Lopez campaign manager tied to boleteras and Rep.David Rivera, FBI investigation

[Unregistered]

Meet Esther Nuhfer, Commissiner Orlando Lopez's campaign manager. This individual has a history of accepting unreported cash monies and paying boleteras under the table. Last week, at a political fundraiser at Cuban Crafter's Cigar Shop, Lopez was surrounded by a crowd that included Southland Towing owners, employees, federally convicted narcotic traffickers and renown absentee ballot boleteras. Present at the meeting were several City of Miami P.D. high ranking officials who have already been offered jobs at Sweetwater P.D. In the event Lopez wins. These are the same individuals that refuse change in this city and would rather continue running it in the darkness a-la-Manny Marono. Enough with corruption and shady characters! Report any AB fraud or campaign irregularities you encounter to the FBI Anti-Corruption Task Force at (305) 944-9101. You may remain anonymous.

More on Lopez's Campaign Manager Esther Nuhfer:

Before launching his bid for Congress last year, David Rivera embarked on a record-breaking campaign for the state Senate, amassing more than $1 million in donations some eight months before Election Day.

Rivera paid $250,000 of that money to his fundraiser and longtime ally, Esther Nuhfer-- including $150,000 in “bonus” money, records show-- all for a political campaign that Rivera never finished.

Rivera dropped that state Senate campaign early to run for Congress. With Nuhfer’s help, Rivera went on to easily win the congressional race, defeating Republican opponents in the primary and Democrat Joe Garcia in November.

But Rivera’s nascent Washington career is in jeopardy, as criminal investigators in Miami and Tallahassee comb through his personal finances and campaign accounts-- including the Senate account that fattened Nuhfer’s pocketbook. Investigators also are focusing on Rivera’s tight relationship with Nuhfer.

...When asked about Nuhfer’s work for him, Rivera would only communicate with the Miami Herald through written questions sent to an e-mail account in the name of his campaign. Rivera described Nuhfer only as his “fundraising consultant.” In 2010, his last year in the Legislature, Rivera described Nuhfer differently to a Miami Herald reporter.

“She’s a close friend,” Rivera said at the time.

Nuhfer was more than that. She also was a lobbyist in Tallahassee, where her connections to Rivera often sparked whispers and criticism from fellow lobbyists, political consultants and lawmakers in the gossipy state Capitol, where Rivera held the powerful post of budget chief in the state House of Representatives in 2009 and 2010.

During the legislative session, Nuhfer was a constant presence in Rivera’s office: She often could be found sitting at or near his desk, using the telephone or typing on her laptop next to Rivera’s legislative aide, Alina Garcia, who was Nuhfer’s roommate in Tallahassee.

Rivera and Nuhfer also traveled together outside the state, according to sources close to the criminal investigation. Through his campaign, Rivera said any trips with Nuhfer were for “fundraising activities and events.” In December, Rivera accompanied Nuhfer to a black-tie gala for Miami Dade College.

...Rivera also burned through the Senate campaign money at an unprecedented pace, spending $700,000 by February 2010-- long before most legislative campaigns even get started. Nuhfer’s firm accounted for the largest expenses: $250,000 in fees and bonuses paid to Communication Solutions over a five-month period, records show.

Rivera said the bonuses were a “contractually-obligated expenditure for the campaign having successfully reached the fundraising bonus threshold.” But Rivera refused to provide The Herald with a copy of the contract with Nuhfer’s firm.

Rivera’s spending from his Senate account has already drawn scrutiny from police and prosecutors, the Herald has learned.

Last summer, Rivera paid $75,000 from that account to a now-defunct consulting company owned by the daughter of one of Rivera’s top aides. According to campaign reports, the money was earmarked for a “thank you” advertising campaign.

The Herald requested records showing how this “thank you” money was spent, but neither Rivera nor the consulting firm provided the newspaper with any documents.

When Rivera decided to run for Congress instead of the state Senate, he once again turned to Nuhfer for help. It was Nuhfer who faxed the notice of Rivera’s candidacy to the state Division of Elections on Feb. 25 and sent out the press release.

Nuhfer received another $192,000 in fees for organizing radio and television advertising for Rivera’s congressional campaign, records show. Nuhfer also worked on Rubio’s U.S. Senate campaign last year, records show.

Now that Rivera is in Washington, Nuhfer has been spotted in his office there as well. And she’s no longer registered as a lobbyist in Tallahassee.

[Unregistered]

I''ll do her in a New York minute

[Unregistered]

Nuhfer's gig is to hire unscrupulous absentee ballot brokers and pay them with soft monies that are never accounted on campaign treasurer reports. The payment are made in cash so no trace. There is a whole cottage industry of ballot brokers waiting to take her money. Heck, you don't have to go far, in Sweetwater keep an eye on Isolina Marono at election time, she has collected absentee ballots for decades for the Diaz-Ballarts, Jeb, Scott, Fernandez-Rundle and of course her convicted son.

[Unregistered]

It was only a matter of time before all the dots were connected.


I Team: GOP Can’t Account For Funds To Rivera Ally
February 6, 2011 11:54 PM
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Related Tags: Communications Solutions, Esther Nuhfer, GOP, Jim DeFede, Miami-Dade Republican Party, The Miami Herald

Jim DeFede
Jim DeFede joined CBS4 News in January 2006, providing reg... Read More

MIAMI (CBS4) — In the final weeks of last year’s election, the Miami Dade Republican Party paid a close ally of Congressman David Rivera $150 thousand primarily to buy time on Spanish language radio stations for a variety of Republican candidates.
But a review led by The Miami Herald could only find documentation at the radio stations for $34 thousand worth of ads. Radio stations are required by law to maintain complete files on all political advertising. And Republican Party officials now admit they have no detailed records or receipts showing where the rest of the money went.


The Dade GOP hired Esther Nuhfer and her company, Communications Solutions, but never signed a formal contract with her. Nor did GOP officials require her to document precisely her expenditures. Party officials now say they have asked Nuhfer to provide a more complete accounting of the money.
At the time the GOP hired Nuhfer, Rivera was the party’s chairman. Rivera claims to have recused himself from the decision making process to hire Nuhfer, a longtime friend who Rivera has hired to work on several of his campaigns.
Neither Nuhfer nor Rivera would comment for this story.
“The only thing I can say is, you have to call the chairman because I’m not at liberty to discuss any of those kind of things or situations or anything,” said J.C. Hernandez, the executive director of the Miami Dade Republican Party.
Hernandez was referring to the current chairman, State Rep. Erik Fresen, who recently took over leadership of the party from Rivera. Fresen twice agreed to an interview with CBS4 News but cancelled one at the last minute and failed to make himself available for the other.
In a statement Rivera denies he had anything to do with Nuhfer being hired by the party to be a “media consultant.” But the ties between Nuhfer and Rivera run deep. Although he identifies her as his political fundraiser, friends say they are much closer.
The two have been known to travel together outside of Miami and they recently attended a black tie event for Miami Dade College, having their picture taken as a couple for the college magazine.
On Saturday when Rivera opened his new congressional district office in Miami CBS4 News wanted to ask Rivera about Nuhfer and the $150 thousand in party money given to her during his time as chairman, but his staff kept us away.
Yet questions do remain. Whose idea was it to hire Nuhfer? Why was there no formal contract between the Miami Dade Republican party and Nuhfer? And why didn’t Rivera and the party demanding more accounting from Nuhfer on how she spent the money?
Investigators who have been examining Rivera’s finances as part of their criminal probe of the freshman congressman have also been examining the relationship between Rivera and Nuhfer and the extent to which Rivera has been responsible for directing campaign funds to Nuhfer.
(©2011 CBS Local Media, a division of CBS Radio Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. )
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[Unregistered]

Orlando Lopez campaign supporters:

1-Comm. Marono - identified as a boletera in every election by The Herald
2-Comm. C. Rodriguez- theft of PD property/criminal past
3-Comm. Guerra - in tow truck business w/M. Marono

Dime con quien andas y te dire quien eres...

[Unregistered]

Don't be so angry:)

[Unregistered]

Glad that others are noticing the 400 lb. gorilla and calling a spade a spade. This city has been riddled with corruption for a long time. You see the snickering every time somebody reads the patch on our shirts. Anything attached to Manny Marono reeks. The individual was a corrupt thief and gangster and he got what he deserved. Sincerely hope FDLE sweeps in and prevents his boletera mother from doing her rounds. Anyone wanting to go back to the days of Manny is not worth my vote.

[Unregistered]

Déjà vu all over again. Below a report from 2013. Coming at us again....

Absentee ballot fraud alert: Sweetwater elections approach

Shhhh. Do you hear that?

It’s the sound of absentee ballots arriving in our mailboxes. The ballots were mailed today, which means voters get them Wednesday and Thursday. And, yes, that is why we heard the pro-Miami Dolphins stadium public financing scam commercial on Cuban radio this morning (more on that later).


No, as far as I know, Ron Paul is NOT running for Sweetwater commission, leaving a choice between the two women.
And while special referendum has me a little worried, no matter how much everyone says it’s impossible, there’s a smaller universe where AB manipulation, if not outright fraud, is more likely to be featured: Welcome to Sweetwater.

City elections in the western edge town of 8,601 registered voters is also on May 14 — as is North Miami, pero Ladra knows Stephanie Kienzle takes care of that part of town quite well. Check out her blog at http://www.votersopinion.com/).

So that leaves me to Sweetwater, and AB operations there may be worth watching.

After all, there were 1,591 absentee voter requests (permanents and for this election) in Sweetwater on Friday and 1,636 requests as of Monday afternoon, according to the Miami-Dade Elections department. If it grows at that rate — 35 AB requests a day — we could have a quarter of registered voters getting mail-in ballots — and a much larger percentage of those who actually vote casting their choices that way.

This for an election with only one real race in it. The only incumbent who evoked a challenge this year — in a city where there are reigns, not terms — and that is Commissioner Isolina Maroño. Yep, the mayor’s mama. And a successful, known boletera in her own right.

Commissioners Jose Diaz, Jose Bergouignan and Orlando Lopez have been re-elected sans opposition.


Sweetwater Commissioner Isolina Maroño
Interim Commissioner Maroño was appointed to fill in a vacant seat left by the late Vice Mayor Ariel J. Abelairas last year after he passed away in late 2011. The mayor’s mama seemed like an odd choice, especially when there were other candidates that people had… oh, I don’t know… actually voted for in the last election.

But it’s not like Mama Maroño was a political neophyte. Isolina Maroño is well known in political circles and has reportedly worked as a boletera, or someone who deals in absentee ballots, for years. Whether she is a runner or a broker who hires runners, and she is likely both in a small city like Sweetwater, I am not sure. But what is known talked about widely is that she corners the AB market in Sweetwater.

Campaign reports show that Sen. Rene Garcia paid Mama Marono – among a few other known boleteras, including Hialeah’s arrested Daisy Cabrera — $1,050 in his 2010 campaign. State Rep. Frank Artiles (R-South Dade) paid her $1,000 in the same year. It was a good year. That August, Isolina Maroño got $1,500 from Gov. Rick Scott‘s campaign work — the same day three other members of her family got a total of $480 for the same “contract work.”

The commissioner volunteered to Ladra that she also did the same work for former State Sen. Rudy Garcia, when he ran for Hialeah mayor, and State Rep. Carlos Trujillo (R-Doral), even though I could not find her in the campaign report. Still, his opponent, perennial candidate and radio personality Paul Crespo, had hinted last year that she was collecting ballots for Trujillo. While the two came close with in-person votes (early voting got Crespo 172 and Trujillo 196 and Election Day saw 576 votes go to Crespo and 733 to Trujillo), the absentee ballots turned in showed that Trujillo had beaten Crespo by almost twice as many (1,348 to Crespo’s 677.

“But I am not a boletera,” Maroño told Ladra Monday.

Then what do these people pay her for? Why, her recommendation, apparently. But of course!

“Because I have been here a long time, because I have a track record in the community, I can recommend them to people who ask me,” she said. “On Election Day, I am at the polls all day, and when someone doesn’t know who to vote for, I tell them who I supported and they can vote for that person.

So the “campaign work” or “consulting” or “contract work” she does is really just about referrals? Really?

“I am not a boletera,” Maroño repeated to me. “But everytime someone calls me because they need help with the ballot, I help them.”

Deborah Centeno, commission candidate, visits with elderly voters.
That’s not what her challenger, former Community Council Member Deborah Centeno, says. Centeno, who hopes to be the first Nicaraguan elected to the city with the densest population of Nicaraguans in Miami-Dade admits to being concerned by the councilwoman’s alleged “help” with ABs. Several voters have told her that they give the Commissioner Marono their ballot or that someone in their building takes care of it. The patient advocate at Bascom Palmer Eye Institute went to the senior center Tuesday and begged the voters there to cast their ballots themselves and not let anyone touch them.

After being annexed into the city because she was lucky enough to live between the old Sweetwater and Dolphin Mall, Centeno ran unsuccessfully two years ago against Prisca Barretto. Yeah, Prisca Barretto! I know. She was elected in 1993 and was a councilwoman when Ladra was a puppy and first started working for the Herald. I also covered the mayor’s first election to councilman when now Miami-Dade Commissioner Jose “Pepe” Diaz was mayor. He seems to be the only one who got out. Because even Commissioner Manuel Duasso is there.

I’m telling you — reigns.

Anyway, Barretto won with 44 percent of the vote to Centeno’s 17 percent.But the gap was much wider in ABs, where Barretto got 561 votes to 160 than it was on Election Day, when Centeno got closer to her with 128 to her 183 votes.

There were also two other candidates and one of them, Elsa Thompson, works for the city and is considered by some to have been a plantidate that took votes from Centeno. She garnered 26 percent of the vote, which means it may have been closer without her.

And while Ladra has nothing agaisnt Maroño — in fact, I love it when my mami comes to work with me — I like what Centeno has to say. Maroño wants to keep things as they are. She believes the city is just fine.

Centeno wants more transparency and to modernize the website. Ladra thinks that campaign finance reports online would be nice.

She wants more professionalism. “Right now, the city is being run like a grocery store,” Centeno said, and she should know since her family owns a bakery in the city.

While the Miami-Dade County Ethics Commission has ruled that there is no conflict of interest with the mother and son serving in office — particularly because Marono is a strong mayor who does not vote and so he can have conversations outside the Sunshine Law — Centeno also wants to see rules about nepotism.

Something the mayor might not like, since his wife, Jennifer Maroño, also works for the city as a special projects manager and his uncle Antero Espinosa works as the director of the maintenance department

And, get this, Centeno also wants to introduce term limits — in a city where politicians reign for decades.

2 Responses to Absentee ballot fraud alert: Sweetwater elections approach

Uh OH.. AB FRAUD AND ETHICS VIOLATIONSReply
April 23, 2013 at 5:59 pm
Wait one second.. Is this even legal? Is there not a conflict of interest having your mother on the commission?? Are their not laws in place for this? Oh wait a second.. I almost forgot The mayor of Sweetwater is BEST-FRIENDS with RICK SCOTT! So I am sure there will be no enforcement
Absentee boletera or whatever you call that term. I call it Democracy wrecker.. She worked for all these people in the past as what? a consultant? This is the kind of shit that needs to stop. When will Rundle step up and do something? Oh wait, rundle hired the same people so the answer is never.
Pingback: Mama Mia! Sweetwater mayor’s mami keeps her seat | Political Cortadito

[Unregistered]

I find it amusing to read all of your rants expecting for the hand of God to come down and elicit justice in Sweetwater.

If you pay attention to Opa Locka politics or Hialeah politics you will notice that your city is no different. What I am trying to tell you is that the problem is NOT the corrupt people running for office; the problem is the corrupt, lame and intellectually bankrupt citizens that vote for them!

This phenomenon has taken over the whole country and we constantly see people that have been ousted from one public office only to get elected to another (Alcee Hastings comes to mind)

I don’t have an answer for you; all I have is a little advice:

Take care of each other, go home at the end of your shift and retire as soon as you are eligible.


Here ends the lesson

[Unregistered]

I find it amusing to read all of your rants expecting for the hand of God to come down and elicit justice in Sweetwater.

If you pay attention to Opa Locka politics or Hialeah politics you will notice that your city is no different. What I am trying to tell you is that the problem is NOT the corrupt people running for office; the problem is the corrupt, lame and intellectually bankrupt citizens that vote for them!

This phenomenon has taken over the whole country and we constantly see people that have been ousted from one public office only to get elected to another (Alcee Hastings comes to mind)

I don’t have an answer for you; all I have is a little advice:

Take care of each other, go home at the end of your shift and retire as soon as you are eligible.

Here ends the lesson

Great, "lesson" over, now catch the bus and head straight to the nut house. Those voices coming through the TV rabbit ears are getting louder and louder! Lol

[Unregistered]

Great, "lesson" over, now catch the bus and head straight to the nut house. Those voices coming through the TV rabbit ears are getting louder and louder! Lol

Living proof that:
1- they live amongst us.
2- you can't fix stupid.

Lesson really over now!

[Unregistered]

I find it amusing to read all of your rants expecting for the hand of God to come down and elicit justice in Sweetwater.

If you pay attention to Opa Locka politics or Hialeah politics you will notice that your city is no different. What I am trying to tell you is that the problem is NOT the corrupt people running for office; the problem is the corrupt, lame and intellectually bankrupt citizens that vote for them!

This phenomenon has taken over the whole country and we constantly see people that have been ousted from one public office only to get elected to another (Alcee Hastings comes to mind)

I don’t have an answer for you; all I have is a little advice:

Take care of each other, go home at the end of your shift and retire as soon as you are eligible.


Here ends the lesson

I'm sure in the area you reside in these sort of things don't occur on a daily basis. As P.T. Barnum once said, there is a sucker born every minute.

[Unregistered]

I'm sure in the area you reside in these sort of things don't occur on a daily basis. As P.T. Barnum once said, there is a sucker born every minute.


No wonder you work at Sweetwater; you are dumber than freaking dirt.
Of course it happens where I live; it happens everywhere.
That was the point Sherlock.
You must be at least a captain. . . . . .

[Unregistered]

No wonder you work at Sweetwater; you are dumber than freaking dirt.
Of course it happens where I live; it happens everywhere.
That was the point Sherlock.
You must be at least a captain. . . . . .

Sounds like you are probably unemployed on the count of how often you troll on this site. And the use of icons! Did you not get a crayons set when you were in second grade?

[Unregistered]

Sounds like you are probably unemployed on the count of how often you troll on this site. And the use of icons! Did you not get a crayons set when you were in second grade?
He was maybe a capt. Now on the road or soon to be.

[Unregistered]

He was maybe a capt. Now on the road or soon to be.

He may soon be on the road but at least he is not corrupt. You know like the former lieutenant who used to be married to the MDPD's town bicycle and stole a horse and now works for a third grade private detective agency or the corrupt former city of Miami goon who betrayed the Cuban American National Foundation and refuses to realize he is 70 years old and unemployable or the drug trafficking former reserve officer who now pays for the use of the boleteras for the Lopez campaign. Yep, he may be back on the road soon but it is sure nice to know he does not carry your baggage. Soon all of you vermin will be vestiges from the past.