Two Democrats and three Republicans are competing Aug. 18 for a House seat in Miami-Dade that Gov. Ron DeSantis has allowed to sit vacant since November.
On the Democratic side, Justin Mendoza-Routt and Gloria Romero Roses are facing off for their party’s nomination in House District 113, which covers a central coastal portion of the county spanning all of Key Biscayne and parts of Coral Gables and Miami.
Across the political aisle, former Miami-Dade Commissioner Bruno Barreiro, political newcomer Tony J. Diaz and two-time candidate Frank Lago are running for the right to defend the GOP’s control of the district in November.
The HD 113 seat opened nine months ago, when Republican Vicki Lopez left for an appointment to the Miami-Dade Commission. She filled a vacancy created when Democrat Eileen Higgins ran for Mayor of Miami.
DeSantis never called a Special Election, leaving the seat empty throughout the 2026 Legislative Session and multiple subsequent Special Sessions. By the time the winner takes office after the Nov. 3 General Election, the district will have gone nearly a year without representation in the House.
HD 113 — which encompasses the Miami neighborhoods of Brickell, Downtown, Little Havana, northern Grove, Shenandoah and Virginia Key — along with PortMiami — is one of the county’s most unpredictable political tracts.
Lopez flipped the long-blue seat by 2 percentage points in 2022 and won re-election with nearly 55% of the vote two years later. Donald Trump carried the district by roughly 5 points in 2024, according to MCI Maps, but Joe Biden won it by 12 points four years earlier.
Republicans in the district hold a slight registration edge — 25,424 GOP-aligned voters compared to 21,678 Democrats among 77,022 voters total, per the Coconut Grove Spotlight — with nearly 40% of voters unaffiliated.
Here’s a look at who’s on the ballot.
Democratic Primary
Mendoza-Routt, 37, is a Colombian American asset appraiser for Tiger Capital Group who spent a decade in finance in New York and Miami. He leads the Miami-Dade Young Democrats and the Historic Bayside Civic Association.
Housing affordability is the cornerstone of his campaign. He’s argued Florida’s workforce housing system leaves out too many people at 120% of area median income and says he’ll work to reform or repeal the developer-friendly Live Local Act, which includes affordable housing provisions.
Mendoza-Routt said he’d also address the state’s persistent insurance issues by targeting the reinsurance market and a combined-reporting loophole he says lets carriers obscure profits. He supports school vouchers, but not at public schools’ expense, and called the GOP-pushed property tax amendment proposal rushed.
Through July 31, he raised more than $47,000 through his campaign account and a now-closed political committee, plus $85,000 in self-loans, and spent all but $17,400 of that sum with less than three weeks before Election Day.
Romero Roses, 55, is a Colombian-born Brickell Key resident who ran an assisted living facility before selling it in 2020. She now invests in small businesses.
She serves as Vice Chair of Ruth’s List Florida and previously worked in affordable housing development and grant administration. In 2012, she ran for Congress, losing a Democratic Primary to Joe Garcia with 31% of the vote.
Romero Roses also has Live Local in her sights. She wants to lower the law’s workforce housing income cap to $75,000. She also wants to provide state financing to affordable housing developers, allow small-scale construction on vacant lots and speed local permitting.
She opposes the property tax amendment, too, calling the two-day Session that produced it insufficient for a decision affecting all 67 counties.
Romero Roses raised more than $331,000 through her campaign account and political committee, more than half of which — $181,000 — was self-loaned. She had about $151,600 by Aug. 1.
Her endorsement list includes Senate Democratic Leader Lori Berman, House Democratic Leader Fentrice Driskell, Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, Miami-Dade Commissioner Oliver Gilbert, former U.S. Rep. Donna Shalala, former CFO Alex Sink, the Florida AFL-CIO, the Florida Education Association, United Teachers of Dade, Latino Victory Project, Ruth’s List, SAVE Action PAC and the Miami Herald editorial board.
Mendoza-Routt, meanwhile, carries nods from state Rep. Ashley Gantt, Miami-Dade School Board Member Joe Geller, Miami Commissioner Christine King, Miami Beach Commissioners Tanya Katzoff Bhatt and Monica Matteo Salinas, former state Sen. Annette Taddeo, former Miami Commissioner Sabina Covo, Florida Rising, Engage Y’all, Moms Demand Action and Florida Young Democrats.
Republican Primary
Barreiro, 60, is a home healthcare executive who served in the Florida House from 1992 to 1998, then spent two decades on the County Commission until 2018. He has run repeatedly since — for Congress in 2018, for the Legislature in 2020 and briefly for the Miami City Commission in 2021, before dropping out after six weeks.
Last year he was among five applicants for the County Commission seat that went to Lopez.
He told the Coconut Grove Spotlight the district needs someone who won’t have to learn on the job, and that he’ll fight overdevelopment and steer state dollars back to Miami-Dade.
He called Live Local a knee-jerk response to the housing shortage that invites overdevelopment without matching infrastructure, but backs the property tax amendment, arguing retirees are struggling to stay in their homes.
Other priorities include toll relief and addressing traffic congestion, community safety and condo safety reform.
Barreiro reported raising close to $161,000 this cycle through his campaign account and political committee, an overwhelming share of it — $125,000 — self-loaned. He entered August with just over $61,600 on hand.
The Miami Herald editorial board called him the most experienced candidate, but flagged his 2009 Commission vote for the Marlins stadium financing deal, which saddled taxpayers with $2 billion in long-term debt.
Diaz, 31, runs a fruit tree nursery and a printing business and has lived in HD 113 his entire life. He told Florida Politics he decided to run for office after seeing two vacancies filled without elections — one on the Miami Commission, the other at County Hall, with Lopez, whom he’d competed against for the appointment.
As a fix, he promised to file a bill requiring a Special Election within four weeks of any vacancy.
Diaz is the only candidate running for HD 113 without a political committee, which he cites as evidence that he’s not beholden to corporate or institutional interests.
He’s also raised the least money: about $47,500 in outside contributions, plus $16,500 in self-loans. Diaz spent all of it and then some; his campaign account shows expenditures topping $67,500 — roughly $3,500 more than he reported taking in.
Unable to compete on the same monetary plane, Diaz has gone on the offensive, targeting Barreiro and Lago with Donald Trump-style nicknames, while employing outside-the-box tactics like opening a “provisional representation office” in January, where he invited his opponents to meet twice monthly to discuss policy.
If elected, he said he’d work to repeal Live Local, enact a four-year moratorium on new data center developments, ban Florida Power & Light from making political contributions and prohibit selective policy offerings by insurers.
He also opposes loosening abortion restrictions, but supports recreational marijuana.
The Herald credited him with good ideas, but said he isn’t ready for state office, citing his name-calling of opponents.
Lago, 46, is a commercial real estate adviser and Chair of the Miami-Dade Planning Advisory. Born in Miami and now living in Brickell, he began as an urban planner at Florida International University’s Metropolitan Center and served as Chief of Staff to Sweetwater Mayor Manny Maroño until 2011 — two years before Maroño’s arrest on federal bribery charges. Lago faced no charges.
His campaign site lists safer neighborhoods, accountable leadership and support for local families and small businesses.
He wants Live Local reformed to incentivize homeownership rather than rentals and to lower the measure’s density-bonus income threshold, according to the Grove Spotlight. He also supports the property tax amendment.
Lago has raised the second-most of all HD 113 candidates — $226,000 through his campaign account and political committee, including $25,000 in self-loans — and he’s spent big; by Aug. 1, he had just $40,000 left.
Lopez endorsed him as her preferred successor, as did state Rep. Juan Porras, Key Biscayne Mayor Joe Rasco, the Herald editorial board, Florida Realtors PAC, Associated Industries of Florida, South Florida Council of Firefighters, Brickell Homeowners Association and Miami Young Republicans.
Barreiro carries endorsements from the Florida Nurses Association. A mid-July Instagram post features a photo of him and Trump, who has not officially weighed in on the HD 113 contest.
Diaz has support from the American Patriot Executive Committee and Guardians of American History, and he’s received contributions from Coral Gables Commissioner Melissa Castro, former Miami Commissioner Joe Sanchez, former Miami City Manager Emilio Gonzalez, Miami-Dade Commission candidate Miguel Quintero and the campaign treasurer of gubernatorial candidate James Fishback.
Paola Vazquez del Mercado has qualified as a write-in for November.
Jesse Scheckner has covered South Florida with a focus on Miami-Dade County since 2012. His work has been recognized by the Hearst Foundation, Society of Professional Journalists, Florida Society of News Editors, Florida MMA Awards and Miami New Times. Email him at [email protected] and follow him on Twitter @JesseScheckner.
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