Miami-Dade public safety czar, Trump-backed Miami-Dade police vet to face off for sheriff
The heavily favored Democrat and the Republican backed by former president Donald J. Trump will meet in the November election to become Miami-Dade’s first sheriff in almost 60 years.
Democrat James Reyes, 47, and Republican Rosanna ‘Rosie’ Cordero-Stutz, 55, won their primary races Tuesday night with the help of key endorsements. Reyes came from Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, who was also easily reelected Tuesday. Cordero-Stutz’s came from Trump and several GOP South Florida congressmen.
Reyes won easily in a field of four, gathering more than 46 percent of the vote. His closest challenger, former Miami-Dade police officer Rickey Mitchell, had just over 20 percent.
Cordero-Stutz, who has been with Miami-Dade Police for nearly three decades, eked out a victory over former Miami commissioner and Florida Highway Patrol trooper Joe Sanchez. She rode the endorsements of Trump and U.S. GOP House Reps. Mario Diaz-Balart and Carlos Gimenez for victory in a crowded field of 11 candidates.
Reyes was expected to win. Cordero-Stutz was considered a slight underdog to Sanchez, 59, a seasoned political veteran. She took an early lead with mail-in ballots and early voting that only grew as the results were tallied Tuesday evening. She eventually defeated Sanchez by 2 percentage points, 24 percent to 22 percent.
It took a while for the crowd at Sergio’s Restaurant in Doral that gathered to cheer on Cordero-Stutz to finally breathe a sigh of relief.
The energy, slightly subdued at first at Cordero-Stutz’s urging, surged with each update from the elections department. As dozens of friends and family members munched on croquettes and empanadas, the mood brightened. When it became clear she would win the Republican nomination at about 9 p.m., Cordero-Stutz hugged Gimenez as chants of “Rosie, Rosie, Rosie” cascaded through the restaurant.
“Ultimately the office of the sheriff should respond to the needs of the people, and the people want us to address corruption,” Cordero-Stutz said of her plans for the new anti-public corruption unit. Gimenez said Cordero-Stutz’s experience won her the nomination, drawing a distinction between her Democratic opponent.
She said the race was a “humbling experience” and said Trump’s endorsement could have been the difference.
“He brought attention to a race that is extremely important because Miami-Dade County matters,” she told the crowd, whom she joined as they posed with a Trump 2024 banner that read “Take America Back.”
Gimenez said Cordero-Stutz would likely struggle in the general election in November, but predicted her experience as a cop would make the difference.
“She’s the most qualified by far,” Gimenez said. “Here, it looks like James Reyes is going to win on the Democrat side. James Reyes has never been a cop. He’s a corrections officer; so, you know, he’s never arrested anybody.”
At Little Havana’s Ball & Chain, where Reyes supporters gathered alongside the mayor’s, Reyes highlighted his experience as a high-ranking administrator at the Broward County Sheriff’s Office and his work with the Miami-Dade Police Department as giving him the resume needed to earn voters’ confidence this fall.
“The things that helped me win today are going to help me win in November,” he said. “Experience being the Number One thing.”
Reyes grew up in Miami but worked in Broward for most of his career. Reyes and his wife have three school-age children, and he said the family plans to move from Broward to Miami-Dade after November.
Meanwhile, in the backroom of Casa Juancho in Little Havana, Sanchez’s supporters remained loud and exuberant throughout the night, even after he conceded. At one point after he left, they sang happy birthday to someone in the crowd.
Sanchez addressed the crowd just after 9:15 p.m., telling them he’d called Cordero-Stutz to congratulate her.
“It was not an easy campaign for us,” said Sanchez. “But the people have spoken.”
Despite two weeks of early and mail-in voting and relatively decent weather on Tuesday — though there were pockets of heavy rain — the turnout for the sheriff’s primary election was extremely low. Less than 10 percent of the county’s 1.46 million registered voters cast ballots for Miami-Dade sheriff in one of the most anticipated races in the county, according to records from the county’s supervisor of elections.
Tuesday was relatively calm. Most voting sites were quiet. The lone exception was a complaint from the Cordero-Stutz camp about texts that were floating around that insinuated Trump endorsed or picked her Republican challenger Joe Martinez to win the primary. Nothing on the texts suggested Martinez or his camp had anything to do with it. And Martinez said he had “no clue” where they came from after being sent copies the texts.
Choosing a favorite for the November general election won’t be easy. Reyes has the bigger war chest and the backing of the Miami-Dade administration in a town that still leans Democratic. But Cordero-Stutz will continue to be bolstered by Trump and a seasoned group of Washington politicians.
Questions over how sheriff’s office will be run
Whoever wins in November will have the tall task of overseeing a fledgling independent government agency with a billion-dollar budget and almost 5,000 sworn and civil employees. And by November, those numbers could grow considerably. That’s because Miami-Dade commissioners will likely have decided by then whether the new sheriff will also run the Department of Corrections and control its $500 million budget and 3,000 employees.
And though a sheriff’s race was all but guaranteed six years ago after a statewide referendum determined Miami-Dade’s main law enforcement agency should be in line with the 66 other counties in the state that have elected sheriffs, there’s still a considerable amount of work to be done and many unanswered questions.
Miami-Dade hasn’t had a sheriff’s office since 1966. That’s when a grand jury indicted then-Sheriff T.A. Buchanan for perjury and failure to report campaign contributions during a major public corruption scandal. Since then — in a move that was widely seen as separating police from politics — the county’s police director has either been appointed by the manager or more recently, the mayor.
Last summer, there was a clear front-runner to become Miami-Dade Sheriff. But that changed quickly when then-Police Director Alfredo “Freddy” Ramirez shot himself on the side of a highway outside of Tampa during a police convention last year. He survived, but dropped out of the race.
READ MORE: Miami-Dade police chief shot himself in the head after fight with wife at Tampa hotel
Now the contest comes down to Reyes and Cordero-Stutz.
Levine Cava hired Reyes in 2022 to turn around Miami-Dade’s troubled Department of Corrections agency, which had been cited by the U.S. Department of Justice for mental health and safety issues. A year later — after Ramirez exited the race — Levine Cava appointed him as the head of Public Safety, overseeing not only corrections, but police and fire.
He joined Miami-Dade after more than two decades with the Broward Sheriff’s Office, where he served briefly on street patrol, before taking administrative leadership posts, eventually working his way up to Colonel in charge of corrections.
In his short time in Miami-Dade, Reyes has become a firm backer of Operation Community Shield, which claims to have cleared the streets of 3,000 weapons. He also helped create a co-responder model of policing in Miami-Dade, with the goal of de-escalating tensions between law enforcement and the mentally unstable.
Cordero-Stutz has been with Miami-Dade Police for almost three decades. She’s worked her way from street cop, to detective, to major in the highest levels of the agency. She oversaw communications.
Along with the support of Trump, Diaz-Balart and Gimenez, she’s also secured support from 27 sheriffs in the state and was recently sworn in as president of the Florida chapter of the FBI National Academy.
Cordero-Stutz, who lives in Broward County, said she’s looking for a home in Miami-Dade. She says her strength is executive leadership.
This story was originally published August 20, 2024 at 11:00 PM.
