Carlos Lopez-Cantera (born December 29, 1973) is an American politician who served as the 19th

lieutenant governor of Florida The lieutenant governor of Florida is a statewide elected office in the government of the U.S. state of Florida. According to the Florida Constitution, the lieutenant governor is elected to a four-year term congruent with that of the governor of ...

from 2014 to 2019. A member of the Republican Party, Lopez-Cantera represented the 113th district in the

Florida House of Representatives The Florida House of Representatives is the lower house of the Florida Legislature, the state legislature of the U.S. state of Florida, the Florida Senate being the upper house. Article III, Section 1 of the Constitution of Florida, adopte ...

from 2004 to 2012; he served as Majority Leader during the final two years of his term. Lopez-Cantera was elected property appraiser of

Miami-Dade County Miami-Dade County is a county located in the southeastern part of the U.S. state of Florida. The county had a population of 2,701,767 as of the 2020 census, making it the most populous county in Florida and the seventh-most populous county in ...

on August 14, 2012. On January 14, 2014, Gov. Rick Scott appointed Lopez-Cantera to the post of Lieutenant Governor of Florida. He served out the remainder of the unexpired term of

Jennifer Carroll Jennifer Sandra Carroll (née Johnson, August 27, 1959) is a Trinidadian–American Republican politician and retired naval officer who served as the 18th lieutenant governor of Florida from January 4, 2011 to March 12, 2013. Carroll is the fir ...

and was elected to a full term in November 2014.

Early life and education

Lopez-Cantera was born in

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), an ...

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = '' Plus ultra'' ( Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , ...

, the son of Cuban Carlos Lopez-Cantera and Esther "Shelly" Smith Fano. His father is

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is am ...

and his mother is

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

. He was born two months prematurely and returned with his parents to reside in Miami, Florida, once he was healthy enough to travel. He earned an

Associate of Arts An associate degree is an undergraduate degree awarded after a course of post-secondary study lasting two to three years. It is a level of qualification above a high school diploma, GED, or matriculation, and below a bachelor's degree. The f ...

degree from Miami-Dade Community College in 1994 and a

Bachelor of Business Administration Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) is a bachelor's degree in business administration awarded by colleges and universities after completion of undergraduate study in the fundamentals of business administration and usually including advanc ...

with a minor in political science from the

University of Miami The University of Miami (UM, UMiami, Miami, U of M, and The U) is a private research university in Coral Gables, Florida. , the university enrolled 19,096 students in 12 colleges and schools across nearly 350 academic majors and programs, ...

in 1996.

Political career

Carlos Lopez-Cantera offering favorable remarks promoting the House budget

In 1997, Lopez-Cantera was a facilitator for the Florida Senate's criminal justice committee. In 2002, he made an unsuccessful bid for a seat in the Florida House of Representatives. Two years later, Lopez-Cantera won his first election to the Florida House of Representatives to the 113th District in November 2004, and was successively reelected in 2006, 2008 and in 2010 when he defeated US Navy veteran and rising democratic party star Alex Cruzet. He was House majority whip from 2008 to 2010 and the House Majority Leader from 2010 to 2012. Lopez-Cantera was twice elected by his colleagues from Miami-Dade County to be the chairman of the Miami-Dade Legislative Delegation from 2011-2012. On August 14, 2012, he became the second property appraiser to be elected by the citizens of Miami-Dade, a county with a population of more than 2.5 million people and almost 1,000,000 properties. Governor

Rick Scott Richard Lynn Scott ( Myers, born December 1, 1952) is an American politician serving as the junior United States senator from Florida since 2019. A member of the Republican Party, he was the 45th governor of Florida from 2011 to 2019. Scott ...

announced Lopez-Cantera's appointment as Lieutenant Governor of Florida on January 14, 2014. Lopez-Cantera was appointed to serve the remainder of the unexpired term of Lieutenant Gov.

, who had resigned the post on March 12, 2013. In November 2014, as Scott's running mate, Lopez-Cantera was elected to a full term as lieutenant governor. He served in that role until 2019. On July 15, 2015, Lopez-Cantera announced his 2016 candidacy for

United States Senate The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States. The composition and ...

to replace retiring Senator

Marco Rubio Marco Antonio Rubio (born May 28, 1971) is an American politician and lawyer serving as the senior United States senator from Florida, a seat he has held since 2011. A member of the Republican Party, he served as Speaker of the Florida House ...

, who was running for president of the United States. However, Lopez-Cantera withdrew from the race following Rubio's June 22, 2016 announcement that he would seek reelection to the Senate.

Personal life

Lopez-Cantara's mother is Jewish while his father is Catholic. Lopez-Cantara — whose wife (since 2005), Renee, is also Jewish, as are his two daughters — celebrated his bar mitzvah in 2016 at the

Western Wall The Western Wall ( he, הַכּוֹתֶל הַמַּעֲרָבִי, HaKotel HaMa'aravi, the western wall, often shortened to the Kotel or Kosel), known in the West as the Wailing Wall, and in Islam as the Buraq Wall (Arabic: حَائِط ...

Electoral history

References

External links

U.S. Senate campaign websiteFlorida House of Representatives ProfileProfile at Project Vote Smart
* , - , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Lopez-Cantera, Carlos 1973 births 21st-century American politicians American politicians of Spanish descent American politicians of Cuban descent Hispanic and Latino American state legislators in Florida Jewish American state legislators in Florida American people of Spanish-Jewish descent Lieutenant Governors of Florida Living people Republican Party members of the Florida House of Representatives Miami Dade College alumni People from Madrid Spanish emigrants to the United States Spanish Jews University of Miami Business School alumni 21st-century American Jews Latino conservatism in the United States