A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
A House Republican running for reelection in a competitive race in South Florida is publicly breaking with President Trump. Representative Maria Elvira Salazar dropped a campaign ad on Thursday telling Trump he's, quote, "gone too far" on immigration enforcement. Here's Catherine Welch.
CATHERINE WELCH, BYLINE: The campaign ad opens with Salazar standing outside the White House, talking directly into the camera.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
MARIA ELVIRA SALAZAR: Mr. President, some of your immigration enforcement efforts have gone too far.
WELCH: Salazar goes on to say that half of the people detained in July had no criminal record.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
SALAZAR: Be careful what your advisers are telling you about immigration policy. The same Hispanics who helped you get to the White House in 2024 feel betrayed today.
WELCH: Florida's 27th Congressional District includes the Miami neighborhood Little Havana. And it's a majority-Hispanic district, with about 73% of the population identifying as Hispanic or Latino, according to recent U.S. census data. Salazar was born in Little Havana to Cuban exiles. She became a broadcast journalist and then turned to politics. In 2020, she flipped the seat, narrowly beating out a Democratic incumbent by about three percentage points. Salazar handily won her race in 2024 by about 20 percentage points and, the following year, voted for Trump's Big Beautiful Bill, which gave ICE $75 billion.
LAURA KELLEY: Trump didn't mislead Salazar. Salazar misled Miami-Dade.
WELCH: Laura Kelley is chair of the Miami-Dade Democrats. She says Salazar is trying to play both sides when it comes to immigration.
KELLEY: To ask people to vote for her because she's going to be good on immigration? What about the rest of the party?
WELCH: Mike Madrid is a Republican political consultant and a co-founder of the anti-Trump Lincoln Project.
MIKE MADRID: You can take any policy position you want in this party, but the one thing you cannot do is cross Donald Trump. And she's just done it.
WELCH: He says the campaign ad is a sign of a rising tide against President Trump, especially among Hispanic voters. Recent polls taken over the summer put Trump's approval rating with these voters at around 30%. That's important because Hispanic voters were instrumental to Trump winning reelection. As for Salazar, Madrid says...
MADRID: There's no other reason that you do this unless you're trying to stop serious hemorrhaging with your voter base. And that's the problem.
WELCH: This year, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee considers it a district in play and sees it as a place they could flip. Florida Republican strategist Brett Doster thinks this campaign ad is a way for Salazar to reach out beyond her base.
BRETT DOSTER: By going against Trump personally and so directly, she knew this was going to become, I think, a national news story. And she's making a play that those Republicans are going to stick with her and give her some credit for being willing to be a truth-speaker, but then also appeal to those nonpartisan voters.
WELCH: Salazar can't go back, he says. And he'll be watching on election night to see if her strategy works.
For NPR News, I'm Catherine Welch in Orlando, Florida.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.