Three Challenges Francis Suarez Will Face Running For President – By Kaleigh Rogers (FiveThirtyEight) / June 16, 2023
Francis Suarez, the 45-year-old Republican mayor of Miami and poli-nepo-baby,1 announced Thursday he’s running for president. Jumping into the already-crowded and growing GOP primary pool, Suarez will need to find a way to stand out and break through with voters. Suarez is kicking off his campaign with a six-figure digital ad buy in Iowa, New Hampshire and, notably, Nevada, an early state with a significant Latino population. This is a signal that the first-generation Cuban-American hopes being the only Latino major candidate in the race will be part of what makes him stand out from the crowd.
But finding a message that differentiates Suarez from nine other Republican candidates isn’t his only challenge. As a mayor of a mid-sized city, a Republican who has refused to worship at the altar of former President Donald Trump, and a bit of a crypto-bro, Suarez has his work cut out for him in this campaign.
Challenge No. 1: Mayors struggle to gain national recognition
Within the city of Miami, Suarez is well known and seemingly well liked. After serving as a city commissioner, Suarez was elected in 2017 with 86 percent of the vote and reelected in 2021 with 79 percent of the vote. In a 2020 poll, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Suarez had a 68 percent approval rating.
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