A Hialeah city employee who earns $48,000 a year spent more than three hours on a Wednesday handing out flyers and hoisting signs for interim Councilman Luis Gonzalez outside the John F. Kennedy Library. Camila Kaemmer works as a full-time field aide in the city's Division of Constituent Services, and she spent the stretch urging voters, in Spanish, to back Gonzalez in the special election. Whether she was on the clock at the time is the question nobody at City Hall has answered yet.
The account comes from the Miami Herald, which reported that Kaemmer carried Gonzalez campaign signs and distributed his flyers at the library. According to the paper, she was heard asking passersby, “Are you a Hialeah resident? Vote for Luis Gonzalez, number 143.” When the Herald asked why she was campaigning for him, she walked away.
The Division of Constituent Services is the office that helps residents navigate city government. City records show Kaemmer was hired on January 12, the same day Mayor Bryan Calvo was sworn in, and Calvo has endorsed Gonzalez's candidacy.
Records Requested, Not Yet Delivered
The Herald asked Hialeah for records showing whether Kaemmer took paid time off during the period she was seen campaigning, including leave dates and hours. The city had not provided them by the time the story was published. Without those records, it is not established whether she was on duty, on paid leave or off duty.
Campaign-finance records reviewed by the Herald showed no payments from Gonzalez's campaign to Kaemmer or anyone else for campaign work on his behalf. Gonzalez did not respond to questions about whether he paid her or whether she campaigned during city-paid hours. Calvo, his chief of staff, his spokesperson and constituent services director Jonathan Martinez also did not respond to requests for comment, the paper reported.
What Florida Law Says
Under Florida Statutes, Section 104.31, public employees’ services may not be used during working hours to further campaigns for elective office. The same statute does not prevent campaigning during an employee's off-duty hours, subject to its other restrictions. A person violating the section is guilty of a first-degree misdemeanor.
Nothing in the available records establishes that any law or ethics rule was broken here. The statute simply frames what hinges on those leave records.
A Race With Some History
Gonzalez is 56 and served 12 years on the Hialeah City Council before losing his seat to Jesus Tundidor in 2019, according to the Herald. Tundidor later vacated that seat to run for mayor, and the council appointed Gonzalez to fill the vacancy. He is now running in the November special election to keep the seat and serve out a term that ends in 2027.
His opponent is 21-year-old Mariana Chavez, who campaigns on a new generation of leadership and more transparent, open government. Chavez told the Herald she has seen Kaemmer campaigning since early voting began October 19 and did not know Kaemmer worked for the city or the mayor's office. She called the campaigning unethical and said Kaemmer should not be doing it while working for the mayor in a nonpartisan race.
Chavez also questioned why Calvo supports Gonzalez, saying the mayor was trying to push Gonzalez on voters and that many voters do not want him in office, noting they removed him in 2019. Those are her claims, offered in the middle of a contested election.
Not Just a Hialeah Question
Similar questions are playing out elsewhere in Florida. Tallahassee Reports says a complaint filed with the Tallahassee Independent Ethics Board accuses an aide to City Commissioner Jeremy Matlow of using taxpayer-funded work hours for political activity. The filing represents allegations, not findings of wrongdoing, and it is unrelated to the Hialeah matter.
For Hialeah voters, the next piece of the puzzle is the paperwork. Until the city releases Kaemmer's leave dates and hours, the question in the Herald's headline, whether taxpayers are footing the bill, stays open.
