Jesse Scheckner
Miami Commissioner Manolo Reyes dominated a severely underfunded and inexperienced political opponent Tuesday to win a third term representing District 4 on the Miami Commission.
With all 22 precincts reporting, Reyes had 86% of the vote. His challenger, technology executive Andres Vallina, held the balance.
Fewer than 3,750 registered Miami voters weighed in on the District 4 contest.
Reyes, an economist by trade and high school teacher by present practice, carried a gargantuan funding advantage into Election Day. He was also a far better-known commodity among voters in District 4, which covers Flagami and parts of the Coral Way, Silver Bluff, Shenandoah, and Auburndale neighborhoods.
Vallina, a partner and manager at technology company Telarus, raised less than $1,000 — all of it his — for his third run at elected office.
Vallina is active in his community. He served as Chair of the Miami Parks and Recreation Advisory Board and founded a nonprofit called Florida Wildlife Kids Conservation Foundation, which connects children with nature and introduces them to exotic animals.
But he was beyond a long shot to unseat the incumbent.
Reyes, who won his seat in 2017 and coasted into re-election unopposed two years later, took in more than $285,000 through his campaign account to keep his seat this cycle.
Much of it from South Florida-based real estate companies Century Homebuilders Group, MOA Offices, the TREO Group, and Florida East Coast Industries, the parent of Miami-headquartered inter-county rail service Brightline.
Reyes also enjoyed support from several fellow Miami-Dade politicians, including Sen. Ileana Garcia, Miami-Dade Commissioner Kevin Marino Cabrera, and former County Commissioner Juan Zapata, as well as ample support from local firefighters and police unions.
The election came at a tenuous time for Miami. Housing prices are at crisis levels. Flooding continues to be a significant issue and promises to worsen.
Three of the city’s six elected officials — Mayor Francis Suarez and Commissioners Joe Carollo and Alex Díaz de la Portilla, the latter of whom Gov. Ron DeSantis suspended from office in September — are under investigation for misusing their positions for personal benefit or vendetta.
While Reyes has fared better in evading negative attention than them, he hasn’t avoided it entirely.
In early 2021, then-Miami Police Chief Art Acevedo accused Carollo, Díaz de la Portilla, and Reyes of corruption and repeatedly trying to interfere with law enforcement affairs.
The three men, Acevedo wrote in a searing memo to Suarez and City Manager Art Noriega, publicly discussed confidential investigation information, defunded police positions he created to clean up the department, and threatened further budget cuts unless he rehired officers he’d fired for misconduct.
The City Commissioner fired Acevedo about a month later. Acevedo sued the city, Noriega, and the three Commissioners for violating his First Amendment right and Florida’s Whistleblower Act.
Like Carollo and Díaz de la Portilla, Reyes has denied any wrongdoing. In an interview with the Miami Herald last month, he described himself as “incorruptible.
