HuffPost

Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.) released a new campaign ad, filmed in D.C. and running in South Florida, accusing President Trump of going "too far" with immigration enforcement, warning that Hispanic voters who helped elect him in 2024 now "feel betrayed." Citing ICE data showing half of detainees had no criminal convictions or pending charges, she urged Trump to "be careful" about his advisers' guidance and compared his potential legacy to Lincoln's on slavery and Reagan's on communism. Salazar said she does not seek amnesty but a "dignified life" for immigrants, tying her message to her bipartisan Dignity Act (also called the DIGNIDAD Act), which would offer legal status to long-term undocumented immigrants without criminal records, updated with Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-Texas) in July. The ad comes just seven weeks before her reelection contest in a Miami-Dade district Democrats hope to flip.

The rare intra-party rebuke comes amid GOP anxiety that aggressive enforcement, including a troubled Minneapolis surge tied to two deaths, could erode Republican gains with Hispanic voters ahead of the midterms. Salazar's district, roughly 74% Hispanic, swung sharply toward Trump in 2024, helping him flip Miami-Dade County red for the first time since the 1980s, after leaning far narrower in 2020, but polling now shows Latino support swinging back toward Democrats nationally. She faces Democrat Elliot Rodriguez, a fellow Cuban-American and former TV anchor, who dismissed her ad as political opportunism; the race has reportedly tightened. Trump has shown no sign of softening his enforcement approach despite the warning.

Republicans in Florida's Naples-area congressional district are heading into a crowded primary to succeed Representative Byron Donalds, who is running for governor. The race to fill his seat has drawn a notably unusual field, including several candidates who previously ran for or served in Congress representing other states before relocating to Florida.

Much of the contest has centered on candidates competing to demonstrate loyalty to President Trump and establish credibility as genuine Floridians, producing what commentators have described as an unusually chaotic and closely watched down-ballot primary. Donalds enters Tuesday's primary as the GOP gubernatorial frontrunner with Trump's endorsement, facing Lt. Gov. Jay Collins, former House Speaker Paul Renner, and businessman James Fishback, each arguing he needs to be challenged or replaced as the party's standard-bearer; Governor DeSantis has declined to endorse a successor. The winner will face Democrat David Jolly, a former Republican, in November. The outcome matters for prediction markets tracking control of a safely Republican House seat, as well as broader signals about Trump-aligned candidate strength heading into the 2026 midterms and Florida's leadership transition.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) won her party's primary in Florida's newly drawn 20th Congressional District, a plurality-Black seat centered on Broward County, after her old 25th District seat was eliminated in Republican-led mid-decade redistricting ordered by Gov. Ron DeSantis. Rather than run in a new, whiter district that favored Trump, she chose to compete in the 20th, drawing criticism from local Black leaders, the Broward Black Democratic Caucus, and Congressional Black Caucus members who saw her candidacy as a threat to Black political representation already weakened by the Supreme Court's rollback of the Voting Rights Act; Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries declined to endorse her.

Wasserman Schultz defeated a divided field of four Black challengers — former Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, rapper Luther "Luke" Campbell, Elijah Manley, and Dale Holness — leaning on seniority, fundraising, and an Appropriations Committee seat while her rivals split the opposing vote. Her win makes her the only white House member representing a plurality or majority-Black district heading into 2027, following the elimination of Rep. Steve Cohen's Memphis district by Tennessee Republicans. The broader Florida redistricting effort cut four Democratic-leaning seats ahead of the midterms.