What Miami-Dade’s District 2 candidates say about prosperity and transparency

Miami-Dade County admin August 3, 2026 0 Comments

What Miami-Dade’s District 2 candidates say about prosperity and transparency

To win a second term as a Miami-Dade County commissioner, incumbent Marleine Bastien promises to expand economic prosperity in a district that includes North Miami, North Miami Beach and parts of Miami. She’s facing a challenger promising to bring radical transparency to District 2, including by installing a live camera in his commission office.

Miguel “Skip” Quintero, 47, who runs a trapeze-artist school out of his home north of Miami, is campaigning with a promise to let voters watch him as much as possible. A second challenger, security guard Ernst Jean Louis, 66, is promising to represent the everyday citizen if he’s elected to the County Commission.

Bastien, 67, who was until recently head of a social services charity that helps immigrant populations, is running on her record of promoting affordable housing, economic development and securing county dollars for the district she represents.

“I have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in infrastructure, invested in improving the quality of life of the residents, and then, most importantly, investing in economic development and economic empowerment,” she said at a June 29 meeting with the Miami Herald Editorial Board. “I was able to do that because of 40 years on the ground working with people, the residents, and providing [social] services.”

In a statement to the Herald shortly after filing campaign papers, Jean Louis said he wants to be a commissioner who remembers the everyday resident.

“We must ensure that individuals with disabilities, seniors, veterans, and vulnerable populations are not left behind,” he said in the statement. “Inclusion should never be an afterthought. It should be a guiding principle in how we build our communities.”

No candidate can compete with the cash that Bastien brings to her reelection effort for another four years before term limits would require her exit in 2030. Jean Louis reported spending less than $1,000 on his campaign, compared to the $12,000 reported by Quintero and more than $300,000 by Bastien.

Between her campaign and political committee, Moving Forward Together, Bastien had more than $700,000 left to spend when the last reports went public.

While lobbyists, developers and county vendors routinely give to incumbent commissioners like Bastien, Quintero, who ran for county mayor in 2024, is hoping to build grassroots support by a pledge to be more connected to the public than any sitting politician. A big part of that plan is to invite the public to surveil him in office.

“I’m gonna put a live camera on 24/7 in the commissioner’s office, because people have the right to know what their employees are doing,” Quintero told the Herald board. “That gives real access to your commissioner. You know what’s going on. You can call in, you can email in, you can text in what you want to see and how you want to see this community develop.”

Quintero was the only candidate to participate in a July 30 candidate forum put on by the Miami Foundation, where he had the online event to himself. He promised to advocate for property-tax rebates and an expansion of District 2’s tree canopy and to fight the growing number of developments where builders want to fill in lakes. “That’s immediate — we’ve got to stop that,” he said.

District 2, which includes parts of Hialeah and Opa-locka, is home to the largest Haitian population in Miami-Dade, and Bastien is the only Haitian American member of the 13-seat County Commission. She’s also been the board’s leading critic of the Trump administration’s push to deport Haitians living legally in Miami through Temporary Protected Status visas that were recently revoked by the administration.

“This is not just about immigration. This is about people,” Bastien said in a county-produced video released July 22 after the Supreme Court backed the Trump administration’s revoking of TPS visas for Haitians and others. “They are our neighbors, our coworkers and our friends. They are an essential part of the fabric of this nation.”