Miami, Miami Beach voters elect new mayors

Nation Goes To The Polls In Contentious Presidential Election Between Hillary Clinton And Donald Trump

In what came as little surprise on a busy election night in Miami-Dade County, voters overwhelmingly picked two new mayors.

In Miami Beach, with 21 of 24 precincts reporting, Dan Gelber got 82 percent of the 10,726 votes.

Gelber, a 56-year-old criminal defense attorney who served in the Legislature from 2000-10, will replace Mayor Philip Levine. He also was House Democratic Leader in 2006-08.

Levine decided not to run for re-election, and instead announced last week a bid for the governor’s mansion.

Levine praised the way Gelber ran his campaign, adding his office is ready to have a “smooth transition from one administration to the next.”

“I’m honored that my hometown has trusted me with this office,” Gelber said in a statement. “I intend to work every day to earn that trust and keep our city a special place.”

As the polls closed Tuesday, results rolled in for the Miami mayoral race – and Francis Suarez was the winner.

Suarez, the son of former Miami Mayor Xavier Suarez, got 85 percent of the 23,451 votes, with 93 of 127 precincts reporting.

Ana Ceballos

Ana covers politics and policy Before joining the News Service of Florida she wrote for the Naples Daily News and was the legislative relief reporter for The Associated Press and covered policy issues impacting immigration, the environment, criminal justice and social welfare in Florida. She holds a B.A. in journalism from San Diego State University. After graduating in 2014, she worked as a criminal justice reporter for the Monterey Herald and the Monterey County Weekly. She has also freelanced for The Washington Post at the U.S.-Mexico border covering crime in the border city of Tijuana, where she grew up. Ana is fluent in Spanish and has intermediate proficiency in Portuguese.



#FlaPol

Florida Politics is a statewide, new media platform covering campaigns, elections, government, policy, and lobbying in Florida. This platform and all of its content are owned by Extensive Enterprises Media.

Publisher: Peter Schorsch @PeterSchorschFL

Contributors & reporters: Phil Ammann, Drew Dixon, Roseanne Dunkelberger, A.G. Gancarski, William March, Ryan Nicol, Jacob Ogles, Cole Pepper, Jesse Scheckner, Drew Wilson, and Mike Wright.

Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @PeterSchorschFL
Phone: (727) 642-3162
Address: 204 37th Avenue North #182
St. Petersburg, Florida 33704