he sorta had to.
Read related: Lynda Bell vs. Levine-Cava debate becomes heated spar
Levine-Cava, the first Democrat elected to the commission with the party’s help, says she doesn’t see the commission as a partisan body. “It’s more about local issues and quality of life. Transit is not a Democrat or a Republican issue,” she told Ladra.
Well, maybe not. But let’s bring up the idea of raising taxes for it or having special taxing districts and you will see partisan division.
Some people fear that this marks the end of nonpartisan races in Miami-Dade and they could be right. Florida law requires judicial candidates to stay non-partisan, but how much you wanna bet that we know who is a Republican and who is a Dem. Candidates in the big cities like Miami Beach and Homestead are already using the invisible “D” and “R”behind their names for campaigning. Small cities are likely next in an increasingly divided and polarized political society.
 

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Proving that tenacity and good old stubborn persistence can pay off, perennial candidate Annette Taddeo finally won an election Tuesday.

And against a “titan” like former State Rep. Jose Felix Diaz, who spent at least twice as much money (more on that later), too.

Taddeo beat Diaz by a comfortable edge, 50.95 to 47.21 percent for Diaz. The difference went to professor and independent candidate Christian “He-Man” Schlaerth, who managed to get 820 people to vote for him. But, let’s face it, he likely peeled votes from Annette so without him she would have won bigger.

Was this a referendum on Donald Trump?

Some seem to think so. The director of the local SEIU, which represents property service workers, including airport workers and janitors, said “Annette Taddeo’s victory is a stunning rebuke of the divisive politics of hate that have been embraced by many Republicans in Tallahassee and Washington.

“We’re excited that Annette will be heading to Tallahassee to fight for raising the minimum wage, good public schools, immigrant rights and equality for all Floridians,” finished Helene O’Brien.

The Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee tweeted that Taddeo’s win was the seventh red-to-blue flip across the U.S. since November and “is just the latest example of voters rejecting Trump and the GOP’s dangerous agenda.”

People who voted for Taddeo and tweeted about it also indicated that anti-Trump sentiment was at least in the back of their minds. “Just did the thing! Hope everyone who cried about trump being elected went out and did their part,” tweeted Nick at @holywavve, including a pic of the “just voted” sticker.

And that was the idea. State Democrats were desperate to turn the seat back around after losing it to the GOP last year. They and Taddeo’s campaign made a lot of comparisons between Diaz and Trump and used the picture of them that Diaz tweeted from last year’s inaugural — and then deleted when he entered this race — on several mailers (sometimes in one day). One of them even blew up a picture of a Trump note from an old campaign contribution, before he was POTUS, wishing Pepi Diaz good luck.

Diaz, who was once Trump’s “apprentice” on the TV show by the same name, was definitely cast as a supporter and surrogate for the orange-haired commander in chief. Democrats are giddy that the Trump card is working — and you can bet we will see more of it.

Said Senate Democratic Leader-Designate Jeff Clemens: “I am thrilled to congratulate Annette Taddeo on her great victory. The Florida Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee committed to righting a wrong in this district and electing a proven champion who will join our caucus to fight for an agenda that puts working families first.”

It was about “righting a wrong.” That refers to the win last year over longtime Sen. Dwight Bullard by former State Rep. and short-lived Sen. Frank Artiles, who was caught making racist remarks to black colleagues in a public restaurant and was forced to resign. And it gave Democrats — not just locally but across the state and even the nation — a second chance to win the seat back.

“Congratulations to Annette Taddeo on this major victory for Miami-Dade and our entire state. This is a win for all of Florida. Democrats represent 16 of 40 state Senate seats. Annette will head to Tallahassee ready to fight for higher paying jobs, affordable healthcare and fully funded public schools. Democrats across the state are energized and mobilizing to flip Florida blue. After nearly 20 years of harmful GOP policies, voters are ready for a better deal.

The Florida Democratic Party joined progressive partners like the FDLCC, unions on a community engagement effort that sets a new standard for our Party. We actively engaged both the Latino and African American communities of SD40 in neighbor-to-neighbor conversations focused on the issues that matter most. This victory is the first of many, as we are poised to claim the governorship, we are prepared to re-elect Senator Bill Nelson, and we are within striking distance of reaching parity in the upper chamber of the state legislature.

The FDP has made significant strides in building long-term political and grassroots infrastructure that will help Democrats win critical seats at the local, state, and federal level. We are organizing year-round and we will be engaging in neighbor-to-neighbor conversations in every one of our 67 counties to turn Florida blue in 2018 and beyond.”

In a statement released at 8:40 p.m., Taddeo said it was a victory for the residents of Senate District 40, who live in Westchester, Kendall and South Dade.

 “The voters wanted a champion in Tallahassee who will fight for higher paying jobs, affordable healthcare and fully funded public schools and I am honored and humbled that they have placed their faith and trust in me. I pledge to work everyday for the families of my community and not the special interests. I would like to thank my opponent for running in a hard-fought race. Our campaign saw a strong coalition come together between the FDP, the FDLCC, labor and community organizations who unified behind a winning plan. I’m beyond thankful for all the work and their efforts and the the thousands of volunteers who committed their time, energy and resources. This was a community, grassroots driven effort and I am ready to continue the work in our state capitol.”

It was also an early voting and Election Day effort. Because Pepi Diaz — who looks optimistic in this photo with poll workers at 8:30 Tuesday morning — won the absentee ballot race by nearly 2,200 votes. It must have been a terrible tease for Diaz because Taddeo later got more than twice as many votes in early voting and made up those 2,200 votes plus a few more on Tuesday.

I have to say, while I don’t love either candidate, Ladra feels a breeze of justice going through her soul because Pepi Diaz was acting like a real piece of, er, work. He was all over social media, at the podium next to the mayor, during the preparations and warnings for Hurricane Irma and afterwards, he had a TV commercial where he said “as a state rep I will be knocking on doors” to see what people needed after the storm. Seriously? He was no longer a state rep but he was sure acting like one and he sure had the access of one. Then there was that other ugly TV commrcial where David Lawrence brags about how Pepi helped 20,000 “perfectly legal” immigrant children. Ouch. Ladra sure hopes The Children’s Trust that Lawrence doesn’t check kids’ papers before helping the neediest children in our community. That’s not what I voted for.

But if Ladra feels a breeze, Taddeo must feel a hurricane of vindication. After all, she has campaigned for about a decade and has a relentless drive to be in elected office (read: watch her like a hawk). Taddeo, who also served as chair of the Miami-Dade Democratic Party, first ran for Congress against U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen in 2008. She then made unsuccessful bids for county commission (2010), lieutenant governor with former Gov. Charie Christ (2014), and Congress again but this time against former Congressman Joe Garcia (2016) — maybe now they can be friends again — who lost anyway and again to U.S. Rep. Carlos Curbelo.

Guess the fifth time (not countying the Florida Dem chair race) is the charm.

And Ladra is fairly certain that will be the final tally, despite threats from some voter rights groups to challenge the special election after Gov. Rick Scott refused to delay it to accomodate voters inconvenienced by Hurricane Irma,

That’s because those groups — Common Cause Florida, State Voices Florida, the League of Women Voters Florida, the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida, Engage Miami, SAVE, LatinoJustice and the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law — can arguably be lumped together under the blue umbrella. They were likely afraid that Diaz would benefit from a low turnout. How much you wanna bet there’s no challenge from them now that Taddeo has won?

Unless they challenge on behalf of Democrat Gabriela Mayaudón, who lost Tuesday in the House District 116 race to Republican Daniel Perez, for the seat vacated by Diaz when he resigned to run for Senate. But that would be ridiculous since Mayaudón is really only a Democrat on paper. Let her run a few times before you run to her defense, huh?

On the GOP side, it seems that at least Diaz — who some say is looking at the Attorney General seat — took the loss like a trooper, tweeting his kudos to Taddeo just after 10 p.m.

“Congratulations to Florida’s newest State Senator Annette Taddeo. I wish you nothing but success in your new role,” he said.

What a difference a few hours makes.

The woman recruited by the Miami-Dade Democratic Party to run in the special election for House District 116 was a Republican only hours before she registered to vote as a Democrat — the same day she qualified to run for state representative.

Gabriela Mayaudon, who is also listed on documents as Maria Gabriela Mayaudon, proudly declared herself “anti-Chavista y anti-Madurista hasta la muerte” and “Republicana” on her twitter profile a day or two before she qualified on the deadline day for the seat to replace State Rep. Jose Felix “Pepi” Diaz, a Republican who resigned to run for a vacated Senate seat.

In a telephone interview with Ladra, Mayaudon said she didn’t remember declaring herself Republican, nor did she admit changing it at the last minute to Democrat before completely changing it to the current candidate profile. But she also didn’t deny it.

Read related story: Venezuelan leader may join House 116 race for Democrats

“I don’t feel Republican. I feel centrist. It’s difficult to explain right now, but I am proud to be representing the Democratic Party and all the people who feel alientated by each party,” Mayaudon said, sounding very much like an NPA. “No, I’m a Democrat. And I will defend the party and I am running to represent all the people who feel disenfranchised.

“And when the time comes — and it will because, I am saying it here first, I will win — I will be able to represent all,” she said.

It doesn’t disqualify her. While a Democrat was forced to withdraw from the Senate District 40 race because he had switched from the Republican Party within the last year and lied about it, there is no rule precluding a newly-registered voter from running, according to Sarah Revell, a spokeswoman with the Florida Division of Elections. Mayaudon simply self-identified as a Republican, she never registered as one. In fact, she never registered at all before June 6, when she registered and filed to run as a Democrat. The Miami-Dade Democratic Party gave her $1,800 for her qualifying fee.

But while she was coy with Ladra, Mayaudon came clean with the Democrats who recruited her — which includes the new political director, who was a Republican himself a year ago (more on that later).

“She was very up front about the fact that when she first got here, she affiliated with the Republian Party,” said Juan Cuba, chair of the Miami-Dade Democratic Party. “But after this election, she could see that her values are not aligned with the values of the Republican Party.”

Cuba says that the party was recruiting for different races because they do not want to see any Republican run unchallenged. Mayaudon, a Venezuelan congresswoman who came to this country seeking political asylum and who became an activist in Doral’s Venezuelan community seemed like a good candidate he said. Her diversity definitely helped.

Read related story: Few hopefuls line up to replace Jose Felix Diaz in 116

“Democrats need to do more work in the Venezuelan community,” Cuba said. “We risk losing an entire generation. And they are affiliating with the Republican Party because they are the only party speaking to their issue.”

But maybe they should have groomed her and waited to run in the district where she actually lives and where she is known, which is House district 105, and supported the Democrat candidate that was already qualified in the 116 race, perennial candidate Ross Hancock. Ross doesn’t live in the district either but he lives as close to it as Mayaudon does and was already looking for a new place. He also has run before so he knows how to walk and, as a full fledged naturalist and a former NPA, he pulls from both the environmental voter base and the independents in the general. Sure, he is a perennial candidate, but not the same as an Annette Taddeo — who is running for her fourth different elected office — because he has only run for one office, a House seat. He hasn’t jumped into other races to serve in just any elected office. He has honed in on the Florida House, where he can best promote an environmental agenda.

He also speaks Spanish a little better than Mayaudon speaks English, which could be an issue. She answered in slow, broken and labored English when pressed but otherwise answered questions posed in English in her native Spanish. Ladra loves Hispanic candidates as much as any buena perra sata, and I have often said that there are some districts where you need a z or a vowel at the end of your name to compete. This 116 seat could be one of those. But both the Republican candidates are so bad that this could have been Hancock’s best chance ever to make it to Tallahassee. Ladra wishes he hadn’t withdrawn, if only to force a debate on the issues with a woman who tweeted, only a month ago, that she lives in the U.S.A. but her heart is still in Venezuela.

Cuba said that neither he nor anyone at the party encouraged Hancock to withdraw, but Hancock told Ladra he made it very clear that he would not run against another Democrat in the primary. Hancock did not want to spend any resources at all until the general, where he felt he would also get a majority of independents to support him against whoever the Republicans chose (either the establishment choice or the Havana poster boy). Cuba said that it was simply a misunderstanding: They thought Ross, who has run three times already, didn’t really want to run and was only doing it because no other Democrat would. So they got one.

Cuba also said that they looked for someone “with a story to tell.”

But it seems the “story” she’s telling is that she’s a Democrat.

And the Democrats — who threw away the chance to win a competitive House seat that Hillary took in November with a genuine candidate by registering a last minute Latina that checks some boxes — might be selling a story, too.

A new and practically unknown Democrat has filed in the race for Florida House seat 116, to replace Jose Felix  “Pepi” Diaz, who resigned to run for Senate. But it’s not her first time running for office.

Gabriela Mayaudon served in the Venezuelan legislature before moving to South Florida about 10 years ago, said Elezear Melendez, the new political director for the Miami-Dade Democratic Party.

“She was a congresswoman in Venezuela and she has an amazing story of fighting dictatorship there. She was looking to get involved in politics,” Melendez told Ladra Monday after Mayaudon filed her papers. He is listed as her treasurer but says that is only temporary until she gets her campaign team together.

Read related story: Cuba engagement photos become issue in GOP 116 primary

“She is someone who comes highly recommended by the civil leadership in Doral,” he said, adding that the city is at the northern end of the district and that Mayaudon became a citizen last year. The address listed on her paperwork seems to be the north part of Doral, however, just outside the district. And records show she and her husband, Carlos Rodriguez, own a house in Sunrise, where they claim their Homestead exemption.

Together, the couple also own Rock Health, a San Francisco-based venture fund that seeds and financially supports start-up companies at the intersection of health and technology. Mayaudon lists her occupation on LinkedIn as vice president of Rock Health. State records with the Division of Corporation show that RockHealth Inc., in Medley, is owned by Rodriguez and Maria G. Mayaudon — who also own the 3-bedroom, 2-bath house in Broward County.

Published reports show that in 2012, Mayaudon helped welome Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, who visited Miami when she came to provide the U.S. Department of Justice with documents that showed a link between the Venezuelan government and drug trafficking.

A woman who answered the phone listed on Mayaudon’s paperwork took Ladra’s name and number and abruptly hung up on me. She said the candidate was unavailable and would have a press conference in 10 days, but she flatly refused to give me her name several times. Ladra is pretty sure it was the candidate caught off guard.

Former Doral Councilwoman Bettina Rodriguez Aguilera, who Ladra always thinks of when she needs more info on a Venezuelan activist, said she knows Mayaudon and that she would be a good representative.

Read related story: Few hopefuls line up to replace Jose Felix Diaz in 116

“She’s taking my leadership course,” Rodriguez-Aguilera said. “She’s an awesome, fabulous woman. She was a Venezuelan congresswoman and supported many Venezuelan groups here. She will do great things.”

Perennial candidate Ross Hancock, who has run in two other state house districts, had already qualified to run for the Democrats so that they wouldn’t be unrepresented, he said. He had not yet decided if he would withdraw or not. He said he had been told by Melendez that Mayaudon would qualify, but she had not as of Monday evening.

“She has until noon tomorrow. Naturally, I don’t want to drop out and leave no option for the Democratic Party,” Hancock said, adding that he may bow out if the party was going to support her.

Ladra hopes he doesn’t. Voters deserve to have a choice, even in a primary. Particularly with someone as new and untested as Mayaudon.

In fact, Ladra is surprised that there was no better candidate for this open seat race in either aisle and thinks that all the current candidates are so blah that anyone with a little bit of money can take it.

This race would benefit from a surprise Tuesday morning.