The Nation - News from Nov. 12, 1987

Miami Mayor Xavier Suarez declared a new era in Miami politics after he won reelection with support from all three of the city’s largest ethnic groups and saw a City Commission foe lose his seat in the runoff. Suarez, Miami’s first Cuban-born mayor, won his second two-year term by a vote of 29,826, or 62%, to 18,173, or 38%, for former six-term Mayor Maurice Ferre, a native of Puerto Rico. The 38-year-old mayor called his wide margins among blacks, Latinos and non-Latino whites “the completion of a dream.” “Miami’s ethnic groups voted together,” he told cheering supporters. “Special-interest politics are not going to hold sway in Miami.” Of the loss by Commissioner Joe Carollo, a fervent anti-communist and frequent Suarez opponent, who was defeated by a wide margin by attorney Victor de Yurre, Suarez said he “cannot blame this on the communists.”