Gimenez family hit in Senate campaign… ADLP’s wag the dog?

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¡Que arroz con mango!

The Senate 40 race has become a total telenovela in the final weeks, with a five-year old, out-of-state misdemeanor arrest record surfacing at the last minute, implicating something salacious and improper between former Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla and the daughter-in-law of the county mayor, who were taken into custody together in a Boston non-smoking hotel room where they were chainsmoking, despite repeated warnings, on a late rainy night.

Shortly after the 2012 incident was first reported in the Herald last week, Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez withdrew his support for The Dean’s opponent, former State Rep. Jose Felix “Pepi” Diaz. Gimenez will not be the guest star, after all, at a fundraiser planned next week at the Biltmore Hotel (which Ladra assumes will be cancelled), citing the negativity of the Diaz campaign.

“He believes that the tone of that particular race has been unnecessarily negative and will not be endorsing any candidate in that primary,” said Gimenez spokesman Michael Hernandez, because, apparently, the mayor’s political life and endorsments is part of Mike’s job now, too.

Also, btw, the race has been unneccessarily negative for weeks and it wasn’t until his family’s dirty laundry started to come out that Gimenez found the campaign offensive.

But what if the information didn’t come from Pepi Diaz? What if it came from ADLP himself? Wait for it… wait for it. I know! Brilliant, right? The guy’s a genius!

If Pepi Diaz — or any of the Tallahasee ghosts who are supporting him (more on that later) — wanted to expose this embarassing episode (forget the girl, the behavior is atrocious enough), they would have spilled the Boston beans before the absentee ballots went out on June 27 . Not weeks after people have already voted. And days before the girl’s father-in-law mayor was hosting a fundraiser for him!

And ADLP isn’t hurt by this. He is not the married one. In the eyes of most Cuban-American Westhchester super voters, he has done nothing wrong. Heck, some of them will want to high-five him. It may pain Ladra to say it, but this doesn’t resonate among his voters. Cruz will be vilified. But she is not running for office. And him? He’s a charming, womanizing, fast-talker who has women throw themselves at him all the time. El no tiene la culpa. He’s not to blame, they’ll say.

Ahora, el sinverquenza que saco los trapos? Yep, this could actually hurt Pepi, who is seen as the desperate villain who besmirched a woman’s name to get elected and, to boot, won’t have the extra dollars that he expected to have for the end game from a Gimenez anointment, which can be a lot. It is not a coincidence that the news of the arrests came only a couple days after the announcement that the mayor — who should have stayed out of the primary out of loyalty to ADLP for his 2011 win — would headline the Biltmore event for Pepi.

This must have irked The Dean. After all he’s done for that cardboard box! It’s not completely unreasonable to think that he put this arrest info out himself to get the cancellation and also a little bit of free publicity as the smeared former Senator trying to defend “the mother of two young girls,” as he said in the Herald story. Another thing: Tania Cruz, the daughter-in-law in question (and this is the good daughter-in-law), gave a long and impassioned statement as well — which there is no way she would have done without ADLP’s consent. In fact, Ladra suspects The Dean wrote her comments.

Then, boom! Gimenez canceled on Diaz.

Then, boom, boom! His lobbyist son, CJ Gimenez, also lashed out at Pepi Diaz on Facebook Thursday.

“For those of you that did not receive the latest email from the Jose Felix Diaz campaign due to limited circulation, my father, Mayor Carlos Gimenez is no longer involved with the Rep. Jose Felix Diaz event at the Biltmore on July 18th citing the negative tone of the campaign,” wrote CJ, who celebrated an anniversary with his wife only weeks ago. 

“My position (me, CJ Gimenez, not the Mayor) is that I am utterly disgusted with the actions of the Jose Felix Diaz campaign and their pathetic personal attacks against me and my family. So I ask you, do not reward Jose Felix Diaz with your support. Please share this post with your friends and family! I thank you!”

Ladra was told that the other daughter-in-law (the bad one) also posted something on Facebook about it.

But what if they’re being played by one of the best in the business? Yes, it would be somewhat Machiavellian to have orchestrated this wag the dog scenario right in front of our eyes.

But look who we’re talking about here.

Brilliant!

  Alex Diaz de la Portilla, Jose Felix Diaz, Senate District 40