Shalala under-performing like we thought she would

MIAMI – A Dominican-American woman who lives in Miami may be the deciding factor on who wins the congressional seat being vacated by Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. 

Mayra Joli, an immigration lawyer, is running as a No Party Affiliated (NPA) candidate in a race against Republican Maria Elvira Salazar, a well-known Spanish-language TV personality, and Democrat and former Bill Clinton Cabinet secretary Donna Shalala, for the soon to be open congressional seat in Florida’s District 27. The race can be decisive in a year when Democrats are trying to win control of the House of Representatives. 

Joli may not be as well-known as the other two candidates, but she has a knack for getting herself noticed. She has been running for about a year now, and in November of 2017 the Miami Herald described her as “a Brickell-based immigration attorney and five-time beauty queen who dabbles as a pundit on Spanish-language television.” They add that Joli is a lifelong Democrat (until she changed to NPA) and an ardent Trump supporter. She labels herself a “Master of Selfies.” 

I have no idea why the title (Master of Selfies) but she must like to take pictures of herself with her smart phone. And the fact is that she has no chance of winning this election. But she can sure make it difficult for the Republican to win, especially when you consider that District 27 is a Democratic Party leaning district (yes… Ileana knew why she was getting out). But the district still has a large number of Cuban American voters and others who cast ballots for Donald Trump in 2016 — although Hillary won the District by almost 20 percentage points. 

So luck may be on Shalala’s side in this election. That and the fact that Trump may yet drag down the party of Lincoln (now Trump’s) in this decisive midterm coming up. 

Because if not for Trump, and a little help from Joli… Shalala may still lose this election as we predicted in March in a column titled: With all due respect Ms. Shalala, you’re not the candidate for Miami’s District 27. 

Nothing but a victory by Shalala is considered acceptable in a district that has more Democrats than Republicans and is one of the largest areas of Obamacare recipients in the country. And yet, in a poll conducted by the Shalala campaign, Salazar and Shalala are in a statistical dead heat: Shalala leads, surely, 46 percent to Salazar’s 42 percent, but one must consider the 4 percent, plus or minus, margin of error. Add to that the 8 percent Joli is polling, and it looks difficult for Salazar.

But it turns out that Shalala is a terrible (and apparently lazy) candidate. She expects to win based on name recognition and, I suppose, a barrage of last minute TV advertising the large amount of money her campaign has collected allows her. Yet she is rarely seen on the campaign trail while Salazar, who speaks both English and Spanish perfectly, is constantly making the rounds on TV and community events.

Looking at this from another angle, a poll completed on Thursday for the Salazar campaign shows her ahead by 7 percentage points. The margin of error in this poll is almost 5 percentage points. Another key factor here is that Ms. Joli was not included in the polling. 

Whatever the case, in a February column (Shalala would spoil Demos chances in Miami’s District 27) I stated that “There’s also her [Shalala] hesitancy and willingness to tackle the hard work needed to beat the rest of the field in this highly contested congressional race. She told the Herald that ‘I’m weighing the kind of work that it will take to get elected. I want to make sure there’s support out there for my candidacy.’ I may be totally off base here, but she gives the impression that if the support is out there than she should be the candidate. The door to door work, the endless walking and talking, and the sweating in the Miami sun while doing this may be a bit below her…”  

Sadly, I believe I was right. There are several things working against Shalala’s chances — although, I feel the Joli factor favors her and she may yet pull out an undeserved  victory. 

Shalala and Salazar are running in a district whose deciding voters may end up being those not registered as either Democrat or Republican. Many are recently arrived Cubans, or naturalized citizens from Latin America and the Caribbean. A great majority of these persons like to communicate in Spanish. And Ms. Salazar is the only one of the two who speaks Spanish. Add to that the fact that during Ileana’s almost 30 years in Congress she communicated with her constituents in English and Spanish. In other words, voters, whether Democrat or Republican, like the idea that they will be attended to in the District 27 offices in the language of their choice.

One other thing… Salazar has shown more energy than the much older Shalala. It all adds up to a possible defeat for the Democrat, which would be devastating to the Party in a district they need to win…

So if you’re a Democrat, and you’re hoping for that blue wave that will return the House to the Democrats, all I can offer is Miami’s own “Master of Selfies,” and a whole lot of fingers crossed.