About
Mario Díaz-Balart (R-Fla.) has served in the U.S. House of Representatives since 2003, representing Florida’s 25th Congressional District in southwest Miami-Dade County and the Everglades.
As a lifelong conservative and Florida’s longest-serving congressman, Díaz-Balart ran for reelection in 2022 with Trump’s endorsement and won with more than 70 percent of the vote. In expressing his gratitude for Trump’s support, Díaz-Balart tweeted that he had been “privileged” to work with the ex-president on GOP priorities such as “cutting taxes, confronting China, fighting the socialist agenda, and protecting American freedoms to improve the quality of life for all.”
In January 2017 the Cuban-American congressman defended Trump’s Muslim ban by claiming that former President Obama had acted similarly against Cuban refugees during his final days in office. However, Politifact refuted this, pointing out that Obama only ended “special treatment” of Cubans who arrived in the U.S. without a visa but didn’t halt immigration from Cuba as Trump did for citizens of the Muslim-majority countries.
After the 2020 presidential election, Díaz-Balart helped spread the Big Lie, objected to certifying the Electoral College results, and voted against both impeaching Trump for inciting the insurrection and establishing a special House committee to investigate it, among other measures. In voting against the proposed voter protection legislation H.R. 1 (the For the People Act), he accused Democrats of using the “false pretense of ending ‘sweeping voter suppression’ to justify this unconstitutional government overreach.”
January 6, 2021
- Just hours after Trump supporters stormed the Capitol, Diaz-Balart joined 146 other congressional Republicans in refusing to certify Biden’s win of the 2020 presidential election.
- In voting against impeaching Trump for his role in inciting the insurrection, Diaz-Balart issued a statement saying: “Impeaching the President exactly one week before his term is complete is unnecessarily divisive and unwise.”
- He also voted against establishing a House committee to investigate the Jan. 6 attack.
The Big Lie
- On Dec. 10, 2020, Diaz-Balart signed an amicus brief in a lawsuit filed by the state of Texas urging the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the results of the presidential election in four swing states: Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
- In refusing to certify the 2020 Electoral College results, Diaz-Balart argued that, “Unfortunately, to this day, many Americans still do not trust the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.” Nowhere does he acknowledge that well before the election Trump and his allies actively fomented that mistrust.
- Diaz-Balart justified objecting to the Electoral College results by issuing a statement that read, in part: “In the lead-up to the 2020 presidential election, in several states, many state officials nonetheless changed the presidential election rules and regulations despite lacking the constitutional authority to do so.” The New York Times reports that GOP skeptics called this argument—which was carefully crafted by Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.)—a “Trojan horse.”