Free Republic

Democrats in the critical must-win state of Florida are panicking at the lead Republicans have taken in in-person early voting in Miami-Dade County, a usually reliable blue bastion. Democrats and Progressives in the traditionally solid blue Miami-Dade County are in a panic as early voting results indicate a spike for Republicans at the polls. Early in-person voting in the south Florida Democrat stalwart sees Republicans in the lead. While Democrats are up overall in Miami-Dade County, when early in-person voting is isolated and analyzed it reveals Republicans are leading. This uptick in early Republican voters in a county that has...

Florida's Hispanic voters are fleeing the Democratic Party and there's little indication that the trend might reverse post-2020. MIAMI, Fla. — Democrats are on track to lose Florida in November, and there’s little indication that the Sunshine State will turn reliably bluefor the foreseeable future.As of this writing, RealClearPolitics’ latest aggregate of Florida polls shows former Vice President Joe Biden leading President Donald Trump by about two points, well within the margin of error for most polls. This time four years ago, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was up by three points and still lost the state’s 29 critical...

It's Fourth of July weekend, and restless patriots want to finally get out of their houses and go to the beach. But they'll have no such luck in Florida's Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach counties. Palm Beach County Mayor Dave Kerner said it would be highly irresponsible to open the beaches, while Broward Mayor Dale V.C. Holness argued it was imperative to keep people safe, considering any open beaches have the potential to draw people from other counties. This is not something we are taking lightly,” Holness said. “We don’t like taking away the freedom of people to go to...

Researchers at the University of Miami said this week that preliminary tests indicate as many as 221,000 residents of Miami-Dade County may have already been infected by the coronavirus, a rate 20 times greater than the current official tally of infections. Scientists from the Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the university's Miller School of Medicine revealed in a virtual meeting on Friday that a county-wide COVID-19 survey, which followed 1,400 participants over a two-week period, indicated that at least 4.4 percent, and as much as 7.9 percent of the county, could have already contracted the coronavirus. That is a substantially...

A code red was issued at South Dade Senior High SchoolA man was arrested Thursday after he was seen with an AR-15 near a southwest Miami-Dade school, prompting a campus lockdown, school officials said. Numerous calls to 911 reported sightings of a man riding an ATV with the rifle's barrel protruding from his bookbag while parents dropped off their children at around 7 a.m. at South Dade Senior High School, police said in an arrest report. School officials locked down the campus as police searched for hours. They did not find an intruder or anyone with a gun and reopened...

MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – Miami-Dade County now has 14 cases of confirmed dengue fever this year. The Florida Department of Health in Miami-Dade County issued a mosquito-borne illness alert Monday afternoon after two Miami-Dade residents came down with symptoms. The latest cases were locally acquired and are linked to a travel-related case previously reported, according to the DOH-Miami-Dade. Dengue is spread through mosquito bites through the Aedes mosquitoes which also spread chikungunya and the Zika virus. Though rarely fatal, those that develop symptoms recover in about a week.

A bridge-building disaster should be incomprehensible in today’s technical world. Humans have been building bridges for centuries. The science should be well sorted out by now — and for the most part, it is. But the National Transportation Safety Board’s investigation of the March 2018 collapse of the FIU pedestrian bridge highlighted basic design flaws and a complete lack of oversight by every single party that had responsibility to either identify the design errors or stop work once it was clear that there was a massive internal failure. We all know “what happened” here. But the “why” is more elusive....

Sybrina Fulton has spent the better part of the last seven years advocating for an end to gun violence and promoting social justice.... Now she’s challenging the city’s mayor for a seat on the Miami-Dade County Commission.... ....Miami Gardens Mayor Oliver Gilbert is also running for the seat, one of five up for grabs....

Miami-Dade’s mayor flies to Tallahassee this week to fight a state takeover of local toll roads, and he says an early victim of the proposed legislation would likely be a planned extension of the 836 expressway into West Kendall. “One of the major issues I have with that bill is the fact that it may stall that project for some time,” said Mayor Carlos Gimenez, who also serves as the appointed chairman of the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority. The toll board of state and county appointees, best known as the MDX, collects tolls on the 836 and four other expressways. “The...

Bronough Street, we have a problem. That problem for Democrats is that Republicans have figured out early voting. The one “ace up the sleeve” for Democrats in Florida has been offset by an aggressive early voting campaign by Republicans. In fact, 7,152 more Republicans have voted early compared to Democrats. When Democrats make small gains in Broward, Miami-Dade, Hillsborough and, yes, Duval Counties, Republicans are making significantly larger early vote gains in Sarasota, Okaloosa, Santa Rosa, and almost every other Republican-leaning county in the state. Remember when I said at the beginning of the election that the Florida Panhandle was...

The crude bombs sent to several liberal politicians and news networks this week were sent through a major Unites Sates Postal Service mailing facility in South Florida, it's been revealed. All 10 bombs sent to the Clintons, former President Obama, CNN and other prominent Democrats are all believed to have come through the Opa-locka processing and distribution center, CNN reports. FBI and canine units were deployed to the facility Thursday as the search continues for the person or persons behind the bombs. The U.S. Post Office Royal Palm Processing & Distribution Center in Opa-locka is the main mailing facility in...

Last week, federal authorities fined Munilla Construction Management $25,868 for “serious” safety violations in its role as the contractor on the Florida International University bridge that collapsed in March, killing six people. The morning after the collapse, Juan Perez, director of the Miami-Dade Police Department, said the department’s homicide squad would explore criminal charges for contractors such as MCM. “We’ve got to look at the reality that there may be some negligence down the line,” Perez said. Perez answers to Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez, who appointed him director in January 2016. Miami-Dade is the only county in Florida where the...

In life, some things are unavoidable: death, taxes — and if you live in South Florida — tolls. Coughing up money to drive on the highways add to the cost of living in South Florida. Drivers in Miami-Dade and Broward spent more than a half billion dollars in tolls fees in the last year. Consider: A daily trip from Kendall to downtown Miami costs over $4 roundtrip by Sunpass, or about $1,000 a year for a five-day a week, 50-week commuter. For those who haven’t signed up for Sunpass, the toll-by-plate rate of almost $8 per day amounts to $2,000...

Miami-Dade commissioners on Wednesday gave preliminary approval to extending the 836 expressway 14 miles into West Kendall, rejecting warnings about environmental damage and urban sprawl in favor of bringing relief to commuters in the congested suburbs. "We've got to start somewhere," said Commissioner Javier Souto, whose district includes western areas in the county. "Do something. Do something." A final vote awaits later this year, but the 9-2 vote captured what appeared to be broad support for the signature transportation package from Mayor Carlos Gimenez, who cited the toll road's extension as a top priority as he prepares to leave office...

A Honduran national in the United States illegally has been charged with killing two women in Miami over the past three months and dumping their bodies on the street, police announced Monday. Juan Carlos Hernandez-Caseres, 37, was arrested Saturday morning for the murders of Ann Farrin, 41, and Neidy Roche, 39. ... Surveillance footage taken at the time shows a black vehicle coming to a stop between Northwest 38th Street and Northwest 37th Street. The driver gets out, removes a body from the passenger side and leaves it on the sidewalk. ... Detectives with the Miami-Dade Police Department obtained an...

Two South Florida McDonald's customers think the fast-food giant is being awfully cheesy with how it charges customers for a signature item that has been on its menu since 1975. According to a class-action lawsuit filed in Fort Lauderdale federal court on May 8, Cynthia Kissner, of Broward County, and Leonard Werner, of Miami-Dade, say they have had to pay for cheese they don't want on their Quarter Pounder sandwiches. The suit asks for at least $5 million. It comes down to this: On the menu, a hamburger at Micky D's is cheaper than a cheeseburger. According to the lawsuit,...

It's time to mount a serious campaign to end tolls in Miami-Dade County. Any time the government wants to charge people money, we should be allowed to vote on it. Florida's Turnpike Enterprise and the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority (MDX) are highway robbers preying on predominantly poor motorists struggling to have a roof over their heads, put food on the table, and take care of their families. I remember the days when there was only one toll on State Road 112 when you left Miami International Airport to get to Miami Beach. Now there are tolls on virtually every major highway...

When a 175-foot stretch of a concrete bridge collapsed Thursday afternoon over Southwest Eighth Street, slamming down onto cars waiting at a stoplight, a prominent construction team instantly came under scrutiny. Munilla Construction Management and FIGG Bridge Group, the firms behind the $14.3 million walkway connecting Florida International University to the tiny blue-collar burb of Sweetwater, have a long history of massive public works projects, political donations — and a few safety issues. MCM is one of the most influential construction firms in Miami-Dade, and its executives are significant donors in county races. Pedro Munilla, the partner and company vice...

The Miami-Dade School District took up the immigration debate Wednesday. The district reports undocumented students are worried sick for themselves and their parents. And the school board issued what is essentially a “stay away” order to federal agents.... “On behalf of every single kid in this community, over my dead body will any federal entity enter our schools to take immigration actions against our kids,” Carvalho said.

Search for the nexus of a political debate over whether Florida should restore felons’ voting rights or purge its rolls and you’ll find a white, 71-year-old radiologist named Douglas Hornsby. A sitting commissioner in the sleepy Miami-Dade coastal town of North Bay Village, Hornsby was removed from office Monday after government officials determined he was never eligible to take his post. Turns out, the septuagenarian omitted an unresolved, 25-year-old felony cocaine conviction in Tennessee from his voting registration forms after he moved to Florida in the ’90s, making him an illegal voter and an illegitimate elected official. Hornsby, whose reason...