Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Hialeah's AB machine whirs again

The numbers are simply staggering.

Ladra took a stroll down the Miami-Dade election department's website and the absentee ballot report as of Tuesday's totals show that a whopping 17,780 absentee ballots have been mailed in Hialeah. That's 20 percent of the 88,565 or so voters registered.

There are more than twice as many ABs already mailed out to Hialeah voters than to voters in Miami, where 7,680 absentee ballots were sent out among the 74,430 registered voters in the two contested seats, for 10 percent so far. Miami Beach has a barely respectable 3,862 ABs mailed out among it's roughly 43,000 registered voters (just under nine percent). Homestead gets no respect: 980 ABs have been mailed out so far to less than 5 percent of the 20,000 registered voters.

But that's not the end of the story because there could be thousands more ABs requested and mailed in the City of Retrogress,  which is famous for its history with AB voter fraud. Because while the number of absentee ballot requests taper off in the other three cities, it practically explodes exponentially in Hialeah. After the initial 16,093 were sent Oct. 8 to voters who are already on the county's AB list, the elections department has been sending boxes of  ballots to Hialeahns who have also requested them for this election -- 80 went out between Oct. 11 and 12, another 115 were sent on Oct. 13 and more than double, 262, went out on Oct. 14. After the weekend, another 425 ballots were mailed to Hialeah voters on Monday and 805 went out on Tuesday.

In comparison, 15 ABs were mailed to voters in Miami and seven to voters in Miami Beach Tuesday. The same day, 805 were mailed to voters in Hialeah.

How much you want to bet more than 2,000 additional absentee ballots are mailed out by the end of this week?

But Hialeah also has a higher rate of return, caballero. You get out of it what you put into it, right? No wonder it is the AB capital of the world. As of the close of day on Tuesday, there were 5,354 absentee ballots returned from Hialeah voters. Again, proportionally larger and more than twice as many as the 2,107 returned so far in the city of Miami elections, the 1,005 returned in Miami Beach and the 342 that came back to the elections department from Homestead.

These staggering, mushrooming numbers can only mean that the AB requests have been intentionally seeded in Hialeah -- and that the absentee ballot brokers are now in the harvest. Several voters have already reported having campaign workers or employees from the alcaldito's office at City Hall come by to collect their ballots. Two of the council candidates have told Ladra they were approached by a known broker (more on that later) and the Miami-Dade Police Department's public corruption unit is, yet again, investigating allegations of a well-oiled, fine-tuned absentee ballot machine run by AB Queen Sasha Tirador, who has sub-soldiers that work the assisted living facilities and public housing buildings for hundreds of questionable votes.

Let's hope something sticks this time -- before the next election finds more than 50 percent of voters casting their ballots by mail (read: risk having their votes stolen).



9 comments:

  1. Elaine, you should write comedy pieces. It's hilarious how you don't mention whose camp committed, (and was unequivocally proven to have done so) absentee ballot fraud in the past. I also find it laughable a public watch dog can support a candidate convicted (overturned on appeal) of corruption. It's almost like ladra claims to vomit from eating grass and now her owner has determined to put her on a diet of exclusively old grass clippings. I've said from day one of this race, the Martinez side cannot win by trying to paint their opponents as crooks. That worked for Gimenez because he was relatively unblemished but Martinez is the only man in this race with a mugshot.

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  2. Everyone knows that Carlos is going to try(notice i said "try") and win by whatever means necessary.

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  3. "Unequivocally proven?" That must be the Diaz-Balart camp in 2008 via Sasha Tirador, as per the close-out memo. Yes, I have seen the 1993 one and the Michael "Muscles" Pizzi complaint and the one before that and none are as damning.

    It's lovely how you throw stuff on here like it's factual when it's not... in fact, you kinda sound like Sasha. Maybe THAT'S it. Makes sense.

    And, by the way, these ARE comedy pieces. I'm laughing my head off.

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  4. Ladra:
    Really??? "That must be the Diaz Balart camp"?? How about when Raul Martinez ran against Nilo Juri and Judge Shaprio threated to throw out the absentees ALL TOGETHER because of fraud?? And just for FYI Raul Martinez won ONLY because OF ABESENTEE BALLOTS. I think former Mayor Martinez has forgotten that once upon it time it was HIS absentee ballot machine that was taken to court not once but TWICE. Your professor Mr. Morales can tell you all about it since his "slate mate" Cindy Miel and her crew took him and the Martinez-Robaina ticket to court. If my memory serves me correct Mayor Pizzi represented "the girls" I now find it laughable that the "Back to the Future" Group including Raul Martinez says they do not have an AB operation, ridiculous!

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  5. Julissa you sound worried? The word is Sasha has been hired by Robaina and crew to keep the
    present administration intact to cover his poor financial ability. Sasha as well as the Carlos slate is gone on November 1st. Wonder what will happen when all the doo-doo at City hall gets fired. Hope they have an alternative plan. Maybe they will sell out all the dirty little dark secrets that Robaina kept hidden. November 1st is going to be the begining of the end for lot's of incompetant people and the "YES" council.

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  6. Isis Martinez mother is hitting senior citizens homes with a bag of can food and milk, (all expired by the way) and she request the absentee ballot for her daughter, she is hitting the homes of those who has received absentee, she ask the vote for her daughter, and then she fills out the ballot for them, because most of them can not see well.
    As far as Iknow, that is illegal, not to mention, the expired can food can poison an old person. Ladra get on that ball, things are heating up and they are cheating

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  7. Anonymous Above:
    I am confused.. is it poor financial ability or dirty little secrets??? With all the rats on the 4th floor and the water department you think they would have found something by now, because they have certainly been looking..... "Poor financial abilty" as you put it is not a crime, otherwise President Obama would be on death row!!!

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  8. Confused Julissa, yes you are confused "Poor Financial Ability" is a crime against all the residents of Hialeah. Dirty little secrets will explode as soon as the present administration and the incumbents are ejected from office. They as well as Robaina should have worked for the benefit of the people not for their own self-interest. As to your Obama comment you reminded me that the president and x-Mayor Robina have another thing in common, they are both FLIP FLOPPERS. That is why Robaina lost the County, "YES" for the stadium than "NO" for the stadium. "YES" for Natasha than "No" for Natasha. As to the 4th floor rats and water department, think of it as growing in numbers they "ALL" departments are talking about poor fiscal management of the Cities resources and that has many employees sharing dirty little secrets.

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  9. Doesn't Esteban Bovo represent Hialeah? Who is he supporting... Carlitos? Or Raul, the man who helped him become a politician?

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