A Florida Democratic state senator announced his plans to run for GOP Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen’s seat in 2018 elections, according to a report.
State Sen. Jose Javier Rodriguez told the Miami Herald in an interview, “It’s a really important time to run.” He added, “It’s a time when we’re trying to define what country we are, and the character of our democracy.”
The Miami Democrat said he spoke to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee about his intention to run for Ros-Lehtinen’s seat in the state’s 27th Congressional District.
Rodriguez, a Harvard-educated Cuban-American lawyer, said that he has been thinking about what he can do for the district especially on issues like healthcare, taxes and economic development.
“A lot of the issues I’ve worked on in Tallahassee are equally as relevant at the federal level,” said Rodriguez, who was first elected to the state House in 2012.
Ros-Lehtinen announced April 30 that she will not seek re-election and will retire at the end of her term.
“It’s been such a delight and a high honor to serve our community for so many years and help constituents every day of the week,” she said. “We just said, ‘It’s time to take a new step.”
“I’ve served under all kinds of different dynamics in all these years that I’ve been in office here,” said Ros-Lehtinen, the former chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “Though I don’t agree with many, if not most, positions of President Trump,” she told the Herald.
According to reports, the four other Democrats already in the race for the seat include Scott Fuhrman, Ros-Lehtinen’s Democratic opponent in 2016; Kristen Rosen Gonzalez, Miami Beach commissioner and a professor at Barry University; Michael Hepburn, an academic adviser at the University of Miami; and Mark Anthony Person, a Democrat.
