Miami Mayor, known for clashes with DeSantis, joins GOP Presidential race.

Francis Suarez backed strict mask mandates, declined to enforce immigration laws

Miami mayor Francis Suarez, who for years battled Florida Republican governor Ron DeSantis over COVID mandates and illegal immigration enforcement, is joining the Republican primary, he announced Thursday.

Suarez launched his campaign during an interview with ABC host and longtime Clinton ally George Stephanopoulos, arguing that he represents “generational change.” Suarez’s entry into the race could lead to an escalation in his long-running feud with DeSantis, whom Suarez has criticized for opposing COVID restrictions and passing laws that clamp down on illegal immigration.

In January 2021, Suarez expressed frustration that DeSantis would not allow him to pass a mask mandate in Miami, calling the policy “commonsense” and “backed by science.” Suarez boasted one year earlier that Miami was the “last city in the entire state of Florida to open” and that he would fine residents who failed to wear a mask in public. Suarez in May also said he would not direct his police department to enforce a DeSantis law that made it a felony to willingly transport an illegal immigrant. “We don’t usually get involved in the federal immigration system,” Suarez added.

Suarez continued to criticize DeSantis during the buildup to his presidential campaign launch, saying in May that the governor “seems to struggle with relationships” before blasting DeSantis’s “personal vendetta” against Disney.

Suarez has longstanding opposition to DeSantis. In 2018, he openly opted to vote for DeSantis’s gubernatorial opponent, Democrat Andrew Gillum, who would later face federal corruption charges following a high-profile drug overdose incident in which he was found unconscious with two men in a meth-filled hotel room. Suarez also voted for failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016. DeSantis cruised to reelection by nearly 20 points last November and is the only GOP presidential hopeful besides former president Donald Trump to consistently poll in the double digits.

In addition to his interview with Stephanopoulos, Suarez released a campaign video Thursday morning, which showed him literally running down Miami’s streets and playing soccer with children.

“I’m going to run for president. I’m going to run for your children and mine,” Suarez says in the video. “It’s time to take things into our own hands. It’s time to get things started.”

Beyond his COVID and illegal immigration stances, Suarez has endorsed liberal police reforms. In 2020, he cosigned a U.S. Conference of Mayors report on “Police Reform and Racial Justice” that accused America of having a “militarized and aggressive policing model.” The report recommended that cities “assess” their police budgets, hire a “chief diversity officer,” and “minimize the use of provocative and unnecessarily aggressive tactics and equipment, such as riot gear and armored vehicles.” When DeSantis in 2021 signed a bill that increased penalties for rioters, meanwhile, Suarez argued the law was not “necessary.”

“The question is, what is the need for any sort of enhanced set of rules?” Suarez asked during a CNN appearance. “I just don’t understand what the need was to change the laws on the books that we use and that we use effectively.”

Suarez will now look to emerge from a crowded GOP primary field, which, in addition to Trump and DeSantis, includes former vice president Mike Pence, former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley, and South Carolina senator Tim Scott.