Politics
‘America First, Florida always’: David Borrero launches bid to succeed Bryan Ávila in SD 39
Rep. David Borrero is giving up a safe seat he’s held for years for a shot at a bigger one.
The Hialeah lawmaker just announced he’s running for Senate District 39, the northwest Miami-Dade seat fellow Republican Bryan Ávila left this month after Byron Donalds named him his gubernatorial running mate.
“I’m proud to announce my candidacy for the Florida Senate,” Borrero said in a statement Monday.
“I stood with President Trump when it cost me something — one of the First Five in Florida, under intense pressure to walk away, and I never wavered. District 39 deserves a Senator with that same backbone: America First, Florida always, no matter who’s pushing back.”
It’s a strategically sound move. Much of SD 39 overlaps with Borrero’s House District 111, where he was re-elected by such a landslide in 2024 — 35 points — that no one challenged him this cycle.
But it also carries risk. Borrero coasted into re-election unopposed in June and could have served there through 2028, when Ávila’s term was to end and when the Senate seat will again be up for grabs, before jumping chambers.
There’s also a catch: No one knows when a Special Election for the vacant SD 39 seat will be. Gov. Ron DeSantis has not called one yet, offering only a “stay tuned” through a spokesperson.
Adding the contest to the Nov. 3 General Election ballot is unlikely. State law lets the Governor fold a Senate Special Election into the regular Primary and General when no Session is scheduled beforehand — the route DeSantis used this year in Senate District 21 — and the condition technically applies here.
But the Aug. 18 Primary has come and gone, and Miami-Dade must transmit military and overseas ballots for the General by Sept. 19.
Whether DeSantis calls for a Special Election before the 2027 Legislative Session commences on March 2 remains to be seen. He didn’t have a problem leaving nearby House District 113 vacant throughout the 2026 Session.
As his statement suggests, Borrero is leaning on his support for President Donald Trump. His campaign noted he was one of the first five Florida legislators to endorse Trump’s 2024 comeback bid, when much of the Legislature was lining up behind DeSantis.
He says allies of a rival presidential campaign, including state officials, pressed him repeatedly to switch and warned that standing with Trump “would not go well for him.” He didn’t budge, later serving as a campaign surrogate and delegate to the Republican National Convention.
A construction lawyer and former Sweetwater Commissioner, Borrero has spent six years in the House building a record on land use legislation and ideological bills.
That includes a major measure he passed this year imposing sweeping land-use preemptions on localities by requiring counties and cities to tie development fees to actual review costs, adopt objective compatibility standards and justify denials in writing.
Senators stripped the law of its most contentious pieces — a study of eliminating Miami-Dade’s Urban Development Boundary and a change lowering the vote threshold for comprehensive plan amendments — but kept a carve-out letting large destination resorts, including the Fontainebleau in Miami Beach, bypass local review.
He also carried the House companion to a measure DeSantis signed in May forcing South Florida governments to allow housing on contaminated land known commonly as brownfields.
He and Ávila have frequently collaborated on legislation. Borrero carried the House version of a 2023 law Ávila co-introduced to bar China and six other “countries of concern” from buying land near military bases and critical infrastructure.
In 2025, Borrero carried the House twin to Ávila’s bill blocking new waste-to-energy plants within half a mile of residential areas, schools and businesses after the Doral incinerator fire. The legislation ultimately died.
Other efforts haven’t fared as well. A repeat bill Borrero filed to ban flags representing political, racial or gender viewpoints from government buildings has died five straight years, and went unheard in the 2026 Session.
In 2024, Borrero proposed banning nearly all abortions, allowing exceptions only to save a woman’s life and making the procedure a third-degree felony for providers. The bill, which had no Senate companion, never got a hearing after then-Senate President Kathleen Passidomo and then-Speaker Paul Renner publicly waved it off.
SD 39 covers all or parts of Doral, Hialeah, Hialeah Gardens, Medley, Miami Lakes, Miami Springs, Sweetwater and Virginia Gardens.
Republicans account for 44.6% of the district’s 234,368 voters, compared with 21.5% Democrats. Trump carried the district by 38 points in 2024.
Ávila, whose term ran through 2028, never faced a close race.
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