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EXCLUSIVE: Miami Republican mayoral candidate Emilio Gonzalez is accusing his progressive Democratic opponent Eileen Higgins of wanting to "create a city of renters," despite pushing a message of affordability. Instead, he is proposing a plan to turn Miami into a "city of owners."
Gonzalez and Higgins will face off in a runoff election on Dec. 9 after none of the candidates reached 50 percent of the vote on election night on Nov. 4.
Higgins won 35.96 percent of the vote, while Gonzalez took home 19.47 percent. Higgins, a Miami-Dade County commissioner who resigned her office to run for mayor, has emphasized "building an affordable and prosperous future." She has touted her successes as county commissioner in investing nearly $3 million in small business grants and investments in building nearly 7,000 affordable housing units.
However, in an interview with Fox News Digital, Gonzalez, who is an Army veteran, former West Point teacher and business leader, warned that while Higgins has emphasized affordability in her campaign, her policies would stunt the American dream and keep citizens in perpetual renter status.
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Gonzalez has been endorsed by President Donald Trump, Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis and Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla.
"She can point to some votes on a county commission to help put up a building here or a building there. But it really doesn't move the needle," Gonzalez told Fox News Digital. "The affordability issue, it sounds very nice, but it means absolutely nothing because she really hasn't done much when it comes to affordability."
"Right now, Miami is so expensive, nothing is affordable," he continued. "We're in a situation where our young people once they graduate from college, they have to leave because the jobs here don't pay enough. The apartments cost too much. Forget about a mortgage. There's nothing in Miami that sells for less than five, six hundred thousand dollars right now. And the jobs will not support that."
Meanwhile, he went after Higgins for talking up her belief in affordability while he said, "she wants to create a city of renters."
"I on the other hand want to create a city of owners, I want property owners," he said. "They want to talk about affordability, everybody does. They want to talk about the challenges of public transportation, everybody does. But it comes down to what is the solution, and that's where I think we differ."
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"We have vastly different views on how to move the city forward and what's best for our residents. She believes in a very statist approach where the government needs to go out and help people build, build, build, build, build, and never to own, but just to rent," he said. "And I'm about making sure that our residents have enough money in their pocket so that they can afford to buy a home and buy that first a condominium or buy that starter home."
"The last thing I'm going to do is allow Miami to fall into the same trap that you've seen … in New York or Chicago, which is bankrupt, or L.A., which is quite frankly, looks like a wasteland in the downtown area. That's not going to happen in Miami, it's not."
He praised DeSantis for advancing an agenda of eliminating property taxes in Florida, a policy he said he would implement if elected Miami mayor.
"I applaud Governor DeSantis wanting to do away with property taxes. We can do that. And we can do that and not skip a beat," he said. "Right now, property taxes make up less than seven percent of the city's budget. You know what? I think we can find seven percent in efficiencies to offset that."
"That's just the beginning," he went on, adding, "I think there are other opportunities that we have to put money in people's pockets through efficiencies, through leveraging our resources and making this place affordable again."
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Despite Higgins’ election night lead, Gonzalez said he is optimistic about his chances of success.
"This is a generational election," he said. "It’s not going to be an easy race. It'll be a tight race. It's probably going to be maybe a five-point race. But we're not letting up at all. We refuse to give up our future."
Pointing to other U.S. cities, such as New York City, and countries like Cuba, that have embraced socialist policies, Gonzalez said, "The residents of Miami, the vast majority of whom came from socialist countries where socialists took over and destroyed their cities and their homes and their families, they don't want that here."
"We see what's happened in other cities in the U.S. and … they do not want that here. And I am their candidate, and I'm going to make sure that that doesn't happen here, even though it's happened in other places in Latin America and in the United States."
Fox News Digital reached out to Higgins’ campaign for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
The winner of the runoff election will replace the current Republican Mayor Francis Suarez, who is term-limited.
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