“I respect Ted Cruz a lot,” said Lincoln Diaz-Balart, a former congressman from Miami who is supporting Mr. Rubio. Mr. Diaz-Balart added that there was “absolute unity behind Marco in the Cuban-American community.”

Still, on Wednesday, Mr. Cruz insisted that he could “win in any state in the union.”

Since last week, when Mr. Cruz’s campaign said it had opened 10 offices in Florida, his advisers have argued that Mr. Rubio’s stumbles could provide an opening there.

At the least, the stop in Florida allowed Mr. Cruz to re-establish a presence in what will be a critical state in the general election. Though Mr. Rubio retains an edge among Cuban-Americans, Mr. Cruz is already well known to many locals, in part because of his father’s experience.

“I don’t know if voters in Kansas or Oregon know Ted Cruz is of Cuban descent, but I bet you a guava pastelito that most Cuban-American voters in South Florida know,” said Ana Navarro, a Republican strategist and CNN commentator who supported Jeb Bush.

She recalled going to a Cuban restaurant with Mr. Cruz during one visit. “I don’t know how fluent he is in Spanish,” she said, “but he can order ‘picadillo.’ ”

Among a diverse crowd of 200 or so on Wednesday, there was at least some reason to believe in a late Cruz surge. Several people defended his valiant if inelegant use of Spanish at a recent debate, after Mr. Rubio accused him of not knowing the language.

“Remember, he was raised in Texas,” said Cristina Brito, 61, whose parents also left Cuba. “It was like an American speaking Spanish.”