The real estate industry rallied around frontrunner Eileen Higgins in the Miami mayoral runoff, and it paid off.
The ex-Miami-Dade County Commissioner defeated Emilio Gonzalez, a former city manager, by an 18-point margin on Tuesday. Higgins nabbed 59 percent of the vote compared to 41 percent for Gonzalez, who entered the runoff facing an uphill battle.
In the Nov. 4 city election, Higgins took first place in a crowded field of 13 candidates with 36 percent of the vote, while Gonzalez won nearly 20 percent. Because no candidate reached more than 50 percent of the vote, it triggered Tuesday’s runoff.
The contest between Higgins and Gonzalez took on a heavily partisan tone, even though Miami local elections are non-partisan.
Gonzalez received endorsements from just about every prominent Floridian Republican politician, including President Donald Trump, whose primary residence is at his Palm Beach private club Mar-a-Lago.
Meanwhile, the national and Florida Democratic parties invested heavily in advertising and mailers for Higgins, who also scored endorsements from famous Democrats like former transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg.
Higgins’ win makes her Miami’s first female mayor and the first Democrat elected to the position in more than two decades.
Higgins rakes in real estate donations
On the campaign trail, Higgins and Gonzalez both promised to fix the city’s permitting process, which small business owners and major developers have complained is cumbersome and causes delays for construction timelines.
Both candidates also touted plans to tackle housing affordability. Gonzalez backed eliminating property taxes on homesteaded properties, while Higgins promoted her record at Miami-Dade County approving projects with nearly 7,000 affordable and workforce housing units.
However, Higgins scored more support from bigwig real estate players than Gonzalez.
Higgins racked up nearly 10 times more campaign donations from real estate professionals, corporations and land use attorneys than Gonzalez, according to finance reports for their campaigns after the Nov. 4 elections.
Higgins also likely nabbed hundreds of thousands of dollars in real estate donations to her political action committee, Ethical Leadership for Miami, which doesn’t have to file its next financial report until January.
Last month, Miami-based land use law firm Bercow Radell Fernandez Larkin & Tapanes co-hosted a fundraiser for Higgins at Brightline Station in downtown Miami. Other heavy hitters on the invite included Jose Gonzalez, executive vice-president of Florida East Coast Industries, Brightline’s parent company; Nelson Stabile, principal of Integra Investments; Jonathan Raiffe, CEO of Adler Properties; and Sara Adler, principal of Adler Properties.
Attendees were asked to donate the maximum $1,000 allowed by state law to Higgins’ individual campaign, or “unlimited funds” to Ethical Leadership for Miami. Under state law, no limit exists on how much money PACs can receive from a single donor.
Finance reports for Higgins’ individual campaign show she received the maximum $1,000 each from 14 developers, real estate corporations and land use attorneys, including Berkowitz Development Group’s Jeff Berkowitz and his wife Yolanda, Swerdlow Group Chief Strategy Officer Michael Liu, Rilea Group and zoning lawyers Iris Escarra and Melissa Tapanes Llahues. In addition, three affiliates of Integra donated a combined $3,000 and six entities with the same address as Adler kicked in a combined $6,000.
Gonzalez received the $1,000 maximum from 11 real estate professionals and organizations, including Cervera Real Estate’s Alicia Cervera Lamadrid, Associated Builders & Contractors and land use attorney Anthony De Yurre.
Other commission race runoffs
The city of Miami also held a runoff for an open city commission seat that ended with a victory for real estate broker and Brickell restaurant Sexy Fish manager Rolando Escalona. His win ended the Carollo political dynasty in Miami.
With 53 percent of the vote, Escalona defeated Frank Carollo, brother of Joe Carollo, who gave up the city commission seat for an unsuccessful run for mayor in this year’s election. Joe Carollo was elected in 2017 when term limits forced Frank Carollo to relinquish the seat after he held it for eight years.
Among those who showed up at Escalona’s victory party to congratulate him was Bill Fuller, a Little Havana developer who, along with his business partner Martin Pinilla, won a $63 million judgment against Joe Carollo in 2023.
In Miami Beach, former city commission aide Monica Matteo-Salinas won an open city commission seat with 71 percent of the vote, defeating lawyer Monique Pardo Pope. The pair were vying for a position vacated by Kristen Rosen Gonzalez, who was narrowly defeated in the city’s mayor’s race by incumbent Steven Meiner.
Pardo Pope attacked her opponent’s tenure as chairperson of the Miami Beach Community Development Corporation, an affordable housing nonprofit which faced allegations of financial mismanagement and poor living conditions for low income residents in its multifamily buildings, according to the Miami Herald.
Pope faced criticism for failing to reveal to voters that her late father was a Nazi-sympathizing, serial killer executed in 2012 for murdering nine people. After Miami-based filmmaker and local activist Billy Corben disclosed her father’s notorious past and her social media posts idolizing him, Pope released a statement that “I too am a victim in this.”
