Is Miami commission candidate’s residency a ‘sham’? Trial set for next week
Two Miami City Commission hopefuls are locked in a legal battle as Election Day quickly approaches, with one candidate hoping to get the other knocked off the ballot over allegations that he doesn’t actually live inside the district he’s running to represent.
Next week, days before the Nov. 4 election, District 3 candidates Denise Galvez Turros and Rolando Escalona are slated to go to trial after Galvez Turros filed a lawsuit alleging that Escalona’s residency is a “sham” that is “fatal to his candidacy.” Both candidates are running to fill the seat being vacated by Commissioner Joe Carollo, who is term-limited; Carollo’s brother, Frank Carollo, is also campaigning for the District 3 seat.
At the crux of the case is a ballot referendum Miami voters passed last year requiring City Commission candidates to have continuously resided in the district in which they are seeking office for at least one year immediately preceding the date the candidate qualifies to run.
In a sworn affidavit filed with the city last month, Escalona said he’s lived in a rental unit between downtown and Little Havana, within the District 3 boundaries, since June 2024 — three months prior to the cutoff needed to qualify in this year’s election. Escalona said on the document that his spouse also resides at that address.
But Galvez Turros alleged in her lawsuit that various records “unequivocally demonstrate” that Escalona and his wife “established and affirmed their legal domicile” at a property in neighboring District 4, in the West Flagler area.
That includes a signed mortgage refinance agreement from February that says the couple was then residing at the District 4 address. In her complaint, Galvez Turros referred to the mortgage document as “the single most compelling piece of evidence establishing Mr. Escalona’s break in continuous residency.”
“Mr. Escalona cannot simultaneously swear to his bank that his primary residence is outside the district while swearing to the City Clerk that his continuous residence is within it,” Galvez Turros argued .
Escalona described the litigation as an “eleventh hour lawsuit incorrectly challenging my residency” that is “nothing more than a politically motivated distraction by longtime insiders who will do anything to hold onto power.”
“I want to be clear: I live where I say I live, I work hard for my community, and I’m running to bring accountability and integrity back to City Hall,” Escalona said in a statement Wednesday. “I am a resident of District 3 and am proud to call this community my home.”
Homestead exemption at issue
Galvez Turros further alleged that Escalona’s wife, Astrid Gonzalez Nieto, has “consistently declared” a homestead exemption on a property outside of the district. That property, where she is the only listed owner, is different from the address where the couple said they were living in February.
A document from the Miami-Dade Property Appraiser’s Office shows that Gonzalez Nieto filed to cancel the homestead exemption in January, saying she no longer lived at the property as of Jan. 20.
But the former homestead exemption still caught the attention of Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Beatrice Butchko Sanchez during a hearing in the residency case Wednesday morning.
“A husband and wife can only have one homestead exemption, and if you’re claiming a homestead exemption for one property, then that’s your — that’s the couple’s homestead,” Butchko Sanchez said. “Unless somebody’s willing to admit that that’s fraudulent and that they really live in the district.”
Escalona’s attorney, Juan-Carlos Planas, replied to the judge that, “If the property appraiser wants to go after Mrs. Escalona for homestead fraud, that’s a completely separate issue.”
Planas added that “there are plenty of spouses that live separate in order to establish residency politically,” saying that Escalona has leased and is living in the apartment in District 3 and has changed his driver’s license and voter registration accordingly.
Planas told the judge that Escalona himself “has no homestead exemption.”
“His wife does, and there’s a presumption that they are living together,” Butchko Sanchez responded. She added: “If you’re a married couple, you can’t claim a homestead and not be living there.”
“I don’t understand how you could be running for an elected position and at the same time have your spouse not following the law when it comes to homestead exemption,” the judge continued.
After Wednesday’s hearing, Galvez Turros’ attorney, Reid Levin, said in a statement that “Mr. Escalona can’t have it both ways.”
“To prove he lived continuously in District 3, he’ll have to disavow his own mortgage and homestead filings, raising serious questions that reach beyond this election,” Levin said. “Either way, he is unqualified for office.”
Planas disagreed, saying in a statement that he’s “confident this case will be swiftly dismissed.”
“The lawsuit against Mr. Escalona is baseless and part of a coordinated political strategy to disqualify a legitimate candidate who threatens the status quo and entrenched power structure in Miami politics,” Planas said. “Mr. Escalona fully complies with all residency and eligibility requirements under Florida law. Any suggestion otherwise is a deliberate distortion of facts designed to mislead voters and manipulate the media narrative during a critical election.”
Too late to change ballots
In her lawsuit, Galvez Turros asked that the judge declare that Escalona is disqualified and ineligible to run in the District 3 race.
She also asked the court to direct the city clerk and Miami-Dade elections supervisor to either “immediately remove Defendant Escalona’s name from the ballot” or to “notify the voting public of the candidate’s invalidity.”
Oren Rosenthal, an attorney representing the elections supervisor, said Wednesday that it’s too late to alter ballots at this point, with mail ballots having already gone out and early voting beginning this weekend.
“People have already voted,” Rosenthal said. “The ballots have already been printed.”
He said the “only relief” the Elections Department can offer would be to place signs at early voting sites and polling places, should the court issue a ruling that voters need to be informed of, in addition to suppressing the election results for a candidate that was later disqualified.
The parties agreed to meet again for a 90-minute trial on Oct. 29, less than a week before Election Day .
This story was originally published October 22, 2025 at 6:02 PM.
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