On April 21st, the Florida Department of State's Division of Elections certified Democrat Frank Gonzalez as a candidate for the US House of Representatives in the 21st District of Florida. This district, first created in 1992, has been held for 14 years by the Bush Republican Lincoln Diaz-Balart. No Democrat has competed in the Florida 21st since 1998. Getting Frank Gonzalez was not easy, while his opponent had some extra help in getting on the ballot.
To be certified as a candidate for the House of Representatives in Florida requires either a minimum number of signatures or payment of a fee of nearly $10,000 to the state. This fee amounts to little more than extortion and Democrat Frank Gonzalez instead choose to qualify for the ballot by going out to the people of the Florida 21st and collecting signatures. The response to his signature drive was positive and gives him more encouragement for the race in the fall.
An estimated total of over 5,500 signatures were collected. After pre-screening them, a total of 4,024 were submitted to the Division of Elections. The Division of Elections verified 3,430 of them, which exceeded the 3,014 signatures required to qualify as a candidate for the House of Representatives. Few candidates in Florida opt for this signature method of getting on the ballot, most pay the state's fee.
On the current certification laws, Frank Gonzalez said "It's a win-win situation with goodies for everyone except Florida voters like me who are beyond disgusted from decades of the same garbage in politics. This is a law that basically states its contempt for voters right to their faces."
In his 2004 race, Gonzalez received nearly 55,000 votes, 27.2%, as a fiscally responsible, socially tolerance Libertarian. Despite his lack of money, volunteers, name recognition and major party backing, he fared better than the only previous challenger, a Democrat in 1998 who received just 25.2%.
For this year's election, Gonzalez decided to join the mainstream by running as a Democrat. Although he still considers himself a philosophical libertarian, he wants to focus on a common-ground strategy to unify the 57% of the district's voters who don't affiliate with the Republican Party. He also hopes to reach out to socially tolerance Republicans. His major issues are opposition to the Patriot Act and other attacks on the Bill of Rights, pulling out of Iraq, and reforming our current Cuban trade and travel policies.
Frank Gonzalez has also filed a formal complaint with the Division of Elections against his opponent, Republican Lincoln Diaz-Balart, whose campaign used an outdated petition form from August 1999 to collect signatures. At this time the media has not picked up on this story, but hopefully word of this will spread. Earlier this year, Congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart was one of three House Republicans to challenge the constitutionality of the redistricting amendment that was supposed to be on this fall's ballot.
Please consider supporting Frank Gonzalez's campaign against the Bush Republican Lincoln Diaz-Balart. Miami-Dade County makes up 80% of District 21 while Broward County makes up the rest. While it does lean Republican, we should be doing everything possible to fight in every district this year.
