Liberal Talk Radio

The New Jersey Senate race is critical to Democrats as they hope to take control of the Senate. So what is Robert Menendez doing? Campaigning in South Florida, of course, courting Republicans:

He shook hands with supporters at Versailles Restaurant on Calle Ocho in Little Havana. He was given the keys to the affluent city of Coral Gables, Fla., at a reception attended by more Republicans than Democrats. He received two proclamations from nearby towns, including one with a Republican mayor who declared Sunday “Senator Bob Menendez Day.”

Yes, that Senator Robert Menendez, the Democrat from New Jersey.

“I want to keep a Republican majority, but not if it means losing Bob Menendez,” said Ana Navarro, a Republican political consultant who helped organize three Menendez for Senate fund-raising events at the historic Biltmore Hotel on Sunday. “He’s part of our extended family.”

At home in northern New Jersey, Mr. Menendez comes across as a textbook Democrat, with a 100 percent scorecard from the League of Conservation Voters, Naral Pro-Choice America and the National Education Association. But in South Florida, a place Mr. Menendez has visited dozens of times over the last two decades, Cuban-Americans and others hail him as a freedom fighter for his fervent anti-Castro views, and revere him as an adopted son who has done well for himself.