Race in Miami-Dade District 7 heats up ahead of Election Day

In 2020, former Pinecrest Mayor Cindy Lerner lost by 1,301 votes to school board member and lawyer Raquel Regalado for the then-open District 7 seat on the Miami-Dade County Commission.

Four years later, in the Aug. 20 primary, Lerner and Regalado emerged as the top two candidates out of three advancing to the Nov. 5 runoff.

As Election Day approached, both Lerner and Regalado used the incumbent’s record to persuade voters to reject the other candidate, a tactic fueled by smears and personal attacks.

“The first thing we need to do is build relationships throughout the county,” Lerner told Caplin News. “The current commissioner has ignored most of the county, especially unincorporated Miami-Dade. I don’t even know where she is.

Lerner, 72, is a former member of the Florida House of Representatives whose platform is based on climate change reform, reducing government corruption and overdevelopment, and expanding transit options.

As mayor of Pinecrest, she developed a climate action plan to reduce carbon emissions and introduced free local transit. While in office, she also chaired the National League of Cities Committee on Energy, Environment and Natural Resources.

Regalado, 50, is currently a District 7 commissioner. She received 49% of the vote in the primary. Caplin News reached out to her for an interview but did not hear back.

READ MORE: Don’t know who to vote for? Here’s our guide to voter guides for the 2024 general election.

The daughter of former Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado, Raquel Regalado’s campaign boasts accomplishments in office that include advocating for children and adults with disabilities, improving water quality in Biscayne Bay, creating affordable housing options in unincorporated Miami-Dade and more. .

“We’ve done so much and there’s still so much more to do,” Regalado said on an episode of the Key Biscayne Independent podcast. “No (municipality) that will not support me in this re-election, and that is an amazing testimony, especially in Key Biscayne.”

However, Lerner’s campaign has attempted to portray Regalado as pro-development, anti-environment and catering to special interest donors who have boosted her fundraising efforts to more than $2 million. According to the Miami Herald, Regalado’s monetary advantage was due in part to donations from developers who wanted favorable votes from the commission.

“It’s really obscene. I don’t know what else to call it, but it’s an obscene amount of donations,” Lerner commented. “70% comes from developers, lobbyists, land use lawyers and real estate companies. The influence they had on her and her voices is very clear.”

Regalado continues to brush off these claims, calling Lerner a politician with a reputation for being rude to voters. She also called Lerner “corrupt,” alleging that she allowed her cousin to use Pinecrest’s facilities for an event without paying rent, keeping a portion of the proceeds for herself.

But the turning point came when an attack ad on Regalado sparked some controversy because it linked the incumbent to a series of corruption charges related to officials, including Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, Miami Commissioner Joe Carollo and suspended Commissioner Alex Diaz de La Portilla. Regalado denied the accusations and called Lerner’s ad anti-Hispanic because it groups politicians of the same ethnicity.

“The message is: Cuban Americans are corrupt,” she told the Miami Herald. “Therefore, Raquel Regalado is corrupt.”

Lerner refuted these claims, saying critics are playing an ethnicity card that doesn’t exist.

“These are unfounded allegations. These are false claims,” Lerner said. “The reason these elected officials were mentioned is because each of them made the front pages of the Miami Herald and made decisions that significantly impacted much of the Seventh District.”

“She is cooperating with people who are being investigated,” she continued. “It’s disturbing.”

There have been no public polls taken in the District 7 Commissioner race.

The Miami Herald editorial board sided with Regalado over Lerner, writing that Regalado has “an extensive list of accomplishments in his first term.”

District 7 covers the southern part of the city of Miami, parts of Coral Gables and Kendall, as well as Key Biscayne, Pinecrest and South Miami. According to a demographic analysis of Miami-Dade County, District 7 is home to more than 77,000 Hispanic voters, of whom more than 31,000 are registered Republicans.

Adriana Garcia, 43, is a Republican and schoolteacher who previously voted for Regalado at the Coral Gables library.

“I voted for her in 2020 and this election because she is more in line with my political views,” Garcia said.

Jorge Casas, a 44-year-old Democrat, is a construction project manager and voted early for Lerner in both this election and in 2020.

“Raquel Regalado is a nepo child. I don’t agree with her policies,” Casas said. “I think she’s just trying to protect herself all the time. A good candidate doesn’t have to sit and defend himself. Their actions will tell people what they do and don’t do.”

Alain Diaz Herrera, 36, is a Latinos for Trump campaigner at the Coral Gables library. A Republican voter and self-employed man, he also voted early for Regalado due to the effectiveness of her policies.

“One of the things I like about her is that (she) knows what works, and (her) idea is not to change what already works. I like that. I like that she respects that things are going well and she has no intention of making drastic changes.”

The story was originally published by Caplin News, a publication of FIU’s Lee Caplin School of Journalism and Media Studies, as part of an editorial content partnership with the WLRN newsroom.