Four more candidates for Miami Mayor have qualified for the contest, which broadened to a 14-person field — for now — with the entry of City Commissioner Joe Carollo.
Carollo hasn’t yet qualified, according to the city’s election webpage[1]. But two fellow Republicans — Alyssa Crocker, a business development specialist, and June Savage, a real estate agent and choreographer — were listed as qualified as of 4:30 p.m. Friday.
So were Democrat Michael Hepburn and no-party candidate Xavier Suarez, a former Miami Mayor, Miami-Dade County Commissioner and the father of current Mayor Francis Suarez.
They join five others[2] who have qualified ahead of the 6 p.m. Saturday deadline, including Miami-Dade Commissioner Eileen Higgins, former City Manager Emilio González, former City Commissioner Ken Russell, entrepreneur Christian Cevallos and Laura Anderson, an affiliate of the Socialist Workers Party[3].
Higgins and Russell are Democrats. González and Cevallos are Republican. Anderson has no party affiliation.
In a Thursday statement announcing he had qualified, Hepburn, a nonprofit executive, described himself as “the first Black Miamian to ever execute a bona fide viable campaign in our city to become the next Mayor of Miami.”
“I am going to continue canvassing our neighborhoods and making phone calls every day, until working-class people all across this city understand — it is time to change the future of Miami,” he said in a statement.
Suarez — who served as Miami’s first Cuban-born Mayor[4] from 1985-1993 and again from 1997-1998, when he both preceded and succeeded by Carollo — told NBC 6[5] he has more free time now than in either of those two prior stints, and more money to support himself independent of the pay he’d receive as the city’s most prominent elected official.
“I now have more experience,” he said, “and just as much energy as before, maybe in some cases more.”
For the District 3 seat on the City Commission, which Carollo currently holds, six candidates — Yvonne Bayona, Brenda Betancourt, Rolando Escalona, Rob Piper, Fayez Tanous and Denise Turros — have qualified.
Two others, Oscar Alejandro and former Commissioner Frank Carollo, the current Commissioner’s younger brother, have filed but still haven’t[6] qualified.
And in the District 5 race, incumbent Commissioner Christine King and two of three people challenging her, Marion Brown and Frederick Bryant, have qualified.
A fourth candidate, Nadia Deravine, filed to run with less than 48 hours before the qualifying period closes.
Miami’s election is Nov. 4. It’s technically nonpartisan.
If no candidate in a given race receives more than 50% of the vote, the top two vote-getters will compete in a runoff.
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References
- ^ election webpage (www.voterfocus.com)
- ^ five others (floridapolitics.com)
- ^ Socialist Workers Party (ballotpedia.org)
- ^ first Cuban-born Mayor (www.cbsnews.com)
- ^ NBC 6 (www.nbcmiami.com)
- ^ still haven’t (floridapolitics.com)