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An formally nonpartisan native contest that usually attracts little consideration throughout the nation, the Miami mayor’s race this yr is elevated to nationwide prominence as a key electoral take a look at of voter sentiment in Trump’s political yard
Democrat Eileen Higgins grew to become the primary member of her celebration in practically three a long time elected mayor of Miami on Tuesday, December 9, defeating a Republican backed by President Donald Trump in a Hispanic-majority metropolis within the coronary heart of his Florida stronghold.
CNN and the Related Press referred to as the election for Higgins lower than an hour after polls closed, as returns confirmed the previous Miami-Dade County commissioner main her Republican opponent, Emilio Gonzalez, by 18 share factors.
An formally nonpartisan native contest that usually attracts little consideration throughout the nation, the Miami mayor’s race this yr was elevated to nationwide prominence as a key electoral take a look at of voter sentiment in Trump’s political yard.
Higgins’ decisive win provides to the momentum Democrats gained in a flurry of election victories final month that dimmed Republican prospects for sustaining Trump’s monopoly over Congress within the 2026 midterm elections.
It additionally sharpens Republican considerations about whether or not Hispanic help that Trump peeled away from Democrats in 2024 has since faltered.
Higgins, 61, made no point out of the nationwide implications of her victory in an announcement posted to her Fb account, as a substitute casting it as an final result that “turned the web page on years of chaos and corruption” on the native degree.
Higgins is the primary Democrat to win Miami’s mayoral race since 1997, when Xavier Suarez, father of the outgoing Republican incumbent, Francis Suarez, was final elected.
She additionally turns into the primary girl ever and the primary non-Hispanic candidate because the Nineties to be elected mayor of Miami, a predominantly Hispanic metropolis of roughly 487,000 individuals that’s a part of Miami-Dade County.
Tuesday’s outcomes recommend Republican power has softened in Miami-Dade, the place the Miami Herald says many traditionally left-leaning Hispanic voters moved to Trump’s camp final yr – as they did nationally – serving to him amass 55% of the general county vote within the 2024 presidential race.
Within the first spherical of the Miami mayor’s race on November 4, Higgins garnered 36% of the vote in a crowded discipline of candidates, comfortably ending in first place however in need of the bulk wanted to win outright. Gonzalez was the No. 2 vote-getter with 18%.
That set the stage for Tuesday’s runoff. Neither Higgins nor Gonzalez, 68, a former metropolis supervisor and retired U.S. Military colonel, began out operating an overtly partisan marketing campaign.
However their showdown took on nationwide overtones within the aftermath of Democrats’ triumphs in a slew of off-year elections final month, together with the New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial races, New York Metropolis’s mayoral election and a redistricting referendum in California.
Then Trump weighed in on November 17 to publicly endorse Gonzalez on Reality Social, urging Miami voters: “GET OUT AND VOTE FOR EMILIO – HE WILL NEVER LET YOU DOWN!”
The Democratic Nationwide Committee countered by throwing its help behind Higgins, as did a number of outstanding Democrats, together with US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
Extrapolating nationwide and even statewide political traits from native races may be fraught, nevertheless. One other Democratic non-Hispanic girl, Daniella Levine Cava, has been mayor of Miami-Dade since 2020 and was re-elected final yr although Trump carried the county within the White Home race. – Rappler.com
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