Miami Mayor Suarez hosted a rare press conference, but not about ongoing city scandals

Miami Mayor Francis Suarez held a rare press conference outside of the Miami Police Department headquarters Wednesday morning amid swirling allegations of corruption, ethics violations and other scandals casting shadows over nearly every office in City Hall, including his own.

When he took to the lectern, however, he did not address the near-daily negative headlines coming out about the government he leads, but rather to give a speech touting statistics suggesting a drop in Miami’s violent crime rate.

Before the event began, the mayor’s communications director, Stephanie Severino, warned reporters against off-topic lines of inquiry. Suarez was then peppered with questions about federal investigations and his frequent travel to parts of the Middle East.

He gave brief, conflicting responses when asked about investigations into potential conflicts of interest between his public office and private work as an attorney, which have resulted in investigations and prompted calls for his resignation from two newly elected commissioners.

Suarez is facing at least four separate investigations — two ethics inquiries, an investigation by the state attorney’s office and a federal criminal investigation into whether the $170,000 in payments he received from local developer Rishi Kapoor constituted bribery.

When asked by a Herald reporter at the news conference whether he had been contacted by federal investigators about Kapoor or any other matter, Suarez initially said he had already answered the question. Then, pressed for details, Suarez said he had been in contact with the SEC but not the FBI regarding Kapoor, but then corrected himself, saying he had not been in contact with any federal investigators about any topics.

Suarez then stepped away from the microphone and approached the reporter, saying that he had been advised by his attorney not to answer those kinds of questions. Suarez would not name the attorney representing him.

In September, Suarez told the Herald, “I haven’t spoken with the SEC but they have communicated with me.” He did not provide any details about the nature of the inquiry.

Suarez also redirected questions about another major news story that broke late Tuesday — the garnishing of Commissioner Joe Carollo’s assets to enforce a $63 million jury judgment for using city resources to harass the owners of a nightclub. The mayor suggested reporters come to Thursday’s commission meeting to ask Carollo himself about the matter. The mayor’s office never got back to reporters with Suarez’s response to a recent investigation by WLRN revealing that City Manager Art Noriega’s wife’s company had received over $400,000 in city contracts during Noriega’s tenure.

As Suarez left the Wednesday event, he faced other questions related to his recent travel to Qatar, where a Herald investigation called “Shakedown City” revealed he made at least two trips since the beginning of 2021.

Although he did not volunteer any information about the purpose or financing behind the travel, in answer to a reporter’s question, Suarez said those trips were not paid for by soccer star David Beckham, who was pictured with Suarez attending the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar. When reporters asked whether his travel had been sponsored by the Qatari government, Suarez declined to comment, citing an ongoing state ethics investigation into the matter.

Suarez did not file a gift disclosure as would be required if his Qatar trip had been paid for by anyone other than himself, his immediate family, his private employer or the city. State ethics rules also prohibit Suarez from accepting gifts valued over $100, including free travel or tickets to sporting events from lobbyists.

Beckham, a registered lobbyist, had just finalized a major deal with the city to use public land to build a massive soccer stadium for the Major League Soccer team he part-owns, Inter Miami. Suarez worked hard behind the scenes to round up the votes for the deal.

On Wednesday, Suarez also denied that Jorge Mas, like Beckham an Inter Miami co-owner, had footed the bill for his Qatar trips.

The Qatari government has made its own Miami-related negative headlines lately, involving, among others, indicted Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey, whose latest criminal charges revolve, in part, around a relative receiving free Miami Formula 1 Grand Prix tickets from Qatar.

A second person in legal peril involving work for the Qatari government has direct ties to Suarez.

Barry Bennett, a prominent political strategist and an advisor to Suarez’s short-lived presidential campaign, was charged in December with two felonies for allegedly violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act and lying to the federal government about public relations and media work he did for the Qatari government.

Bennett’s work for Qatar predates his efforts on behalf of Suarez’s campaign. Facing prison time if convicted, Bennett signed a deferred prosecution deal, agreeing to pay a $100,000 fine and refrain from lobbying for any foreign government for 18 months, in exchange for charges being dropped.

Legal experts have separately raised questions about whether Suarez might have been working as an unregistered foreign agent of Saudi Arabia when he used his mayoral office to bring a Saudi public relations initiative to Miami at the request of a representative of the Gulf nation’s sovereign wealth fund. The fund is a major client of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, the international litigation firm that hired Suarez to help drum up new business around the world.

A spokesperson for Quinn Emanuel previously told the Herald that the firm had sent Suarez to Saudi Arabia but not Qatar.