With Shalala favored, Salazar goes negative with her TV ads
WASHINGTON
With Democratic Rep. Donna Shalala the heavy favorite to keep her seat against her two-time Republican challenger, former TV journalist Maria Elvira Salazar, in the race for Miami’s 27th congressional district, Salazar has increasingly gone on the attack, in ads and in person, as Election Day closes in.
In one TV ad, Salazar criticized Shalala after she broke the law by failing to disclose stock sales during her congressional term. In another, she says Shalala “broke the law to enrich herself off coronavirus” without providing evidence for the claim. In a mailer sent to voters, she tries to tie Shalala to socialists in the Democratic Party, a common attack across the country by Republicans.
And in a meeting with the Miami Herald editorial board, she accused Shalala, 79, of staying home rather than working for her constituents during the pandemic.
“I think that she should have been around during the pandemic. She didn’t do the job but she kept the title,” Salazar, 58, said during a meeting with the Miami Herald editorial board.
When asked if she was saying that Shalala — who frequently traveled between Miami and Washington during the height of the pandemic to vote on legislation — was too old for the job, Salazar evaded the question: “I leave [questions of] the energy, the age and the stamina up to you.”
Shalala’s campaign manager Raul Martinez provided a list of Shalala’s media appearances and meetings during the pandemic, saying any suggestion that Shalala isn’t up to the job is “reprehensible.”
With the election already well under way, thousands of votes cast through mail