Miami-Dade sheriff to mayor after post-plane crash live TV tiff: ‘That must not occur again’

MIAMI — A tense moment playing out in front of live news cameras at the first news conference following Sunday’s deadly cargo plane crash at Miami International Airport prompted an exchange of strongly-worded letters between two of Miami-Dade County’s most powerful officials.

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The flap was over protocol and who should speak first: Sheriff Rosie-Cordero-Stutz or Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava.

Levine Cava’s chief of staff was heard saying that the mayor, in charge of both MIA and Miami-Dade Fire Rescue as the county’s chief executive, should speak first.

Cordero-Stutz wasn’t having it.

“I know what you believe,” she said. “This is public safety and I’m going first.”

(View the exchange in the video player above; both letters can be read at the bottom of the page)

Sheriff: Staffer’s request ‘not appropriate’

In a letter, dated Wednesday and made public on Thursday, Cordero-Stutz called the request “not appropriate” and something “that must not occur again,” saying that a “misunderstanding over our respective roles” should be resolved “now, calmly and in writing, rather than at the next incident.”

Cordero-Stutz told Levine Cava that she “had already delayed the Sheriff’s Office briefing so that you could arrive, be brought inside the perimeter my deputies had secured, and address the press,” which she said she did “deliberately and as a courtesy, because your presence was appropriate and I wanted the public to see the County’s leadership standing together.”

“What is not appropriate,” she said, “is a member of the Mayor’s staff attempting to direct the Sheriff at the scene of an incident the Sheriff commands, in front of the assembled media and the deputies under my command.

“I do not believe that reflected your instruction, and I am not writing to assign blame to a staff member. I am writing so that we agree, going forward, on where authority rests at an incident scene, so that no one on either of our staffs has to guess.”

Cordero-Stutz said that her office was responsible for the perimeter and investigation.

“Five people were dead inside a perimeter my deputies were holding, and the investigation was already underway,” she said. “The person who briefs the public first at such a scene is the officer responsible for it. That is not a question of protocol or seniority. It is a question of accuracy and accountability: the public is entitled to hear from the official who is answerable for what is being done.”

Cordero-Stutz went on to state that she believes the mayor, as “head of the County for emergency management purposes” per its charter, would only lead at such a scene if she declared a local state of emergency. It’s something Levine Cava would take issue with in a response.

The sheriff, in her letter, hinted at a rift between the two, saying the dustup pointed to a “larger issue” over the relatively-recent return of the county having an elected sheriff.

Before Cordero-Stutz took over in 2025 as the county’s first elected sheriff in decades, Levine Cava ultimately oversaw the preceding Miami-Dade Police Department.

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Political labels weren’t used, but Levine Cava, a Democrat, openly supported the Republican Cordero-Stutz’s challenger in the 2024 election.

She said that “operational direction – of deputies, of scenes, of investigations, and of what the Sheriff says to the public about them – is not something the County retained, and it is not something a member of the Mayor’s staff can exercise by insisting on it at a podium.”

She continued by saying that “an assumption that the old structure survives will keep producing moments like Sunday’s until it is corrected, and the next one may come at a scene where the confusion has consequences.”

Cordero-Stutz proposed a protocol plan that stipulates that the sheriff leads communications at a “law enforcement incident,” the mayor leads county communications during a “declared state of local emergency” and that neither official’s staff directs the others.

Mayor responds: ‘Precisely the kind of emergency’ charter gives me ‘clear responsibility for’

Levine Cava hit back in a briefer response letter, also dated Wednesday.

“I want to be clear: This incident went well beyond a fire rescue and law enforcement response,” Levine Cava said, emphasizing the county’s ownership of MIA, which ended up being shut down for “an extended period on a holiday weekend, impacting tens of thousands of passengers.”

Levine Cava said the incident was “precisely the kind of emergency management event the Charter gives the Mayor clear responsibility for.”

“The Mayor, as the head of the County for emergency management purposes, has the authority to mobilize County resources and lead the County’s response to an event of this scale, pursuant to state and local law,” she wrote. “Not every emergency of this magnitude results in a formal declaration. But that does not diminish the County’s authority to act in those circumstances, nor the Sheriff’s.”

Levine Cava said both the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office and county agencies under her purview played complementary roles in the response.

She noted, “I did not instruct anyone on my staff to direct your deputies, and I do not believe any staff member intended to.”

“A member of my team sought to clarify the respective roles of each responding public safety agency during a multi-agency, multi-casualty incident on County property,” Levine Cava said. “Before the news conference, I joined senior County staff, County Commissioners and federal officials for an incident briefing and to coordinate the information that could appropriately be shared with the public.”

Both officials concluded their letters by agreeing that incidents of a similar magnitude require unified response.

But it appears they still differ on what a unified response ― at least as far as communications are concerned ― looks like.

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Read the letters: