Eliott Rodríguez sues to keep Miami-Dade's elections chief off the District 27 recount against María Elvira Salazar

November 7, 2026

Cuban-American Democrat Eliott Rodríguez filed a federal lawsuit on Friday, November 6, asking a judge to bar Miami-Dade Supervisor of Elections Alina García from ruling on ballots and the recount in Florida's 27th Congressional District. Republican incumbent María Elvira Salazar leads Rodríguez by 1,090 votes in the latest count, according to CBS News Miami and Florida Politics.

The 16-page complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, argues that García's seat on the county canvassing board would violate Rodríguez's right to due process. His lawyers point to a remark the Miami Herald reported she made on election night, "María Elvira is the winner, with or without a recount," and to the fact that Salazar's recount lawyer, Robert Fernández, is García's son-in-law. Salazar is named as an interested party, but Rodríguez is seeking relief only against García in her official role.

García has refused to step aside. "I will not recuse myself. There is no conflict," she told CBS News Miami. Her spokesperson, Juan Mendieta, told WLRN she will stay on the board and that her daughter Alyn Fernández, who works at the same law firm as her husband, attended Friday's hearing "as a member of the public." Salazar answered on X that her opponent "is behaving like an election denier, attempting to turn this process into a political circus because he does not like the election outcome."

Florida law triggers an automatic machine recount when the margin is under 0.5 percentage points, and a manual recount if it narrows to 0.25 points or less. Salazar, who is seeking a fourth term, and Rodríguez, a former CBS Miami anchor, are both Cuban-American former TV journalists.

Sources: CBS News Miami, Florida Politics, NBC News, WLRN and Univision.