This time, Miami didn’t mess up its moment in the spotlight | Opinion
This week, Miami was the subject of worldwide curiosity as to how it would respond to a question that’s been circulating in the realm of pop culture since 1950: “Are you ready for your closeup?”
Media attention peaked Tuesday afternoon when former President Trump showed up at Miami’s Wilkie D. Ferguson Jr. U.S. Courthouse to respond to a 37-count felony indictment for mishandling classified documents.
Trump had urged his supporters to show up and protest this unprecedented indictment of a former president. Given what had happened at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, law-enforcement agencies in Miami knew that they had to be ready for the unexpected.
So, in a commendably coordinated effort, Miami police and the feds prepared for the possibility of having to deal with an outbreak of violence while simultaneously safeguarding the First Amendment rights of protesters and counter-protesters. The plan paid off. There was little trouble reported.
Indeed, Miami looked good. Several national media observers described “a carnival atmosphere.” NPR reported that a resourceful vendor was selling mango slices while some of the neighborhood’s free-range chickens wandered around.
Just before Trump arrived at the courthouse, he used his social media platform to declare that this date will be remembered as “one of the saddest days in our country’s history.”
So, in Trump’s mind, the degree of national sadness over his brief court appearance is evidently on a par with that of Gettysburg, Pearl Harbor and 9/11 — or even the assassinations of Presidents Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy.
Trump’s claims that he’s being targeted and “politically persecuted” might not seem as credible to his avid supporters were it not for the Justice Department’s apparent indifference and/or nonchalance when it comes to pursuing allegations of serious misconduct previously leveled against Democrats such as Hillary Clinton, Hunter Biden and certain other members of the Biden family.
As for Miami’s appearance in the national spotlight, residents of the city and the surrounding region need to get used to it, and nowhere is Miami’s ascent into national prominence more evident than in the world of sports.
That was underscored by the global buzz when David Beckham’s Inter Miami futbol franchise announced that Lionel Messi, one of the sport’s biggest stars, would be joining the team. A similar buzz occurred when the national sports media became fascinated by the Miami Heat’s improbable run in the NBA playoffs and the Florida Panthers similar advance in the NHL.
Though both teams lost their respective championships, their entry into the finals is a reminder that the Miami metro area is one of only a handful that have franchises in all five professional sports leagues — MLB, NBA, NHL, NFL, and MLS — plus major college sports and important events on the golf, tennis and NASCAR circuits. Not even New York has all of those.
Much of this sports recognition is a byproduct of the region’s phenomenal population growth. At the midpoint of the 20th century, the Miami metro area’s population totaled only 579,017 and ranked 26th among the nation’s metro areas. Even when Major League Baseball finally arrived in 1993, the media mavens viewed the Marlins as “a small market team.”
In stark contrast, in the U.S. Census Bureau’s estimate for 2022, the Miami metro area ranks ninth, with a population of 6,139,340. Much of the growth is the result of an influx of a diverse group of migrants and refugees who have gravitated to this selectively welcoming gateway to the Americas.
Moreover, recent trends suggest that if the region solves a housing shortage that has slowed its growth, it soon could rank seventh by overtaking Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., two of the many metro areas that have been losing population.
Because of the sports world’s high visibility, Miami’s successes in that realm may have been more widely noticed around the country, but there have been noteworthy gains in areas less visible to the public. They include tech, trade, finance and, especially, higher education, given Florida International University’s impressive growth and the University of Miami’s recent invitation to join the prestigious Association of American Universities.
Granted, like every other large urban area worldwide, metro Miami has its share of problems. One of them is governance. Between them, Miami-Dade and Broward counties encompass more than 60 municipalities.
Some of the region’s more livable cities are widely admired, but many others are parochial little fiefdoms where corrupt local officials, unfortunately, receive little media scrutiny nowadays and, thus, are rarely held accountable for their misdeeds.
If the region is to continue growing and reach its full potential, its endemic and widespread problems with poor governance need to be addressed, lest the state government intervene again with additional strictures on home rule.
Therefore, even as the residents of Southeast Florida enjoy the recognition that comes with the area’s frequent appearances in the national spotlight, the region’s public officials should take care to remember that there’s still much that can be done to ensure that Miami remains ready for its closeup.
