As Florida’s District 27 congressional race heads to an automatic recount, the Democratic candidate is questioning the county’s election chief and demanding that she recuse herself from the process.
The campaign of Eliott Rodriguez, a former local news anchor, released a statement on Thursday raising concerns about Miami-Dade’s Supervisor of Elections Chief Alina Garcia. Officials said she made comments on Tuesday night that indicated bias toward his opponent, Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar, a Republican.
The statement reads in part:
“Ms. Garcia already announced her winner. On election night, Ms. Garcia announced to the Miami Herald, “María Elvira [Salazar] is the winner, with or without a recount.” The newspaper also reported that she considered a reversal possible but unlikely. That qualification does not take back the declaration.”
Lawyers for the Rodriguez campaign also accused Garcia of having a conflict of interest, writing…
“…according to information provided to our campaign, the lawyer representing Maria [Elvira] Salazar in the recount is Robert Fernandez, Ms. Garcia’s son-in-law.”
It’s unclear where the Rodriguez campaign obtained the information about an alleged conflict of interest, and they would not elaborate to 7News beyond the written statement.
Representatives for the office of the supervisor of elections also did not confirm whether Garcia’s son-in-law is Salazar’s lawyer, nor did they expand on how she was quoted on election night to the local newspaper. They did confirm, however, that Supervisor Garcia would not recuse herself from the process.
After seeing Rodriguez’s statement, Salazar responded with her own, accusing Rodriguez of “behaving like an election denier” and saying her vote-count lead is “an insurmountable margin.”
She added:
“My opponent should allow the Canvassing Board and election workers to do their jobs and stop trying to undermine public confidence because he does not like the current results.”
Her statement, posted to social media, also did not address Rodriguez’s claim that Garcia’s son-in-law is connected to the congresswoman’s campaign.
The race between Salazar and Rodriguez remains too close to call as of late Thursday night. Only a little over 1,000 votes separate the two candidates.
In a news conference on Wednesday, where she announced the recount in this race, Garcia reassured voters that the process is transparent.
“I just want voters to understand that everything here is transparent, above board, and everyone is welcome if they want to come and watch,” she said. “This falls within Florida’s 0.50% threshold for an automatic machine recount.”
Fernandez did not respond to 7News’ request for comment.
