While Miami lobbies for the 2020 Democratic Convention, party officials are bracing for an awkward outcome: hosting a nominee such as socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., in a city filled with immigrants who fled socialism in their home countries.
Democrats are debating between the Florida metropolis and the sleepier Milwaukee, Wis., with Houston, Texas, a distant third option.
Miami Democrats are frantically trying to convince national leaders that holding the convention in the biggest city in a critical swing state would be an important step toward winning the Electoral College in 2020.
“Republican strategy has been to maximize gains outside of South Florida and erode our support here,” South Florida-based consultant Christian Ulvert wrote in a letter to Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez. “Florida is ground zero for presidential elections — Miami-Dade is clearly ground zero for Florida.”
Recent polling shows avowed socialist Sanders a front-runner for the nomination, already beating out establishment favorites such as Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., and former Vice President Joe Biden in early primary states such as New Hampshire.
But some Democrats in southern Florida are nervous about having to explain to their constituents that their party may nominate a candidate critical of President Donald Trump’s rhetoric on Venezuela and sympathetic to the Castro regime in Cuba. Whether Sanders wins or not, a contingent of attendees sympathetic to his views is sure to be on hand in the convention hall.
“Socialism is a dirty word for a lot of Hispanics [in Miami],” Lidia Moore, the Havana-born president of the Miami-Dade Cuban American Democratic Club told the Washington Examiner. “Bernie [Sanders] praising Castro in the 1980s is a deal killer. Anybody who comes here with the word ‘socialism’ is going to run into problems.”
Miami Democrats are split. Steve Simeonidis, chair of the Miami-Dade Democratic party dismissed Moore’s point that a socialist Democratic nominee could alienate Hispanic voters.
“The immigrants fleeing dictatorships aren’t leaving because their leader called for a living wage or affordable healthcare, ” told the Examiner.
“They’re fleeing because of the environment created by corrupt regimes that jail political opponents, use violence against peaceful protesters, and disavow a free press and independent judiciary. The Trump administration uses similar tactics to silence critics, and voters in Miami-Dade will recognize that and vote accordingly.”
Ernesto Ackerman, president of Independent Venezuelan American Citizens, a Miami-based, non-partisan Venezuelan advocacy group, predicted unrest should his city host a self-identified socialist in 2020.
“I expect protests. I’m not a guy who usually protests, this is a free country. But protesting is something I expect,” he told the Examiner. “The Democratic Party is turning into the Socialist Party. You can hear it in people like [Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez] and Bernie Sanders.”
“As the president said, I don’t want socialism in this country. [Venezuelan-Americans have] seen what socialism did, it turned one of the richest countries [in South America] bankrupt.”
Republicans are eager to make mischief. Luis Rodriguez, communications director for the Republican Party of Miami told the Examiner: “Just remember that Sen. Sanders has always been extremely liberal and has been supporting leftist regimes in the Western Hemisphere, including Cuba, since the early 60’s.
“We, at the Miami GOP, believe in democracy and freedom of speech and we promote those values, So, even though our community is full of people who fled their home countries because of the same leftist ideology Sen. Sanders promotes, they came to this country looking for free speech, democracy and respect for diversity of ideas which they also promote.”
The GOP, still basking in their narrow 2016 and 2018 victories, sense an opportunity to create a lock on the state. In his 2018 Senate run, Scott won 48 percent of the state’s Hispanic vote — instrumental in beating Democratic incumbent Bill Nelson by just over 10,000 votes.
Trump’s pressure on Nicolas Maduro’s regime in Venezuela could also be a way for the GOP to court Florida voters. Trump gave a speech against socialism last month at the Florida International University.
“Socialism has so completely ravaged this great country that even the world’s largest reserves of oil are no longer enough to keep the lights on,” Trump said. “This will never happen to us.”
For years, Venezuelan-Americans have tended to favor Democrats. With a Democratic party lurching further left, Trump might have an opening.
“I’m concerned about the Trump administration politicizing this issue, using Venezuelans’ suffering to score political points here in Florida,” Miami Democratic Representative Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, said after the speech. “We shouldn’t be using this as a political weapon.”
