Thirteen candidates vie for House seats overseeing Pines. Here’s who’s on ballot
The race to represent Pembroke Pines and southwest Broward in Washington is entering its final stretch.
Do you know who’s running to oversee your city?
Primary elections for Florida’s U.S. Representatives are Aug. 18, followed by the general elections on Nov. 3, but you don’t have to wait to see who could end up on the ballot.
Candidates have been locked in since June 12 — the deadline to qualify for the state primaries — and Pembroke Pines is faced with over a dozen contenders who want a shot at leading the city on a national stage across two district seats.
Those are District 24 and District 26, which underwent a boundaries redraw when a Gov. Ron DeSantis-proposed congressional map was signed into law by the Republican-controlled state legislature.
The changes followed pressure from President Donald Trump to redistrict congressional maps ahead of the midterm elections and are expected to increase Republican representation statewide.
Florida currently has 20 Republican and eight Democratic seats.
To check what congressional district your home falls under, visit the Florida Senate’s interactive map.
Here are the candidates looking to represent Pembroke Pines in Congress this fall.
District 24
The new District 24 covers the southeast corner of Pines, including areas south of Sheridan Street, west of Palm Avenue, north of Pembroke Road and east of Florida’s Turnpike.
Currently held by U.S. Rep. Frederica Wilson, who announced her departure from Congress in May, it is one of Florida’s two remaining Black-performing seats and a historically blue district, with Florida Politics reporting that “the winner in November will almost assuredly be a Democrat.”
Ten candidates are gunning for the seat — seven Democrats, two Republicans and one unaffiliated.
Top hitters on the ballot include state Senator Shevrin Jones and Miami-Dade Commissioner Oliver Gilbert.
Jones, who was raised in the Carol City neighborhood of Miami Gardens, was elected to the Florida House in 2012 and to the State Senate in 2020, and was poised to serve as the Senate Democratic Leader from 2028-2030.
Before being sworn into office, he taught Advanced Placement chemistry at Florida Atlantic University High in Boca Raton.
Jones’ campaign website lists the Dignity for Incarcerated Women Act, Blue Envelope Program and Infectious Disease Elimination Program as some of his most notable feats in the Florida Legislature.
Listed on the website as his priorities if elected to Congress are tackling “the affordability crisis,” lowering healthcare costs and “pushing back on the worst of the Trump MAGA agenda.”
Gilbert, a former Miami Gardens mayor and the most recent Chair of the Miami-Dade Commission, has been endorsed by Wilson to fill her seat.
“It’s not a job for a neophyte, it’s a job for experience. You have to hit the ground running,” Wilson said during a campaign event for Gilbert in Miami Gardens, the Miami Herald reported in June. “I need somebody who’ll fight just like I fought.”
While on the commission, he’s championed development in the North Corridor of Miami-Dade’s delayed Strategic Miami Area Rapid Transit (SMART) plan, secured funding for a Miami Gardens Performing Arts Center slated for 2028 and launched a septic-to-sewer conversion program.
Gilbert’s campaign priorities include affordable and accessible healthcare, eliminating income taxes for working families, expanding rapid transit, ending immigration raids, affordable housing, universal childcare, and investing in jobs and career development, according to his website.
Also on the ballot is lawyer Kendrick Meek Jr., the son of former U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek and grandson of Wilson’s predecessor, former U.S. Rep. Carrie Meek, the first Black Floridian elected to Congress since Reconstruction.
Other Democratic candidates: former Miami-Dade commissioner Jean Monestime; doctor, lawyer, Air Force veteran and repeat congressional contender Rudolph Moise; cultural and arts leader Marshall Davis; and civil rights lawyer Roderick Vereen.
Who’s running Republican? Te Mayonna Brown, a self-acclaimed real estate developer, small businesswoman and “pro-MAGA, pro-Constitution conservative,” and write-in candidate Patricia Gonzalez, who also ran in the 2024 election cycle.
The ballot’s sole no-party affiliation candidate is Andy Daro, a North Bay Village commissioner and head of real estate firm The Daro Team.
District 26
The rest of Pines — areas of the city north of Johnson Street and west of Palm Avenue, far into the Everglades — makes up the new District 26.
The area is currently headed by U.S. Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart, longtime congressman and the district’s only Republican candidate on the ballot.
Before DeSantis’ map redraw, Díaz-Balart was charged with eastern Collier County, which has since been handed over to U.S. Rep. Lois Frankel, who oversees District 22.
Most of Díaz-Balart’s congressional territory is still moored by Miami-Dade, including the cities of Doral, Hialeah and Miami Lakes, and parts of Miami International Airport’s land.
Díaz-Balart is the dean of Florida’s congressional delegation as the longest-serving Floridian in the U.S. House of Representatives. He was first elected to office in 2002 as part of the 108th Congress.
Most notable in his history is his family’s decades-long roots in South Florida and Cuban politics.
Díaz-Balart and his late brother, former U.S. Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart, who represented a neighboring congressional district from 1993 to 2011, were known in Congress for their staunch political opposition to the Cuban communist regime.
Their father, Rafael Díaz-Balart, was a leader in the Cuban House of Representatives before Fidel Castro’s regime. Díaz-Balart is the paternal nephew of Castro’s first wife.
His top priorities, per his campaign website, are defense and national security, Everglades restoration, fiscal responsibility in Congress, hurricane preparedness and recovery efforts, immigration reform and border security, and tax relief, among others.
Díaz-Balart’s main opponent come November will be Democrat candidate Nicole Locklin, a big tech lawyer for software company Databricks with former ties to Silicon Valley.
This election cycle marks her first congressional run, which she’s dubbing an “anti-corruption fight” against Díaz-Balart.
Her campaign centers on universal healthcare, housing affordability, putting an end to immigration raids and Alligator Alcatraz, the Cuban relief effort and government accountability, among other issues.
Rounding out the District 26 ballot is Deborah Meidinger Hosey, its sole no-party affiliation candidate.
Not much is known about Hosey, but Florida campaign records show she’s a 61-year-old Weston resident.
