Politics
Vicki Lopez seeks full Miami-Dade Commission term against Rob Piper, Joe Sanchez
Miami-Dade Commissioner Vicki Lopez is running for a full term in the District 5 seat she gained by appointment last November.
Two challengers hope to deny her.
Lopez, a former state Representative and Lee County Commissioner, faces Democrat Rob Piper and fellow Republican Joe Sanchez in the county’s Aug. 18 Primary. Because County Commission races are technically nonpartisan, all three appear on the same ballot.
A candidate must secure more than 50% of the vote to win outright; otherwise, the top two finishers will advance to a Nov. 3 runoff.
District 5 covers parts of Miami and Miami Beach, including Brickell, Downtown Miami, Little Havana, Miami River, Mid Beach, The Roads, Silver Bluff, Shenandoah, South Beach and West Flagler.
The seat opened when Democrat Eileen Higgins resigned in November for a successful run at the Miami mayoralty. Soon after, the County Commission’s remaining 12 members voted 7-5 to appoint Lopez over five applicants, including Sanchez, after Chair Anthony Rodriguez rejected Vice Chair Kionne McGhee’s motion to call a Special Election.
Lopez, 68, was serving her second term in House District 113 when she sought the appointment. She won that seat in 2022 by 2 points, flipping it red, and was re-elected with nearly 55% two years later.
She proved an especially effective lawmaker, passing, among many other measures, the Live Local Act, a rewrite of post-Surfside condo safety law and a pilot program extending home-hardening grants to condo owners — all while securing millions in local appropriations.
She also broke with her party, voting “no” on Florida’s six-week abortion ban and a proposal to roll back age restrictions on long rifle purchases.
This year, she has campaigned on affordable and senior housing, cleaner waterways and small-business support. At County Hall, she has worked to change how affordable housing income limits are calculated, so Little Havana residents aren’t measured against those in Brickell.
Lopez has been among the Commission’s loudest critics of the November property tax amendment, telling a Miami Foundation forum it would cost the county nearly $1 billion over two years.
Her endorsement list runs deep and crosses the political aisle, with Democrats like Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, Miami Commissioner Christine King and former Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber — a fellow former state Representative — backing her alongside Republicans like Sheriff Rosie Cordero-Stutz and Miami Commissioner Miguel Gabela.
All six Miami Beach Commissioners support her election effort, as do organizations including the South Florida AFL-CIO, AFSCME Florida, two SEIU chapters, the South Florida Police Benevolent Association, two firefighter unions, Miami Realtors PAC and the Bay of Pigs Veterans Association.
She has raised roughly $1.4 million since her appointment, much of it from real estate interests, and has run six-figure bilingual ad buys. As of July 13, she had $658,000 remaining in her campaign account and political committee.
Her record carries baggage. Lopez resigned from the Lee County Commission in the 1990s and served 15 months in prison for honest services fraud before her sentence was commuted and the conviction set aside.
The Miami Herald editorial board withdrew its 2024 endorsement of her House re-election following reporting that her son took a job at a school bus camera vendor shortly after she co-sponsored a bill benefiting the industry.
Lopez denies wrongdoing. After her release, she worked as an advocate under former Gov. Jeb Bush specializing in criminal justice reform, including as Chair of the Governor’s Ex-Offender Task Force, while holding leadership roles with the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce.
Piper, 54, spent 23 years in the Marine Corps, including three combat tours in Iraq, retiring in 2016, the Miami Herald reported in its endorsement of him.
He earned a doctorate in international relations from Florida International University, led a 2020 recall effort against then-Miami Commissioner Joe Carollo and ran unsuccessfully for the Miami City Commission last year.
This year, Piper is running on a promise to create a revenue-generation task force to examine the county’s finances, prevent moving the Urban Development Boundary that protects vulnerable environments from development, and work to end the influence special interests have at County Hall.
He also wants to invest in climate resilience and flood protection, establish a progressive fee structure that charges the county’s wealthiest residents more, and lower housing costs while expanding affordable housing.
Piper called the Live Local Act, which preempts local governments to grant developers sweeping allowances in exchange for a per-project share of affordable units, a gift to developers that erased Miami’s zoning plan.
He also opposes Florida’s proposed property tax amendment, which would significantly hike the state’s homestead exemption cap.
But Piper is running at a significant funding disadvantage. Between when he entered the race in June and the end of July, he raised less than $3,000.
His campaign page lists endorsements from several local and county-level Democratic organizations. He also carries a nod from the Florida Coalition to Advance Racial Equity.
Sanchez, 61, served on the Miami Commission from 1998 to 2009, including as Chair, and spent decades with the Florida Highway Patrol, earning a Medal of Valor for his role in the 1996 ValuJet recovery operation.
He came to the U.S. from Cuba at age 5 on the Freedom Flights and grew up in Little Havana, according to his campaign website. He is also a U.S. Army Reserve veteran and today serves as Florida Highway Patrol’s Public Information Officer for South Florida.
In the 2024 cycle, he ran unsuccessfully for Miami-Dade Sheriff, placing second in an 11-candidate Republican Primary. He was among five applicants passed over for the appointment Lopez received.
Sanchez is running on a platform prioritizing public safety, boosting government transparency, tamping down government waste, ending no-bid county contracts, and protecting local waterways and the Urban Development Boundary.
He supports eliminating property taxes for seniors in homesteaded homes — one of numerous proposals House lawmakers considered this year — and raising the homestead exemption to $500,000.
He also backs the November property tax amendment, telling the Herald that residents on fixed incomes deserve relief, but abhors the Live Local Act, which he said was written by developers tired of dealing with the public and local government barriers.
Since Lopez’s appointment, Sanchez has raised close to $197,000 through his campaign account and county-level political committee.
In the run-up to Election Day, Sanchez has complained about incumbency advantages. The Herald reported in May that a county-funded Related Group housing complex canceled his campaign event weeks after it hosted Lopez at an official ribbon-cutting, and that a Miami Beach policy adopted in March bars candidates — but not sitting officials — from city senior events Lopez attended.
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