South Florida U.S. Reps. Lincoln, left, and Mario Diaz-Balart.
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While Washington, D.C.-based election analysts like the Rothenberg Report and Cook Political Report call the Diaz-Balart races toss-ups, polls show Ros-Lehtinen, 46, with a lead ample enough to keep her seat in the GOP fold. Still, although her district remains two-thirds Latino, it is less than 30% Cuban today—and non-Cubans like her Colombian-American Democratic challenger, businesswoman Annette Taddeo, 41, are gaining political clout.
That trend looks likely to continue in Miami-Dade County, where new Democratic voter registration is significantly outpacing that of Republicans. Many Miami Cubans—including the Diaz-Balart brothers, who are the nephews of Fidel Castro's first wife—were once Democrats before joining the GOP during the more ardently anti-communist Reagan decade of the 1980s. If either Martinez, Garcia or both pull off upsets next month, it will be sweet for Democratic Cuban-Americans who held out all these years. But it may not be sweet enough to help Miami overcome the sour aftertaste of these congressional campaigns.