After a decisive reelection win as Miami-Dade County mayor, Daniella Levine Cava may soon be looking at a much harder race: Florida governor.
On Tuesday night, the first-term Democrat won another four years by a wide margin, turning back a slate of mostly Republican challengers in the officially nonpartisan race. Precinct data shows Levine Cava dominated Democratic strongholds and was competitive in parts of Miami-Dade that reliably vote Republican.
After months of quiet chatter about a potential Levine Cava statewide campaign, her camp is now pointing to her bipartisan support in Miami-Dade as a potential launch pad for a 2026 governor run in a state that hasn’t gone Democratic since the 1990s.
“When she travels all over the state, she is regarded as the top Democrat everybody is looking at. And last night’s results confirmed that,” Christian Ulvert, Levine Cava’s longtime political consultant, said at a news conference Wednesday morning after the mayor took questions in English and Spanish. “Democrats are talking about, ‘What’s our future?’ And the future rests not only with mayors, but women mayors.”